Denver Dog Owners Are Sending Their Pets to the Pound in Record Numbers

Is Denver going to the dogs? This city has more pet pooches than it does kids, and that raises a number of issues, as we're exploring in this series. Here's the next installment:

In the first 138 days of this year, 634 dogs were taken to the Denver Animal Shelter by their owners...and left there.

That's nearly five dogs surrendered to the one shelter every day of 2025 — and the situation is only getting worse. Dog surrenders at the City of Denver's shelter are up 237 percent compared to the same period in 2019, according to city data. That year, there were 544 surrenders total; a number 2025 surpassed weeks ago, around four months into the year.

Just five years ago, dog surrenders at the shelter were on a steady decline, reducing annually from 2018 to 2019 to 2020, before seeing a spike in 2021. Since then, they've jumped by between 26 percent and 42 percent every year. They're on track to do the same in 2025.

"It's a growing trend at our shelter," says Melanie Sobel, the director of Denver Animal Protection, who oversees the Denver Animal Shelter. "We're seeing a significant increase, even from last year to this year."

Sobel attributes the rise in owner surrenders to several contributing factors, some of which date back to the start of the COVID-19 pandemic.

Nearly one in five American households adopted a pet during the pandemic, according to the American Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals. The wave in demand resulted in breeders producing more dogs, many of which were not spayed or neutered. At the same time, pandemic restrictions limited service at veterinary clinics, further reducing access to spay and neuter care for these new pets, Sobel explains.

Puppies soon flooded shelters: some accidental litters from the new, intact dogs adopted by Coloradans, and others left over from breeders who couldn't unload them after the COVID-boom died down. In many instances, though, the original pandemic pup is the one left at the pound.

"A lot of people were working from home during the pandemic when they got animals," Sobel says. "When they had to go back to work [in person], dogs started having behavioral problems because they weren't properly socialized, they weren't properly trained. We had surrenders because people didn't want the animal anymore, we had an influx of adolescent young adult dogs."

The surrenders haven't slowed with the pandemic's end. Colorado and the nation at large have suffered from a shortage of veterinarians in recent years, continuing the lack of access to spay and neuter care. Beyond that, the shortage means all vet care is harder to access and more expensive, financially straining pet owners.

In addition to surrenders, the Denver Animal Shelter has seen a staggering increase in owners bringing dogs to be put down. So far this year, 119 dogs were surrendered to the shelter for euthanasia, compared to 38 at this time in 2019.

"Generally, it is because the animal is old and sick, and they can't afford vet care," Sobel says. "The animals need to be in pain, suffering or have a severe, severe behavioral issue where the public is at risk."

Rising costs of vet care exacerbate an increasingly challenging economic climate. Some surrendering owners can't afford housing that allows them to have a pet, Sobel says. For renters, pet deposits and monthly fees add up quickly; if they are priced out of their apartment, the next building may not accept their furry friend, particularly large dogs (this year's most commonly surrendered dogs are chihuahuas, labradors and huskies).

The trend is not exclusive to dogs, however. Including all animals such as cats, birds and livestock, year-to-date owner surrenders at the Denver Animal Shelter are up 241 percent from 2019 and 24 percent from 2024. Surrenders for euthanasia are up 210 percent from 2019 and 4 percent from 2024.

The issue also isn't unique to Denver; shelters throughout the state and country are facing similar problems. But the Denver Animal Shelter takes the brunt here because of its less-common operating practices, Sobel says.

The Denver Animal Shelter is open admission, meaning they take every animal that comes to their door, while other shelters may turn away, waitlist or charge fees for owners surrendering animals. The shelter also has night drop-off kennels, offering a way to surrender animals after hours. Earlier this week, they took in twenty animals from the kennels in one night, Sobel says.

Despite the increase in surrenders, the shelter is turning out more animals than it is taking in, whether via adoption, returning lost pets or transferring animals to other facilities, such as to receive specialized medical treatment.

"We've been able to manage the increase effectively," Sobel says. "Our intake is up, our strays are up, everything is up. But we've had adoption specials every single month since I started [in August 2022]. That's helped because our adoptions are way up. We have a really good return to owner rate, as well."

The shelter is also taking steps to address the issue at its root. It provides spay and neuter care at low cost and sometimes for free. Its recent Pay to Spay program used a private $25,000 donation to spay/neuter pit bulls for free and to give owners $100 grocery gift cards to incentivize participation.

Denver Animal Protection has a temporary housing program providing free pet care for owners experiencing crises like hospitalization, domestic violence or a house fire. The agency regularly offers free spay/neuter, microchips and vaccines for underserved, marginalized communities, including homeless pet owners.

For individuals who want to help slow surrenders, Sobel offers this advice: look into support services for struggling pet owners; adopt instead of buying from breeders or pet stores; make sure pets are tagged, microchipped and registered; and prevent behavioral issues by properly training dogs using "science-based positive reinforcement" instead of fear, intimidation and force.

Above all, she says the "key" to addressing the issue is what Bob Barker told us for decades: "Help control the pet population. Have your pet spayed or neutered."

Read the first story in the series, "Has Denver Gone to the Dogs?"