There are more options than just adoption: Here is a compiled list of tried and true ways to help animal shelters that don’t require you to take a furry friend home.
- Transporting Animals
- Donate To A Shelters Wishlist
- Volunteer At An Animal Shelter
- Create Content For Social Media
- Raise Money By Using ResQWalk
- Help Your Neighborhood Cats By Supporting The Trap-Neuter-Return Program
- Set Up A Birthday Fundraiser
- Donate Your Vehicle
- Check Facebook Marketplace For Donations
- Save A Trip To The Shelter
Animal shelters need your help.
There are millions of animals in need of a home and many more that are overlooked. The Humane Society of the United States estimates there are 3,500 animal shelters in the United States with only 2,000 being no-kill shelters. Over 6.5 million pets enter animal shelters each year with only 3.2 million pets being adopted. Shelters are overwhelmed with the increasing number of animals that enter their shelters each year. They need our help, but they can’t do it alone.
We all have a soft spot for animals and the idea of rescuing them from shelters. But it’s not always easy to do, especially if you have other responsibilities. Don’t be discouraged, there are many other ways you can help make a difference. Shelter animals deserve a chance at love and permanent home and there are plenty of ways to ensure they get that. Here are 10 great ways to help animal shelters locally or across the country.
Transporting Animals
Volunteerism is the best thing you can do to help animals. Take the time out of your busy schedule to help these animals by transporting them from one shelter to the other!
There are many programs within shelters that arrange transportation, but Doobert is another great alternative. Doobert.com is a flexible program that allows animals to be transported cross country without requiring the volunteer to drive the whole way. Volunteers choose a “leg” to drive so that the pet is passed on to the next driver all the way until they get to the final destination. There are also options for the volunteer to choose a route that allows them to be the sole driver to the destination. You only volunteer for routes you can do so there is flexibility with volunteering.
Make sure to check out the local animal shelters and see if they need your help transporting animals. It is a perfect way to help animal shelters by volunteering your time to provide a life-saving ride.
Take a look at a day in the life as a transporter:
Donate To A Shelters Wishlist
Shelters are at full capacity with animals every day. There are so many items that are needed in high volume to clean, house, and enrich the lives of these pets while they wait for their forever homes. A great way to help animal shelters is by donating supplies from a shelter’s Amazon Wishlist. You get easy access to each product, and you don’t even have to worry about taking time from your day to deliver it, the items ship straight to them. Think about how often we naturally Amazon everything. Throwing in a $8 cat hammock, $20 box of wet cat food, or $5 pet nurser bottles is something to consider throwing in your cart from time to time.
Volunteer At an Animal Shelter
Volunteers are animals’ main source to human connection while they wait for their forever families. If you’re looking for ways to volunteer at an animal shelter, this is a great list of how you can offer your services.
-Take the dogs on a morning or evening walk
-Assist with writing pet bios
-Photograph the animals
-Decorate the dog kennels
-Assist in adoption follow-ups or other department duties
-Socialize with the animals to reduce stress
-Assist the community with questions and help people who want to adopt
-Clean up the kennels
-Offer your skills in marketing, graphics, web design, etc. to help them create more awareness
-Assist with adoption events
Take a look at a day in the life as a volunteer:
Create content for social media
Elaborating more on skills you can utilize, creating content for an animal shelter’s social media can make a world of a difference in how quickly a dog can be adopted. In this digital age, there is endless opportunity to spread awareness. Creating videos creates empathy and tugs on our heartstrings and that is what will drive someone watching to go to the shelter and adopt. TikTok has been a great platform to spread awareness quickly of animals in need. TikToker, BeccaXJensen uses her platform to highlight dogs on the red list that are scheduled to be euthanized. With the power of users simply sharing, commenting, and liking, her videos pick up traction and she has saved hundreds of dogs. Shelters have also been utilizing TikTok to highlight their animals and give users an idea of what the loving animal is like. A misconception about adopting from shelters is that the animals will be too damaged to function in the family normally. A simple video showing the dog’s socialization, favorite toy, and friendliness make a huge difference in the way the animal is perceived than if they just seen a photo. If you love social media and are a creative/ strategic individual then volunteer your skills as a way to help animal shelters, you never know how many animals you can help be adopted.
Content examples on how to spread awareness about adoptable animals
Raise money by using ResQWalk
ResQWalk is a free mobile app that raises money for animal shelters just by walking! Every month a business sponsors the app ResQWalk by donating $2,500. Your job is to take a walk and track it with the app so it can record the distance. When you accumulate enough money from your walks you can choose a shelter to donate your walk to and every week the shelter gets its portion of the donation. Every dog owner takes their dog out multiple times a day. Imagine if they were all recorded walks? This app makes it unbelievably easy to donate so make sure to hit the pavement and walk!
Help Your Neighborhood Cats by supporting the Trap-Neuter-Return Program (TNR)
The most Purrfect way to help outdoor cats is by participating in the TNR program if you have local cats near you that you frequently spot. The way TNR works is you humanely trap the cat you’re trying to help. This sounds difficult but local cats typically return to the same places for shelter so it may just take time to earn trust before you can trap them. Your local shelter will provide you with methods on how to trap a cat as well. Next, you take the cat to your local shelter where they will Neuter and vaccinate it. Once the cat is recovered, you will return the cat back to its neighborhood. TNR is a great way to help shelters prevent the spread of infectious diseases as well as keep the number of cats in animal shelters lower.
Set Up a Birthday Fundraiser
Celebrate your day by creating a personal fundraiser where your friends and family can donate to an animal shelter on behalf of you for your birthday. There are many organizations you can do this through that make it simple to set up including social media platforms like Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter. If you host a party, you can require guests to only bring dog toys or items necessary for the shelter. Take one year to dedicate your birthday to making an impact.
Donate Your Vehicle
Yes, your vehicle! Through animalcardonation.org you can donate your vehicle and the sales from the vehicle go towards the shelter’s funding. This donation is 100% tax deductible, and you get to dispose of an unwanted car. The car does not have to be working but it does need to be sold for $500 or more to get a tax deduction. The shelter typically arranges the tow and makes it a painless way to donate to an animal shelter.
Check Facebook Marketplace for Donations
Facebook Marketplace is a great way to sell items locally and to also donate. Many posts are from local people offering free furniture and items that are unwanted. Make sure to check the posts from time to time because there may be items that are being donated that can be given to animal shelters such as dog toys, beds, blankets, bowls, collars, harnesses, etc.
Save A Trip to The Shelter
People who find lost animals typically go straight to their local animal shelter. Instead of doing this, keep the animal for a little bit to see if you can find its owner by yourself. You can do this by going to your local animal shelter and scanning for a microchip linked to an owner. You can also walk around your neighborhood or site where you found the pet and see if it stimulates the dog’s behavior to point you in a direction or if you feel comfortable, ask the neighbors if they know who the animal’s owners are. You can also post the pet on social media to spread awareness. These methods may not work for every lost pet situation, but they can help alleviate a dog’s stress if you can take the time to find its owner.
Assisting animals has always been a passion of mine and I hope at least one way to help an animal shelter inspires you to help the animal community too. If you love animals, want to help prevent cruelty and abuse, and get the satisfaction of helping others, please consider volunteering your time and services to help animals find their forever homes.
Comment one of your favorite examples of ways to help animal shelters !
