Investigating owner relinquishment to animal shelters through data practices, self-rehoming outcomes, and community surrender pathways

Relinquishment of dogs and cats to animal shelters remains a concern due to overcrowding in shelter facilities and separation of multispecies families, which impacts animal welfare and human wellbeing. As such, animal shelters aim to divert intake from facilities through more proactive, community-based solutions. However, investigation of pet surrender outside of shelter facilities remains understudied, despite the potential to provide insight for community-based solutions. The overall objective of this thesis was to analyze the circumstances that lead to owner relinquishment through investigation of animal shelter data and community-based alternatives to relinquishment. Chapter 1 introduces the context for this research. Chapter 2 reviews the literature about owner relinquishment and intake diversion strategies. As current research within animal shelters relies largely on data collected at intake to inform diversion strategies, Chapter 3 evaluates the consistency of data collection practices related to owner relinquishment. Chapter 4 investigates the outcomes of an online self-rehoming website to understand characteristics that predict adoption, retention, and subsequent relinquishment after being posted on the platform. Chapter 5 surveys pet owners who surrendered an animal within the past five years (through self-rehoming or shelter relinquishment) to understand patterns of surrender circumstances that were related to support seeking and use of community surrender pathways. Lastly, Chapter 6 presents a general discussion that proposes the use of an ecological systems model to conceptualize owner relinquishment. This thesis contributes to the literature on owner relinquishment and intake diversion and provides recommendations for organizations to adapt in-shelter and community programming to support the human-animal bond.