Did You Know That Today Is National Dog Day?
If you love your dogs like we do here at Cohen Law Group (not even joking, there’s usually at least one dog in our office every day), you might feel like every day is National Dog Day. But today, August 26th is that day, but what does that mean?
Colleen Paige, one of America’s foremost pet and family lifestyle expert started National Dog Day eleven years ago, and it continues today with a simple premise: awareness.
National Dog day was started to bring public awareness and appreciation to the love and affection brought to us by our family dogs or our hardworking service dogs, but also to bring awareness to the sheer number of dogs that need to be adopted from a shelter or rescued from the streets. The Humane Society of the United States estimates that 6-8 million dogs and cats are housed in shelters each year, and that at least half of that number (3-4 million) are put to sleep yearly. Just in our area alone, the Pet alliance of Greater Orlando anticipates that more than 10,000 homeless dogs and cats will be sheltered by their staff this year.
The goal of National Dog Day, then, is to convince people to get out there and adopt from their local shelters. Ms. Paige, however warns about adopting a dog just for the sake of adopting a dog. Many dogs are in shelters because they were unwanted, she says. Maybe they were bought as a Christmas present for a child that ultimately couldn’t handle the responsibility of taking care of them, or people didn’t know how to handle the responsibilities that come with a certain breed, like shedding or health issues.
We should take this opportunity to seriously consider whether we can take on the responsibility, because it’s hard to argue that the love and affection we will get from our pets isn’t worth that little bit of effort. If you cannot take on that responsibility, Ms. Paige recommends that people take this occasion to send a $5 donation towards their local shelter or Humane Society in recognition of the work that they do.
Please visit your Local Humane Society and make a difference today.
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