Shelter and Rescue Work | Best Friends Animal Society - Save Them All

Shelter and Rescue Work

Humane Animal Control Manual

Humane Animal Control manual, assembled by Best Friends Animal Society, describes lifesaving municipal shelter programs for dogs and cats.

Animal control officer holding a cat in front of some kennels at a municipal shelter

How to Help an Adoptable Pet From Your Home

Are you interested in helping an adoptable pet from the comfort of your home? Here are some tips for sharing the pet and writing a compelling animal bio.

Enrichment for Shelter Cats

Shelter cat enrichment resource outlines reasons for, benefits of, and various forms of enhancing felines' lives and provides sample enrichment plans.

White and gray cat in a kennel playing with an interactive toy, with a pink enclosed bed

Animal Coalition: How to Build a Successful One

Gregory Castle, Best Friends CEO, walks you through a dozen ways to help build a successful animal coalition of pet welfare groups and organizations.

Gregory Castle, former CEO of Best Friends, and cat. Best Friends is continually working to build and support a successful animal coalition.

12 Ways to Help Animal Shelters

Want to help animal shelters save more dogs and cats? Here are 12 effective ways to help homeless pets.

woman holding her dog she rescued from an animal shelter

Dog Foster Care Manual

This dog foster care resource is for people new to fostering. Animal shelters and rescue groups can tailor it for their own purposes.

Girl with her family's foster care dog, a white Labrador Retriever mix

Best Friends Volunteer Handbook

Non profit volunteer handbook for Best Friends, including info about policies, that may be used as a sample or template for other organizations.

Man playing with a cat using a wand toy

Best Friends Pet Adoption Survey Results

Americans love pets, but how do they feel about shelter animals and adopting? View the Best Friends' pet adoption survey results.

Smiling adopted small terrier mix dog on an orange chair

Animal Shelter Dogs: Promoting Them for Adoption

This action kit gives instructions of how to promote shelter dogs for adoption. Get tips on promoting individual dogs and holding adoption events.

There are many ways to promote animal shelter dogs like this pooch, aptly named Charmer.

Animal Welfare Coalition-Building Action Kit

Animal welfare coalitions are teams that have a mission focused on helping homeless animals. This comprehensive how-to guide provides instructions.

Medium-sized black dog and woman

Animal Shelter Fundraising Ideas

This guide covers animal shelter fundraising fundamentals: developing a fundraising plan, strategies to raise money, grant writing and more.

Use animal shelter fundraising strategies to help sweet pitbull puppies like these balls of love.

Enrichment for Dogs in Shelters

This action kit provides ways to provide enrichment for shelter dogs, improving their day-to-day lives in the shelter and increasing their adoptability.

This pitbull dog is enjoying agility training, an enrichment activity offered in some specialized programs at animal shelters.

Essay on Animals: How to Write a Persuasive Paper

If you’ve decided to write an essay on animals, either for a school assignment or for another purpose, here are the steps to follow.

This girl (with help from her two black cats) is writing an essay on animals for school.

Training Shelter Dogs

Training shelter dogs helps get them ready to be adopted. Since many haven’t lived in a home, we work to prepare them for a home environment.

Woman using positive reinforcement to train a shelter dog

Humane Pet Sales Laws by State

Here's a comprehensive and continually updated list of cities and states with humane pet sales laws.

A smiling beagle whose tongue is out

Shelter Dog Won't Go Back in Run

Shelter dog won't go back in run? After being out, the dog puts on his brakes. You try to pull him, and he starts to growl. What to do?

This shepherd mix is more interested in playing with his ball than going back in his crate.