Because of my interest in animal welfare and dog rescue, I follow several different dog rescue groups, I research what is happening is these areas, and I often check the lists of available animals. The latter is because I can't seem to help myself. I already have three rescue dogs and two rescue cats, and I certainly do not need another cat or dog to feed; but I always look. On one of my recent checks of available adoptable dogs, I found a puppy with a $600 adoption fee at a humane society. The size of the fee shocked me. In the past, humane societies and similar animal shelters had reasonable adoption fees. What is happening?

I frequently take a stroll through my local humane society looking at animals needing a home. This is how I have found the dogs I have adopted in the past. My most recent adoption was a 9 week old puppy that had been abandoned in the downtown area. This was a year and a half ago, and I was surprised to see a higher adoption fee for this puppy than I had paid for any of the adult/senior dogs I had adopted in the past.

There were signs posted around the shelter indicating the move to variable adoption fees, and certain dog kennels had signs indicating the dog's status as a "desirable" breed and posting a higher than usual adoption fee. I wasn't excited about the higher fee for my puppy, though, because she was definitely a mixed-breed dog; but I had already held her and, in the end, would probably have paid even more.

As a society, we are demanding that our shelters become No-Kill facilities. This means that animals will be kept until adopted and not just a few days before euthanasia. Shelters now need to be bigger, they need more staff, and their expenses are much higher with the extended care of the animals. Variable adoption fees serve as a way for the shelter to increase their income.

Because I am a believer in the need for shelters to become No-Kill, I approve of variable rate adoption fees--within reason. I approve of variable fees based on the age of the dog. Puppies are generally quick to be adopted, so their fees are higher. Senior dogs are often slow be adopted. Their fees are lower than the "normal" adoption fees. This seems logical.

I have a problem, though, with the concept of "desirable breed." Unless a pure-bred dog is relinquished in WITH its papers from an appropriate registry, it is impossible to know the exact breed of a dog. We can say a dog looks like a Lab, or a Cocker Spaniel, or a Boston Terrier; but appearances don't mean very much. The recent trend to breed "designer" dogs has shown this fact better than anything else. A backyard breeder can mate a Golden Retriever with a Poodle to produce Goldendoodle puppies, but these designer combinations do not "breed true." This means one puppy might look just like the Poodle parent, another puppy can look like the Golden parent, and another puppy look the way the breeder was hoping. All three puppies get called Goldendoodles, but they vary a great deal in appearance.

The concept of "desirable breed" at an animal shelter is, to me, an oxymoron if papers do not come with the dog. Just because the person who relinquished the dog SAYS it is pure bred, does not make it so. I do not think anyone should pay exorbitantly higher fees for dogs of unknown origin. A somewhat higher fee for a dog that looks "pure bred" is acceptable as long as people understand that they are not being guaranteed that the dog is what it seems. A $600 fee at an animal shelter is TOO MUCH.

A WORD Of CAUTION! If you do not see yourself paying $600 for a puppy from a shelter, then NEVER, NEVER, NEVER hold the puppy! Once you've held that adorable little puppy and she put her little head against your neck your checkbook will cease to matter. At least, that's what happened to me. No, I didn't pay $600, but someone else did, the very next day; and I know how that happened!

In conclusion, variable adoption fees for age variation and the likeness to pure bred dogs are acceptable as a way to increase income for shelters as long as these fees are reasonable and not so large as to decrease an animal's chance of being adopted.