One dramatic consequence of the pandemic has been that lonely and anxious home-bound Americans have been getting dogs. Pet food marketers estimate that 12 million Americans have gotten dogs since early 2020, and many more are thinking about it.

How to get a dog is one of my favorite writing subjects, and I want to do some writing about it  when it really matters.

How Americans decide when and how to get a dog, and what kind of dog to get is often a catastrophe for many millions of dogs and for people.

Dog bites on people are skyrocketing, up nearly 50 percent a year. There are now  89.7 million dogs as pets in the United States, one for every 3.5 humans.

Millions of dogs are being returned to shelters, where they are often euthanized (2.7 million dogs and cats a year) because there isn’t the money or space to shelter them, short-term or for life.

Millions more die from being overfed or fed the wrong things. Others are simply neglected by people who didn’t quite get the dog they wanted or had no idea what a dog was like.

The idea that there is only one way to get a dog – rescue it – kills far more dogs than are abused because people get them in thoughtless, emotional,  and irresponsible ways and too often and know absolutely nothing about them.

When you get the wrong dog and return it to a shelter, you will likely be sentencing it to death. That’s an excellent reason to think carefully about how you get a dog and what you want from it.

I am not a fan of no-kill shelters, which claim to be humane but are not. I do not believe condemning a dog to live in a crate for years or life is anything close to being humane.

It is, to me, a new form of socially sanctioned abuse.

I would rather my border collie, or Yellow Lab be euthanized than confined to a crate for his or her life no matter what.

This faddish and politically correct way of getting a dog – the only way to get one is to rescue one – is a license to be lazy and thoughtless.

It sets the owner and dog up for trouble.

Rescue one or buy one; it doesn’t matter. What does matter is that you know what kind of dog you are getting.

Trust the person who tells you to do your homework and think.

Do not trust the person who says there is only one way to get one. The noble thing when it comes to getting a dog is doing it intelligently and thoughtfully, wherever it comes from.

Rescuing a dog is noble; I’ve done it six different times,  but it’s a dangerous and short-sighted way to get a dog if that is the only factor in choosing it or the only thing you know about it.

Don’t let anyone tell you there is only one way to get a dog. It’s nobody’s business but your own. Get the dog you want and will love, train, and steward.

There are many good ways to get a dog – responsible rescue groups, well-funded and staffed shelters, experienced and conscientious breeders are the top three on my list.

Those are all good ways. And sometimes, bad ways. Be aware.

Good breeders breed to keep the best traits of dogs alive – temperament, health –  competent dog rescue organizations monitor their rescue dogs carefully and weed out the troubled or dangerous ones; good shelters work hard to match the right dog with the right owner.

When people don’t do any of those things, walk away.

I don’t choose to get my dog out of a van in a shopping mall parking lot, just up from Alabama. And I am no dog snob.

If you want to feel good, help the homeless. Getting a good dog is hard work.

When I get a dog, I picture what I want from the dog:

An outdoor dog to hike with me?  A therapy dog? A dog to protect the house? To walk with at night? A water dog to go to the beach? A writing dog to snooze at my feet most of the day? A companion dog to keep me from loneliness? A friend to my son and daughter as he or she grows up? A dog for my aging parents? A dog to ride around with me?

There is the right dog for all of these things; if you do your homework, there are many dogs who would be terrible at many of them.

Anything else than diligence is Russian roulette dog style. You might get a good one for you, you might not.

The more work you put into it, no matter how you do it, the better the chances of your getting a dog you can keep safely, love, and care for all of its life.

There are important realities dog acquirers need to understand and think about.

An estimated 4.7 million Americans suffer from dog bites annually. 885,000 dog bite victims require medical attention for injuries each year, requiring 344,202 emergency room visits. Dog bites result in 9,415 extended hospital says, 31,552 of these bites were on children 5 to 9 years of age. 26 percent of dog bite fatalities were children aged 0 to 2 years of age.

It matters what kind of breed you purchase.

It’s important to say that the odds of dying from a dog attack in America are one in 118,776. Car accidents are much more dangerous. But some people do get killed by dogs.

Nearly a third of fatal dog attacks on people are on infants – way too many.

The problem isn’t that dogs are evil, but many have been bred over time for guarding and fighting. Other dogs – especially some cold weather breeds are fierce food guarders, not because they are mean, but because there isn’t much food in their native habitats, and they fight for it to survive.

A child crawling towards their food bowel can seem a life-threatening threat to them. I wouldn’t get one of those breeds if I had an infant crawling around the house.

Pit Bulls, much maligned as vicious and dangerous, are often the most wonderful family pets, but they have also been trained and bred for centuries to fight and guard. Biologists say they are one of what are called wolf-like breeds. When they do bite, it is often serious.

In a massive veterinary study of injuries and fatal attacks from dog bites from 2016 to 202o of 46 breeds, researchers found that Pit Bulls killed 284 people (Read on, the AMVA says this is not the fault of the breed or typical of it), 65.6 percent of the total.

Rottweilers were second – 45 deaths – or 10.4 percent of the total. German shepherds killed 20 people, mixed-breed dos 17, Mastiff/Bullmastiffs 14, Husky’s 13.

Inbred or poorly bred Labrador Retrievers killed 9, and Boxers 7.

The AVMA or American Veterinary Medical Association conducted an in-depth data review to analyze dog bites and serious injuries.

Their findings indicated no single breed that stands out as the most dangerous, not even the Pit Bulls so often associated with attacks on people.

According to their study, perhaps the most thorough ever done on dog bites,  breed is not the most dependable marketer or predictor of dogs’ dangerous behavior. Better and more reliable indicators include owner behavior, training, sex, neuter status, the dog’s location (urban vs. rural), and varying ownership trends over time.

Pit Bull type dogs are often reported in severe and fatal attacks, but the reason, says the AMVA, is most likely that they are kept in high-risk neighborhoods and often owned by people who may use them for dog fights or criminal and violent acts. Well-trained and loved and bred pit bulls are no more dangerous than other dogs.

Unfortunately, many of them – especially in inner-city and urban neighborhoods –  are not trained at all, except for fighting or guarding.

When I decide to get a dog, I spend hours poring through the data in books like The Domestic Dog: Its Evolution, Behavior, and Interactions with People by James Serpell of the University of Pennsylvania.

I consider this book the best and most thorough book on domestic dogs ever written. It’s expensive – more than $40, but worth every dollar.

Serpell has researched and written about behavioristic and values that differ from breed to breed. You can know too little about a dog you want to bring home, but you can’t know too much.

Serpell’s measures and values are activity level, snapping at children, excessive barking, territorial defense, aggression to dogs, aggression to family members, affection demand, trainability, watchdog barking, housetraining ease.

His charts and graphs are invaluable when it comes to choosing a dog.

You really can know what you are getting if you don’t listen to the wrong people or look for a dog in the wrong place.

The issue for new dog owners is not rescuing versus breeder – that is simply one of the worst ways to choose a dog. The issue is what kind of dog do you want, and what is the dog you are interested in living with? What kind of behavioral traits and values does your future dog possess?

I want answers to most, if not all, of Serpell’s proposed values.

If I can’t find out anything about the dog, or if nothing is known about the dog beyond the fact it needs a home, I sadly look elsewhere. Cute is not a good criterion.

Bringing a live animal into my home for 10 to 15 years is much too important a decision to be made in such a simple way.

If you do your homework and find the right rescuer, shelter worker, or breeder, you can learn, for example, that Akitas and Chow Chows and Chihuahuas are among the most aggressive-to-dog dogs among all breeds. Golden Retrievers, Poodles, Papillions, and Whippets are among the least aggressive-to-dog breeds.

Well-bred and trained Labs and Golden Retrievers, Shih Tzus, and Corgis are the most affectionate family dogs. Chow Chows, Shar Pei’s Akita’s, and Dachsund’s are among the most aggressive- to- family members.

Vets and veterinary groups, and biologists also can tell you which dogs are the most trainable, the most intelligent, and the best around children.

Also, it’s 2021, the vaccines are coming in and the pandemic is heading out. Be mindful that your life is likely to change, you will be going out much more frequently by the end of the summer.

Your children will be playing with their friends again and going back to school again.

Will your dog still have the life it deserves?

I think everyone reading this hates to think of all those millions of dogs languishing in basements, crates, or back yards,  or heading off to those “humane” no-kill shelters.

In a sense, getting a dog is practical and transactional. Like anything else worth doing, the more you put into it, the more you’ll get out of it.

Close your eyes and picture your life with the dog, now and years down the road. Then go find it, even if it takes a few months or a year.

They are worth that, and so are you and your family.