Thread: example of a shelter whose methods should be questioned

I just ran across this: http://www.sterlingshelter.org/shelter/aboutus.html

Read this part in particular:

Our shelter cannot and will not place ANY animal that shows aggressive behavior for ANY REASON. We would never knowingly adopt out an aggressive animal for concern and safety of family members or family pets. Aggression in any animal is NOT acceptable here in our shelter. If we deem a pet UN-adoptable for any reason, the owner has the option to be contacted and notified that his/her pet is a liability and NOT placeable. In such case, the previous owner must pick up their animal within 24 hours of notification. Otherwise, the animal must be humanely euthanized. Potential adopters coming to our shelter are NOT here for, nor do they expect, want or desire an aggressive animal...and neither do we.

I wonder what their "temperament testing" routine is like... Winograd makes some great points in this publication:

Limitations of Temperament Testing
So, what is a temperament test? Are temperament
tests necessary? Do they have predictive
value? Should we do them? And if an animal
“fails,” should that necessarily mean a death
sentence? Let’s look at each question in turn.
Temperament testing is a series of exercises
designed to evaluate whether an animal is aggressive.
Because dog behavior is highly specifi
c to context, it is unfortunately not enough
to say that a dog is friendly and of reasonably
good temperament if she comes into a shelter
with her tail wagging. The fl ip side is also true.
Because the shelter is a highly stressful, unnatural,
and frightening environment for a dog
who has just been abandoned by a family, the
fact that a dog is scared and growls at staff on
intake is not enough to make a determination
that the dog is unfriendly and vicious. So it is
not only fair, but a good idea, for shelters to
evaluate dogs to make sure they can safely be
placed into loving new homes.

But temperament testing has many limitations.
It requires skill and training; the results greatly
depend on the environment in which the test is
conducted; and, because its predictive validity
has not been established by any stretch, it can
– and often does – result in dogs being wrongly
executed.
Despite an article in the September/October
2003 issue of Animal Sheltering magazine, the
claims of predictive validity do not stand up to
scrutiny. In other words, we can’t say, with any
sort of scientifi c rigor, that the result of a temperament
test has a defi nite correlation to what
a dog will do once he or she gets comfortable
in a home. If a dog fails his temperament test
because the doll that is supposed to resemble
a child scares the knickers off of him, does that
necessarily mean the dog will react like that
with your kid? If a dog passes the test with fl ying
colors, does that necessarily mean that he
and the mailman are going to be great pals?
We are not sure.
In fact, because of the training and ability of
shelter personnel or, more accurately, the lack
thereof, if you took two testers and had them
test the same dog, you could easily get two
different results. If you took the same tester
and the same dog over different days, you still
might get different results.

If a "humane" society is going to post an excuse for euthanizing on their website, I suggest they also inform the public of their methods for determining what "unadoptable" truly means in their eyes and how they go about determining it, as done by Tompkins County SPCA here:

Preserving Life at Tompkins
County SPCA
Three days after a dog arrives at the Tompkins
County SPCA, the dog goes through an
initial temperament test. (See the case study
• 435-644-2001 • www.bestfriends.org
4
on the next page.) If the dog shows signs of
aggression, a veterinarian who specializes in
behavior medicine is consulted on the case.
This veterinarian comes to the shelter and reevaluates
the dog, rules out a medical origin
for the behavior, and either passes the dog
and recommends a course of rehabilitation,
or recommends that the dog be killed. After
the evaluation is received, the executive director,
the dog trainer, relevant staff, and the
veterinary behaviorist discuss the issue before
a fi nal recommendation and determination is
presented to the director.
What we are looking for is not just aggression,
but aggression where the prognosis for rehabilitation
is poor. Otherwise, the dog is placed
on a behavior modifi cation regimen to rehabilitate
the behavior. In the cases of dogs where
the prognosis is not clear (and it often isn’t),
we place dogs in a skilled foster home to better
assess “real world” responses to “real world”
behavior. In the end, if the dog is vicious with a
poor prognosis, the dog is put to death.
The no-kill philosophy’s break from traditional
methods of sheltering is underscored by fundamental
fairness to the animals. This commitment
to fairness is echoed in the mission statement
of virtually every humane society and
SPCA in the country, most of which claim to
cherish animals, enforce their rights, and teach
compassion. These lofty goals can only be
achieved if we judge, treat, and devise a plan
(whether redemption, adoption, or destruction)
for shelter animals individually with all the resources
we can muster.

temperment testing is indeed something that someone needs training for. If the shelter does not have a specialist doing this testing, if done by an untrained person they may interpuert an aggressive move when they lift their hands too quickly or make sudden moves around a scared and abused animal. animals brought into a sheter, usually the middle of the night or after looped with a wire and dragged into a strange cage is scared, as would any of us would be. It should be required that each dog be tested by a certified aggressive temperment specialist. So many are also dying for being aggressive when they are only scared of a strange place, people, and things around them. I know that some of your better shelters have trained people that come in and test the dogs, but not all. Some are tested my any member of the staff available at the time. Before a dog is put down, a trust test shoul be done on these animals.

Every shelter has temperament testings that weeds out 'unadoptable' dogs. Their guidelines for what is adoptable are VERY narrow. They are so scared of getting sued AND there are soooooo many animals needing homes that public shelters have to do something to keep the population down. I do not think this is right, but it is how it is.
I have 2 "unadoptable" dogs that are wonderful.

ANY shelters that uses temp testings as a tool "to clear space" should be largely questioned! I am not sure if they actually believe they are doing what is best for the animals or have they just been brainwashed into believing "what is the alternate? If we don't do this...the dogs will just sit and rot in a shelter"!

How do they sleep at night?!?

Hello

Well,their guidelines for what is adoptable are VERY narrow. They are so scared of getting sued AND there are soooooo many animals needing homes that public shelters have to do something to keep the population down. I do not think this is right, but it is how it is.