Miura 1

Matthew Miura 

Mr. Ryan Smith 

English 11 Section 1 

24 March 2021 

Ruff Times: The Many Benefits of Having a Pet Dog

Introduction

According to a study done by Daniel Bubnis published in 2021, 22% of Americans suffer

from depression, 45% suffer from high blood pressure, and a whopping 50% are considered

obese (Bubnis). So many people in America suffer from these serious health issues and there

could be a simple solution to help ease these problems. Pet ownership. A man’s best friend can

be a man’s best health provider.

Some people love pets, and some do not. Some people like cats and some do not. This is

one question society has always been debating. The percentage of people who own a dog in the

U.S. is about 50 percent. Many people would not believe these statistics of what pet dogs could

do for your health and the added benefits they provide for you. Since dogs provide all these

benefits why wouldn’t everyone go out and get a pet dog? Simple, dogs are quite expensive and

take a lot of work to take care of which many people do not want to do. Are the added benefits to

your health worth all the money and effort it costs taking care of a pet dog?

Currently we are suffering from a pandemic and people around the world are struggling

to survive. Many people are getting sick, and their mental health is also taking a hit causing

many people to suffer from depression and other problems. Dogs can help people’s morale’s all

over the country by providing them with an emotional comforter, a non-judgmental friend and

listener, and finally being a stress reliever by letting people pet them.
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Our Solutionary Project is called Ruff Times, a group of my friends and I will take

donated dog food and deliver it to people who need dog food. We plan to help a lot of dog

owners around the island especially those people who are struggling from the pandemic.

Problem Section

One part of the problem which is a main reason people do not get dogs, or they cannot

take care of them responsibly is because they are expensive. The price of owning a dog is a main

reason we started Ruff Times as our Solutionary Project. Being able to give out dog food and

help families and people in need will allow them to have a dog with minimal costs and all the

benefits they can provide to your health both mentally and physically. To explain how much a

pet costs David Weiler wrote an article explaining “On average usually a dog will exceed 1000

dollars on their first year and about 500 dollars annually after that” (Weiler). What this means is

it is expensive to own a dog and if we can help a few families with some food expenses

especially during this time then it will really go a long way. Another example of the expenses of

a dog and the effects it can have on you is by David Weiler who adopted two dogs when they

just began a family and the expenses, they faced costed them over 5,000 dollars each. This

money could have been put in better places especially since they just started a family.

The people hurt by this problem are both humans and dogs. In this situation with covid

dogs are not getting fed and that creates turmoil between both dogs and their owners. This leads

to both parties being hurt because their relationship begins to suffer and dogs may go hungry and

end up getting sick or even worse, dying. This problem not only happens when we are in a

pandemic, but it also happens in everyday life. When people do not have enough money to help

feed their dogs and cannot take care of them that is when the dogs are getting hurt more and
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usually it is more of the dogs getting hurt. When this happens, this is what leads to hungry dogs

and even animal abuse because of how bad their living conditions are.

Usually in these situations nobody benefits because the owners do not want to put their

dogs through a tough time, but they have no choice, and these dogs do not want to be hungry, but

they have no choice either. Since nobody benefits from situations like these that means the

downside is bad. Things like animal abuse and law enforcement start getting involved which

means problems start happening.

Some statistics to help solidify evidence of dog hunger is according to a study done by Lisa

Towell in 2019 on average 1.4 million dogs around the world die from hunger and 1 million of

those dogs do have owners registered to them (Towell). This number shows that the problem of

dog hunger was a problem way before the pandemic hit and since then an average of about 1.5

million dogs have died annually because of this. Lisa Towell reported that there are non-profit

shelters who do take dogs in, but they are starting to get full which causes them to leave dogs on

the street left to starve. This evidence shows how important it is to take care of our dogs. Many

families around America disregard their pets and forget these dogs are alive and they need food

and water. This stat shows how all of us are either forgetting to feed our dogs or just cannot

afford it which is why we started our project. The last fact by Lisa Towell proving that dog’s

hunger is a real and dangerous thing is although impossible to predict accurately around 60

million dogs in America are strays (Towell). One positive from this is that only about 9% of

these stray dogs die from hunger. Although a positive in some regards its extremely sad all these

dogs are stray in American and their living conditions are extremely poor. These dogs on the

street go hungry many of the nights and not to mention all the other problems they face like

diseases and injuries. And to relate these stray dogs with household dogs is Lisa Towell did a
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study to where she predicts over 50% of these stray dogs once had owners and a home to live in

but their owners could not afford to keep up with the expenses and chose to abandon these dogs

to the street to be left alone to die. The situation of dog hunger has gone on long enough and it is

a situation we need to combat. This also shows how important it is for us to care for dogs

because many of these strays were released from us owners who could not afford their dogs. This

is another reason our project is so beneficial because it helps these owners stay with their dogs

and helps the dogs stay off the streets.

Previous Efforts

In the past there have been many efforts to help this issue but none really that are as big

as what is happening currently in the world especially since we are in a pandemic. There were

many small non-profits that were working to this issue but many of them have disbanded since

then. Currently about 3 non-profits are still working towards this issue but have been slowed

because of the pandemic but, they are working even harder now that guidelines have opened.

As of right now the biggest thing being done to help combat food hunger is the PetSmart

charities. PetSmart has started a charity raising in total 10 million dollars this year to pet food

insecurity in homes. This article by the pet age staff also noted a surprising statistic saying 1 in 4

households in America suffer from food insecurities even before the pandemic hit (Pet Age

Staff). It should be noted that if 1 in 4 families suffer from food insecurities and over 50% of

households own a dog than many families after the pandemic hit must be really struggling to

feed themselves and their dogs. That is Why PetSmart started this charity and they are planning

to use all the 10 million dollars raised to buying petfood and delivering it all over the country.

In the future we do not know what is going to happen and we do not know how the

problem will fare or if there even will be a problem. Many scientists predict the pandemic will be
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over in a few years so many families might get some of their income back to help pay for pet

food but still will be struggling. In the future their will me more charities for this cause and more

people working to help ease this problem and more people working to help change these families

fortune for the better.

The Solutions

One solution that helpful and beneficial is preventing waste. Preventing waste sounds like

a simple solution and it seems like wasting dog food is uncommon. Surprisingly, in a survey

done by numerous pet food foundations asking about how much dog food households waste, the

number was shocking around 50 pounds a year was going to waste per every other household.

Households explained it as bugs and ants would get into the food or spoiled, the dog would not

eat at that time and it would get old, and they would buy a brand their dog would not eat, or their

dog would not eat a certain type of dog food. This can be easily combated to help save dog food

and help save households money. Households can buy Ziploc bags and resealable bags to help

keep bugs out of dog food and to help keep the dog food from going stale or old. Households

could observe their dogs eating patterns and the time their dog eats to know when the proper

time to feed them would be. Households could also observe what type of dog food your dog likes

whether it be steak, fish, chicken, or plant based. All these factors could decide whether your dog

will eat the food or not and waste it. Many people would argue that wasting dog food is

uncommon and around 50 pounds a year is not that much. Which, there could be some truth to

that being that only half of dog owners waste food which is not that much. Although a reasonable

argument if half of dog owners waste around 50 pounds a year and there are 63 million

households in America with dogs there would be close to 1 billion pounds of dog food waste in

America.
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The second solution which could be more presentable to the community would be

donating dog food. Donating one bag of dog food to any organization will go a long way to

helping a household and more importantly a dog in need. Organization depends on families and

companies mostly to provide the dog food. More importantly non-profits need your help to

donate food bags because they have no source of income to buy the food themselves. It could be

argued that one bag of dog food will not make a difference to this big problem or that it will be

too expensive to donate a whole bag of dog food. While it is true that dog food is expensive and

that it is a big problem, and 1 bag of dog food will not help the cause. These reasons are not

necessarily true because if everyone does not think about the price and counts that others will

donate to then so many households will get the support they need. Also, if it is the price, they are

worried about they need to think about the household this bag is going to which could really help

them go a long way.

Our Solutionary project is called Ruff Times and it is a group founded by my friends and

I who are working to deliver bags of donated dog food to households in need. We feel it is a

perfect way to help solve the problem because it gets to the root of it. The problem is households

are not making enough money to support their family and their pets which cause a lot of added

stress to their lives. This causes their physical and mental states to take a hit which brings the

morale down of both dog and owners. Our project attacks the root of the problem of people not

having enough money to support their family by giving them dog food to take the extra bill off

from buying dog food. This allows them to buy other necessities around the house such as food

and water. Many people would also argue that for our project we could do something better like

give money away so it could help their general needs, but that is something we cannot do
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because they could be using the money for other non-necessity needs and the dogfood really

helps our purpose of wanting to help dogs and families during this time especially.

Another reason it is an excellent idea is because especially now during a pandemic people

are going through tough financial situations. Many people are being laid off work and sometimes

the only happy thing they come home to are their pets which they now cannot afford anymore.

The saddest thing about this problem is many households were giving their pets up for adoption

because they could not afford to keep them anymore. If we as a group can do as much as deliver

some dog food, it will make all their lives so much better.

Conclusion

In the end the most important things are the pets and the people's families. These people

are going through so much and the least we can do to help them is this. That is why we started

Ruff Times is because we want to be there for people and help people who are going through

rough times. Doing this will help us feel we are doing some good to help these people and

thanking god for blessing us well try to do as much as we can for others as well.

Works Cited

Charities, PetSmart. PetSmart Charities® Announces $10 Million Commitment to Combat Pet
Food Insecurity Across North America, 25 Jan. 2021, www.prnewswire.com/news-
releases/petsmart-charities-announces-10-million-commitment-to-combat-pet-food-
insecurity-across-north-america-301214190.html.

King, Cody. “APPA: Americans Spent $95.7 Billion on Their Pets in 2019.” KSAT, KSAT San
Antonio, 28 Feb. 2020, www.ksat.com/news/local/2020/02/28/appa-americans-spent-
957-billion-on-their-pets-in-2019/.

King, Jeanine. The Pongo Fund, Pong Fund, 2021, www.thepongofund.org/the-pet-food-bank/.

“November 1-14, 2020.” Ohio Animal Foundation, Ohio Animals,

www.ohioanimalfoundation.org/tackle-pet-hunger/.
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Williams, Jack. “11 Facts About Animal Homelessness.” DoSomething.org, Do Something, 2021,
www.dosomething.org/us/facts/11-facts-about-animal-homelessness.

Research Essay Rubric

Name: ________________________________

Criteria / Standard 1 2 3 4 Score Feedback

IDEA DEVELOPMENT
x x
 Text is focused; captures the reader’s attention.
 Topic is narrow and manageable.
 Details are relevant, interesting, vivid, accurate.
 Point is clear.
 Details support the paper’s main idea.
 Ideas engage, inspire, or intrigue reader.

ORGANIZATION x x

 The order compels, enhances, and moves ideas.

 Introduction intrigues, invites; conclusion resolves.
 Thoughtful transitions show how ideas connect.
 Sequencing is logical and effective.
 Pacing is well controlled and purposeful.
 Organization flows smoothly; matches purpose.

VOICE x

 Writing is compelling, engaging; aware of the

audience.
 Tone is interesting and appropriate for audience
and the purpose.
 Author’s presence is evident, powerful.
 Expository writing is committed, persuasive.
 Narrative writing is honest, engaging, personal.

WORD CHOICE x

 Words are precise, interesting, powerful.

 Words are specific; meaning is clear.
 Words and phrases are striking.
 Language is effective and appropriate.
 Verbs are lively, nouns precise, modifiers
effective.
 Choices enhance meaning and clarify meaning.

SENTENCE FLUENCY x

 The writing flows with rhythm and elegance.

 Sentences are constructed to enhance meaning.
 Sentences vary in length and structure.
 Sentences use purposeful, varied beginnings.
 Writing has cadence.

CONVENTIONS x
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 Observes and uses standard conventions; few

errors.
 Spelling is mostly correct.
 Punctuation is accurate and effective.
 Capitalization skills are evident.
 Grammar and usage are correct and enhance the
text.
 Paragraphing is sound; reinforces organization.
 Writer may manipulate conventions for style.

91

Total Score
1 = standard not met; 2 = standard partially met; 3 = standard met; 4 = exceeds expectations