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Adoptable, Schmadoptable…

January 28, 2025, Dr. Emily Weiss

Dr. Emily Weiss suggests a new way to talk about the animals in our care who simply need to go home

I have a wish. I wish to eliminate the word adoptable from animal sheltering vocabulary.

Hear me out…  “Adoptable” is a widespread term in animal welfare, used both internally and when communicating with the public, to most often describe animals who have met the shelter criteria of an adoption candidate. The thing is, at the and of the day, unless the animal is truly unsafe or suffering, without pragmatic remediation, aren’t all of the animals in your care able to be homed?

I recently visited a shelter where they first walked me through their adoption suites and then took me to their intake and holding areas. They spoke of the “adoptable” dogs and cats and then took me to the areas where the animals who did not have an adoptable label were housed. Here were the animals who were only available to rescue or were being held for behavior work. Here dogs and cats had restrictions for handling and enrichment because of safety concerns. 

It is important to note that if an animal cannot receive proper social opportunities and other enrichment options due to handler safety, his welfare is not being supported. He either needs to move quickly to someplace that is able to support his needs, or he needs to be euthanized to end his suffering (yes – being held long-term in low welfare situations causes significant suffering).

However, many of the dogs and cats I have observed in animal welfare organizations who could be potentially labeled as “unadoptable” are often dogs and cats who may just be “un-shelterable” (or shelter-challenged) but quite home-able. The over-aroused, pushy, mouthy 9-month-old big dog… The fearful cat or dog… The easily overstimulated kitty… The dog-reactive dog… These dogs and cats are often faced with long shelter stays, and depending upon the organization, may not be candidates for adoption. However, in most all of these cases, the animal is likely to thrive in a supportive home environment. In other words, they are very home-able.

Take the over-aroused pushy, mouthy 9-month-old. He can quickly become the dog in the shelter who is restricted – only experienced volunteers are allowed to interact with him, and only specific adopters are allowed to adopt him. We take the dog who is desperate for interaction and stimulation and restrict him from just the things that he needs. If we send this same dog off with a foster who is empowered to find an adopter, he is moved into a fully enriched environment and can be marketed appropriately to any adopter looking for a high-energy, mentally engaged pup to share a life with. Home-able.

Several years ago my team at the ASPCA investigated the impact of a program that empowered foster volunteers to find adopters for their foster pets. That peer-reviewed research found that not only were their fewer returns for the population of pets adopted through fosters (7% vs. 17% for in shelter adoptions), but the fosters were finding whole new adopter pools – increasing not only the number of adoptions, but the overall reach of the shelter!  You can learn more about that program, including the tools to implement it, here.   

By embracing “home-able,” we may open up options for the dogs and cats who tend to deteriorate in the shelter, dogs and cats who may not get a chance to go home, and dogs and cats we try to fix before they go home. What animals in your care truly need behavior support before they can humanely (and/or safely) live in a home, and who simply needs to go home to live safely and humanely?

Learn More

Here are some other resources to help pump up your home-able dogs & cats
Resources to Empower Fosters as Adoption Ambassadors

Dog Day Out programs
Maddie’s Foster Caregiver Marketing Guide

About Dr. Emily Weiss
As an Applied Animal Behaviorist, Dr. Weiss has worked with species as varied as lions, orangutans, elephants and Komodo dragons, as well dogs, cats and horses. She is a nationally recognized speaker, and has published extensively on topics related to applied animal behavior and human-animal interactions. She served as the ASPCA's VP. of Research & Development, overseeing groundbreaking research related to the animal sheltering field and developing assessment tools for shelter animals. Before that she created training programs to improve husbandry and decrease stress for zoo animals. More recently Dr. Weiss led ASPCA's Equine Welfare efforts, with a focus on increasing the rehoming of horses, the development of effective safety net programming and effective law enforcement response to cruelty and neglect. In all of her work, two central questions have driven her approach: “Why?” and “How do you know?” These questions guide a consistent creative and scientific approach to the work of improving welfare. Emily recently sunsetted her successful career at the ASPCA and will be tackling a few select projects where her knowledge, skills and talent can make a significant impact for animals.
  1. We have a Working Cats program and often take unadoptable “feral” cats from area animal controls. Don’t have the data but roughly 50% of the cats turn very friendly after relocation and end up in the new caretaker’s home, adopted. The cats just need the freedom to choose what they want out of life.

  2. It seems that almost any cat or dog is adoptable–some just have a much broader range of potential homes than others do. The right foster home can widen the range of suitable homes for a particular animal.

    Our family adopted 8 feral cats over the last 40 years, each with a different reason for why it wasn’t suitable to place it back outside after trapping and neutering. Our home and family were well suited for all of them, because they were able to live their lives on their own terms.

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