Faced with overwhelming demand and no more space, Pound Rescue has temporarily stopped taking in animals.
The Okotoks-based rescue announced the decision in a July 27 Facebook post, citing overcapacity and a shortage of foster homes.
"Unfortunately, we are now at over capacity. We will not be doing any intakes for at least a month," reads the post.
According to the organization’s president, Rosa Kurtz, a constant stream of animals in need of care and shelter has far surpassed the space available.
Because the organization relies primarily on foster homes to house and care for animals until adoption, its ability to take in more animals depends entirely on the number of foster homes willing to accept them.
"It becomes a bit of a challenge if you don't have a holding facility to assess them," Kurtz explained. "When you're handling 15, then that's fine. But when you're handling 40 or so, then it's a lot more work. With puppies, get three sets of vaccines if you have them that long. You have to keep a record of when the vaccines are all due to be given again, make sure that they have been dewormed and then that they get dewormed again, especially before being adopted, so that we're sure that there's nothing there to hinder the new adoption."
In some cases, the situations are so urgent and heartbreaking that Pound Rescue has no choice but to act immediately, even when space is scarce.
"The last batch we just got, the reason we got them is because one of the puppies was found decapitated... these are just like six-week-old puppies. There were three litters, so we had an emergency intake of 26 puppies and a couple of mums."
Kurtz is hopeful that upcoming adoption events will help relieve the pressure, but fostering remains the most immediate form of help.
"If you're looking for a dog, fostering is a nice way of kind of looking at different dogs and then deciding which one's the one that's best for you or your family or situation," said Kurtz. She also emphasized that giving fostering a try isn't a financial burden. "You're supplied with food and vet care and all those things to ensure that you're safe during that process of picking a dog.
For those who want to help but aren’t able to foster, Kurtz says there are a few supplies Pound Rescue urgently needs.
"Donating dog beds is very helpful. Cat food, we're actually having to buy cat food now. We have canned, but dry cat food is running very low here, so things like that are really helpful for us," said Kurtz. "When we have to start buying food, that's when it starts to deplete our funds quite rapidly because we have so many cats in our system."
More information on adoption, fostering, and donations can be found on the Pound Rescue website.