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Emily Courtin
Professor Collins
ENGL 1302
4 May 2016
The Stray Population in Houston is Far Too Dense
There are too many stray animals in Houston and the city has an abundance of animal
shelters, yet they are unable to accommodate for the vast number of strays created, or abandoned
each and every year. The Writer of the article, What One Group Does to Solve Houstons
Homeless Pet Problem, states, Houston has an overabundance of stray animals - Many of
whom are euthanized if no homes can be found for them (Florian Martin). A significant
number of these animals being euthanized are healthy adoptable pets. Martin exclaims, The city
estimates that there are between 800,000 and 1.2 million stray animals in Houston. BARC, the
citys animal shelter, takes in about 25,000 a year (What One). Unfortunately, the BARC
animal shelter killed or lost over 10,000 animals in 2014 alone (Bringing No). The ratio of
homeless animals and homes without pets can be greatly remedied by bringing awareness of the
actual number of strays in the city and persuading people to adopt from shelters instead of
buying from breeders or pet stores to reduce the overpopulation and to reduce the euthanasia
rates of healthy animals. Most shelters today require a spay or neuter procedure before the pet is
adopted to help ensure that the pets being adopted do not have the ability to breed and then
potentially create a new generation of strays. According to the website, Nokillhouston.org,
there are five shelters in Houston that euthanize about eighty thousand pets per year, that is over
eight hundred pets every month. These souring numbers reside solely in Harris County alone.
The Houston community should come together for the sake of the animals to change laws and

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move towards an entirely no kill city that requires every shelter or adoption agency to spay and
neuter all of the animals before the adoption process is complete because the numbers of strays
in Houston are overwhelming and something must to be done immediately to save the lives of
these innocent animals.
The first step that should be taken to save the animals is to make Houston a no kill city.
The best way to go about that would be to have people write letters to the city about the five
animal shelters in the Houston area that are using the euthanization method to control their
animal overpopulation. The letters will persuade the city to take the necessary steps to prevent
shelters from killing animals to make room for new animals. If the citizens of Houston do not
fight for these stray animals then their predicaments will go unnoticed; they cannot speak for
themselves. Afterwards, awareness should be brought to the general public through social media,
mail, and television to encourage adopters to go to the five kill shelters in Houston to adopt their
pets and this may potentially lower the euthanization rates until the kill shelters Houston has now
are no longer able to use euthanasia for population control. Several shelters in the Houston
require a spay or neuter and a microchip insertion before the adoption process is completed. This
is a wonderful practice because it ensures that the pets that are getting adopted are less likely to
contribute to the stray population and ought to be made a requirement for any animal shelter or
foster home. The laws against abandoning an animal are very light and unenforced. A change is
necessary straightaway because the reason our stray populous is so high is because individuals
abandon their pets that are not fixed and those animals breed and create an even more vast
stray population. According to an article Companion Animal Overpopulation, Approximately
2 to 3 million cats and dogsmany of them healthy, young, and adoptablemust be euthanized
in animal shelters every year (PETA). When a pet is adopted and a microchip is inserted

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under the animals skin. The adopter should be required to activate the chip because in the future
if they decide to drop the animal in the streets somewhere the pet parent can be found; If the
abandoning was intentional there should be a heavy fine or jail time served because the penalties
present now are not intimidating enough to convince someone that they should not abandon their
animal. Making the penalties more severe will greatly help prevent animal owners from dumping
animals and contributing to the already dense homeless animal population. Ian Elwood of
Animal Legal Defense Fund states, Abandoning a domesticated animals is not only a cruel
thing to do, in many states its a crime (Abandonment is). In Texas, abandoning an animal is a
crime and should not be taken lightly. According to the SPCA of Texas, if a judge rules that a
person or people have been cruel to animals, the judge may take away their animals and/or order
them to pay restitution. (Texas Animal). This is clearly not sufficient enough of a penalty for
cruelty to animals. Animal Cruelty should be considered a reasonably heinous crime, and the
punishments for committing these crimes should be comparable to those of cruelty to human
children. Cruelty to animals consists of torturing, failing to provide food and shelter, cruelly
conveying and caging animals, killing, poisoning, truly harming, causing animals to fight each
other, injuring an animal that belongs to someone else, and seriously overworking an animal
(Texas Animal). There are many steps involved in passing an ordinance or law such as,
choosing the problem, researching and being educated on the problem, making a proposal,
finding people who agree and are willing to contribute, start lobbying, then prepare to vote and
persuade others to vote favoring the cause. To convince people to get out and vote for the cause,
there is a necessity for bringing awareness which can be done most efficiently through social
media. More individuals would vote in favor of the laws necessary to break down the homeless

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animal population if they had knowledge of the problem, but somehow the specific issue relating
to the great numbers of strays in Houston has gone ignored and or unnoticed.
Guaranteeing that all pets from this moment on are spayed and neutered can pose
problems especially with breeders and potential breeders. In Texas there should be a law passed
to penalize anyone who has an animal who is not spayed or neutered because they are
contributing to the homeless pet population by the thousands. People who make money off of
breeding should be penalized for doing so, breeding should be considered a cruelty; it may not be
cruel if it is done in a reasonable manner, but it is cruel none the less by taking the potential
homes away from the immense number of stray pets that already reside in our streets, shelters,
and foster homes. If not one person bought animals from breeders or pet stores there would be
enough homes for the amount of strays. Fortunately there is hope according to the article by The
Texas Humane Society, As a nation, America has become much more aware of animal welfare
issues in the past four decades. As the human population increased, the number of animals
welcomed to American homes has also gone up (Animal Sheltering).
Not every person is an animal lover though, and that is to be expected; but the sad truth
is, there are many people who could not care any less about the stray problem and those people
would proclaim that euthanasia is the solution to Houstons homeless pet population. If Houston
steadily kill eight hundred to one thousand animals a month it should restrain the stray populous
from getting unmanageable. This solution is offensive, and would never work because animal
activists would protest this and it would not be popular to the public. Making a law to penalize
breeding and breeders would not work either for similar reasons as the breeders and people
making a living on breeding out their animals would dispute the law and it would also be
unpopular to the general public. Some animal activists would argue that boycotting pet stores and

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breeders is the best solution to remedy the stray populous but unfortunately that method just has
no potential to change anything. There are too many people who have a pure bred puppy or
name brand puppy in mind and there is no altering their ideas on that. At every single shelter in
Houston there are pure bred animals, even puppies; yes they are harder to come by but if
individuals who are shopping for a pet knew of the pure bred pups in cages in the shelters
maybe that would deter them from buying instead of adopting or rescuing but boycotting is not a
practical or realistic solution.
Changing the laws for animal cruelty, and spaying or neutering all of the animals shuffled
through the adoption system are the best solutions to the Houston stray problem. They are
reasonable and there are no reasons why anyone from the general public would object to these. It
is easy to spay or neuter an animal. There are places all around the Houston area where spay and
neuter procedures are discounted as low as twelve dollars per operation. The Texas Humane
Society has many helpful tools to help an individual find a clinic or shelter to perform the spay or
neuter for their pet. They claim that, many people want to have their pets spayed or neutered,
but when they find out what it costs, they think it wont be possible. But it absolutely is
possible-- there are many shelters, veterinarians, and organizations that are ready and able to
help (You Can). Creating stricter punishments for committing animal cruelty such as
abandonment, is the best way to see results. When adopting an animal the adopter is taking
responsibility for the adopted pets lives, and when the owner of the animals fail to take
responsibility they should be punished and it is difficult to imagine anyone disagreeing with that
statement.

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Works Cited
Animal Sheltering Trends in the U.S. The Humane Society of the United States. Mar, 11. 2009.
Web. Apr, 19. 2016.
Bringing No Kill Sheltering to Houstons Pet Shelters. No Kill Houston. 2015. Web. Apr, 19.
2016
Companion Animal Overpopulation. PETA, People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals. N/A.
Apr. 19. 2016.
Elwood, Ian. Animal Abandonment is a Crime. Animal Legal Defense Fund. Apr. 8. 2014. Web.
Apr, 19. 2016
Martin, Florian. What One Group Does to Solve Houstons Homeless Pet Problem. Houston
Public Media. Aug, 15. 2015. Web. Apr, 19. 2016
Texas Animal Cruelty Laws. SPCA of Texas. N/A. Web. Apr, 24. 2016.
You Can Afford to Have Your Pet Spayed or Neutered. The Humane Society of the United States.
Dec, 14. 2015. Web. Apr, 19. 2016