A COVID Christmas May Drive Demand for Companion Animals Skyward

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Most of us are still wrapping our head around an upcoming holiday season where shared gifts may not be unwrapped in person.

But the scarceness of carolers and Santa laps to sit on may not dampen many families’ desires for holiday cheer in the form of a pet.

There are no comprehensive pet adoption and sales statistics yet available for the 2020 holiday season, but COVID has brought a year-to-date boon in these metrics. Shelters, non-profit rescues, private breeders and pet stores (where legal) have experienced soaring demands, especially for dogs and puppies, compared to 2019.

Applications for individual shelter dogs this year have in some cases doubled. At the SPCA Los Angeles last June, 10 to 13 dogs were adopted each day, president Madeline Bernstein told the Washington Post.

Demand persisted as the second wave of COVID struck during which Bernstein saw a change in demographics. During the first wave, frenzied pet parents cleared out shelters in anticipation of  the statewide shutdown, she said. The second wave consisted of vacationers who deferred plane travel for the prospect of staycations or driving vacations with a new furry family member.

Katie Hansen, director of communications at Animal Care Centers of NYC, reported that about 25 percent of people who agreed to foster dogs temporarily at the start of the pandemic had permanently adopted them by late June. Ordinarily, that figure hovers at around 10 percent. Hansen also noted lower than usual return rates which she attributed both to social media posts of prospective adoptees and an electronic and streamlined pre-adoption process able to identify more genuinely interested and suitable adoptive pet parents.

Ironically, the flood of applications — and resulting long waiting lists — for adoptive dogs at some shelters have prompted some prospective adopters to seek commercial options. Turned away by non-profits from the San Francisco Bay area to Oregon’s west coast, one California couple ended up buying a toy poodle puppy for their 11-year-old daughter off Craigslist — to the tune of $1,375.

Hank Grosenbacher, a breeder of Pembroke Welsh corgis who owns the Heartland Sales auction in Cabool, Mo. — where commercially licensed breeders often buy and sell dogs as breeding stock — said that as of late June, some breeders were investing more heavily than usual in puppies they could raise into breeding-age dogs. Other breeders were reporting pet stores buying full litters of puppies that hadn’t been born yet, putting the money down in advance just to try to keep inventory in the pipeline going forward.

The waiting list at Oregon Mist Goldens, a breeding program in Salem, extends well into 2021. High demand has driven prices skyward. A golden pup, ordinarily selling for $3,000, now goes for $3,500. 

Given this year’s trend, we may see a third spike in pet adoptions and purchases as we ride a winter wave of COVID and flu.

Some people reason that there is no better way to counteract loneliness and despair during this time of social isolation — feelings that can be easily magnified by the holidays. But this motivation alone to bring a pet home, whether adopted or shopped, is misguided, selfish and potentially disastrous.

It’s like marrying someone to fill the holes in our soul without regard to the holes we may be ripping in their’s.