Better matches

By Published by The Editorial Board

Published: July 29, 2008

The Danville Area Humane Society has a new tool to help people who adopt a dog or cat from the shelter know exactly what kind of animal they’re getting.

Using dog and cat behavioral screening tests, the Humane Society hopes to match potential adopters to the kind of canine or feline personalities those people are most comfortable with. Because there are far more dogs, puppies, cats and kittens available for adoption than there are suitable homes for those animals, anything that can be done to help people make a better choice at adoption time will help the animals.

Not only does the behavioral tests determine a dog’s personality, but it can also reveal what motivates them.

“That gives you a better idea how you can train the dog,” said Paulette Dean, executive director of the Danville Area Humane Society. Behavioral testing on cats will soon begin at the shelter.

Dean said some people come to the shelter looking for a pet of a certain size or color. Sometimes, they’re looking for an animal that looks like one they’ve known or owned in the past. That can lead to a subjective decision that won’t help the adopter know what kind of new animal they have brought home.

But animal personality testing can help people make the right kinds of choices. For example, sedate people seeking a quiet lapdog probably wouldn’t be happy with a high-energy animal that wants to play all the time, anymore than active people would be with a dog that wants to live as a couch pup.

For the animals, adoption is literally a matter of life and death. At Danville’s shelter, approximately 5,000 dogs and cats are euthanized each year. Even though roughly half that number either have health problems or obvious behavioral issues that makes them unadoptable, the supply of animals greatly exceeds the number of people willing to make the lifetime commitment to a dog or cat. It’s not just a problem here in the Dan River Region, either.

That’s why anything that can match the right kind of companion animal to a willing adopter is great news. The animal behavioral profiling offered by the Danville Area Humane Society is not only good news for humans, but for the animals that need their love.