Who is to blame? Dog owners not properly confining their pets; owners who abandon their animals to starve; owners who abandon their dogs because of illness.

You have to pick up a wooden box full of 3-week-old puppies left behind a tombstone in the middle of January to understand our frustration.

We respond to and investigate around 2,000 complaints a year in Scioto County.

Many of these are aggressive attacks on our children. Last year, while exiting a school bus, a 9-year-old girl was pulled out of her grandmother's arms and dragged by the face seven feet down a gravel driveway. This was a very aggressive dog.

We would like to find homes for every dog we are forced to pick up. Some we cannot put up for adoption.

We take pictures of all dogs that enter our kennel and put them on petfinders.com. We work daily with rescue centers throughout America. We send out several dogs weekly to rescue centers and have kept dogs for up to a month trying to find homes for them. We are only required to keep stray dogs three days. We are not the villains some people make us out to be.

Three months ago, a mother and 11 pups; a mother and seven pups; and mother and three pups; and seven adult dogs were pulled by rescues and found homes in just a one week period.

The same week we had to humanely put down two puppies that were ill. We cannot let two puppies that did not have responsible owners infect 25 dogs we hope to find homes for.

I believe some people do make dogs mean. They are not born that way. I try to be on the dog's side in every case. They can not defend themselves.

I will not hide the aggressive actions of a dog from a person wanting to adopt the animal. Its my duty to the citizens of our county. I wish we had the funding and time to rehabilitate every dog we are forced to pickup, or is dropped off at the Scioto County Dog shelter.

Dogs are mans best friend. Please have your pet spayed or neutered. Keep your pets shots updated to stop the spread of disease, and please keep your dog properly confined.

Do not abandon your pets. Find homes for them.

Please, legally adopt a dog at local Scioto County shelters. If every dog owner in our county would follow these guidelines, it would be a blessing to us all - man and man's best friend.

Gary Erlenwein

Scioto County dog warden