No-kill wording question

I have the greatest admiration for shelters and humane societies who are able to provide so-called 'no-kill' facilities. Since I work with our city animal shelter, staffed by major animal lovers, the wording 'no-kill' bothers me deeply.

It's a lovely luxury to be able to keep animals until a suitable home can be found for them, but I think it's an unnecessary slap in the face of our municipal shelters who do not have that luxury or that choice. They cannot say what or how many animals come through their facility. They do not have a choice when they run out of room. Funding, space, and staffing is limited. Euthansia is never their first choice and I know it hurts them deeply to have to perform that sad task.

Could we not come up with a better term for organizations that are able to keep animals indefinitely rather than calling them 'no-kill'? I really hope so. We're all on the same side, after all.

Actually, I read an interesting thing about no-kill shelters somewhere saying that some of them will take their animals to the "other" shelters...so they don't kill them, but the other shelter ends up doing so. I don't know how many or how common this is, I just found it interesting and unsurprising.

I personally would choose to go to a shelter that does euthanise when they reach capacity. I mean, you're not really saving a life if the animal is allowed to be in the no-kill forever.

Edit: Let's call them "Picky shelters", because they can pick and choose the animals they take in so they don't have to euthanise them.

I see where you both are coming from, but I have to put in a word in defense for no-kill shelters. I've worked at 2 and volunteered with another for many years now. I frequently visit shelters in other cities and attend conferences, etc. I don't think it is common for a no-kill shelter to ship their animals to a city shelter to have them put down. I heard it does happen, but I really don't believe it is common practice. As with anything, there are good shelters and there are bad shelters.

No-kill shelters *have* to be "picky" in order to get the dogs adopted. If a no-kill facility were to take whatever showed up at the doors, you would eventually have a shelter filled with unadoptable animals who will just sit there for the rest of their lives.

With that said, the main no-kill shelter that I've been involved with for the past 4 years does wonderful work. If we are unable to take a dog (or cat) in for whatever reason, we use our rescue contacts and do whatever we can to ensure the animal will not have to go be put down at the city shelter. However, if there is a medical or behavioral problem that is just not fixable, we do euthanize in those cases because we believe that is the most humane thing to do. So although we are technically no-kill, we do put down maybe 10 animals per year. If we put down for a behavioral problem, we have them professionally evaluated prior to making any decisions.

I guess I'm sensitive when I feel people might not like no-kill shelters and think they're irresponsible.

I too have struggled with this issue.

Is a no-kill shelter really any better if all they do is turn away animals when they reach capacity...animals that will just end up at a shelter that does euthanize? It seems then that the two are inextricably linked.

I think there must be some better way to term this distinction but I can't really think of anything now.

I'm glad you posted Aly. It's helpful to see an opinion from someone with experience in both kinds of shelter situations. I'm glad to know that there are exceptional "no-kill" shelters, unlike my description --- my assumption of how most worked.

I've only volunteered at a "kill" shelter. Honestly, they really had no choice due to feral cat populations, dog fighting and money problems. All I can say is....heartbreaking. :(

I didn't say I thought them irresponisble....just that there really is no good solution at this point...:(

I appreciate everyone's input on this subject! I also appreciate no-kill shelters. They have terrible funding and space problems, too, and are doing wonderful work.

I was just hoping we could come up with another way to express 'no-kill' and maybe make it popular enough to replace that expression.

How about 'life-placement' or something like that? :)

The No-Kill Controversy:
http://www.vetcentric.com/magazine/m...ARTICLEID=1130

My problem is the way people refer to the other shelters as "kill-shelters". Why don't they just call it a shelter, it's not like the animals are put down for the fun of it... it makes it sound like it's such a cruel shelter when in reality they are doing the best they can to give every animal a chance to find a home.

Thanks for the article in vetcentric.com. It was very interesting and certainly addresses the sensitivity problem I was aiming at. Maybe we could all, in our own areas, work to minimize the use of the term 'no-kill' in favor of a more positive and unifying term. We are, after all, working toward the same goal.

A 'no kill' shelter is really a rescue isn't it? They could call them 'all breed rescues' or some such thing.