02/07/2026
This is not okay.
❗️PSA❗️
We’re apologizing in advance for the distressing post, but there reaches a point that we need to stand up for ourselves.
Just because we are a shelter, does not mean you can abandon animals with us. While we are here to serve the community and help in times of need - there is a right and wrong way to do things…and today was wrong.
This post is not about shame, but to bring knowledge and accountability.
We want to make this perfectly clear:
We DO NOT have a full time vet on staff.
We do not have unlimited funding or unlimited kennel space.
We DO have an intake process that ensures the safety of our staff and the animals in our care.
Today a woman walked through our front doors with a dog and stated that she would not be leaving with her. While we started to gather more information, we explained that we schedule our surrenders besides in the case of emergencies to help control our population.
While she started arguing with our staff, if became clear quite quickly that the dog (whose name was Trixie) was experiencing severe respiratory distress. The owner claimed it was anxiety from being in the car.
After a very short time of observing Trixie, we flat out told the owner that her dog appeared to be actively dying, and that we did not have a vet on site that could save her.
We repeated multiple times that she needed to quickly put Trixie back in the car and drive to the closest vet so they could intervene.
The owner refused to do so, while Trixie lost complete control of her bowels and began vomiting and defecating on herself on our lobby floor.
After it became clear that her owner was not going to help get her the care she needed to survive, we did our best to quickly do a legal transfer of ownership so we could end her suffering.
At this point her entire mouth had turned purple, and it appeared she had been without sufficient oxygen for far too long.
(If you ever see your animals tongue/gums turning a shade of blue/purple, please seek IMMEDIATE medical attention!)
This entire interaction from Trixie walking through the door, to passing on at the offsite vet occurred in about 30 minutes total. We acted as quickly as possible, while adhering to Minnesota laws surrounding end of life care.
So while we DID sign up for this work…we didn’t sign up to be put in situations time and time again that cause severe emotional distress to our staff.
We did not sign up to try and cool a dying dog down with ice packs while begging their owner to do the right thing.
We did not sign up to be taken advantage of.
So please understand, we will always do our very best to help the community and their animals…but that can only be done with mutual respect.
We want to send a thank you to the local vet who quickly stepped in to help Trixie once they legally could do so. Thank you to our staff for getting her loaded and to the offsite vet as quickly as possible.
Thank you to the hundreds of people we see each week who are kind, respectful and understanding of our policies.
We want to remind the public that many dogs with short, flat faces and squashed skulls can struggle to breathe. The high temps mixed with activity can increase their struggle, and lead to an emergency situation very quickly. Please keep a close eye on your pets this summer. Do not leave them unattended in a hot car for any duration of time.
Lastly we want to say sorry to Trixie.
We’re sorry there wasn’t more we could do for you. We hope you felt how hard we were fighting for you, and that the gentle head scratches from strangers brought you some comfort in the end.❤️
We will be reporting this situation to the authorities.
