Montreal dogs sniff out new life in Calgary

Two stray pit bulls from an overcrowded Montreal shelter are getting a second chance to find adoptive homes in Calgary.

An anonymous donor paid for the dogs, named Popeye and Bluto, to fly by air cargo Thursday afternoon to Calgary where there is space for them at the humane society.

"They're having a crisis situation with the shelter there with the volume of dogs, so rather than have these dogs euthanized why not give them a chance," said Cheryl Wallach of the Calgary Humane Society.

Shelters in Montreal are overflowing with unwanted animals. The city's two biggest facilities, the Montreal SPCA and Berger Blanc, euthanize about a quarter of the 48,000 cats and dogs they admit every year because of a lack of space and adoptive homes.

"There's an ebb and flow to the volume of animals that we have and when we have extra space then we're willing to take animals from other organizations that are overflowing," said Wallach, who pointed out that moving the animals increases their adoption opportunities.

This is the first animal transfer from Montreal, but Calgary's shelter has been accepting overflow animals from Inuvik for the last six years with the help of a transportation company's donated services.

The Calgary Humane Society has space for dogs because more owners are neutering their pets, and because the city's pet licensing bylaw, which charges more for unsterilized animals, has helped control the number of strays.

However, Calgary's shelter has a surplus of about 400 cats and had to send 50 felines to Edmonton last week.