Pet food banks are beginning to give away food to help pet owners who are going through tough times.

More people are giving up their animals to shelters, because they can’t afford to keep their pets around. This is causing the shelters to fill up at faster rates, and leaves pets with no where to go. To prevent overflow in pet shelters, pet food banks are being established to help owners who want to keep their pets, but can barely afford it.

Dog food can range from $20 to $60 a month, and when you include treats in the equation, the annual cost of food for your pet can total from $250 to $700. This expense might not have seemed that big a few years ago, but as we begin to scrimp and save, pet food banks can be a huge help!

It’s great to see organizations actively trying to help owners keep their pets. Being forced to give your pet up to an animal shelter is a terrible thing to have to think about.  You can’t know what’s going to happen to your animal after you give it up, and pet food banks are a great way to help you hold on to them.

The amount of pet food banks around the country is pretty low right now, but that can and should change. Instead of packing these poor animals into cages at a shelter, let them live the lives they have been. It might even be cheaper for shelters if they were to give away food, so they don’t have to take care of the animals themselves.

If you see a pet food bank sprout up in your neighborhood, please use it instead of giving up your pet. They’ll be much happier if they’re able to stay with you. If you don’t need the food bank, please think about supporting it with a donation. This way, your neighbors can enjoy the kind of love and affection you enjoy from your pets!

Tags: animal shelters, dogs, food, food banks, pets, shelters

This entry was posted on Wednesday, March 25th, 2009 at 12:14 pm and is filed under Pet News. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.