22/10/2025
📣 Please ID Your Dogs — It Could Save Their Life! 🐾
We can’t say it enough — your dog should have identification on them at all times.
That can be:
🏷️ An ID tag with your phone number
💉 A microchip (make sure it’s registered!)
✍️ Even a collar with your name and number written in Sharpie
👉 Rabies tags are NOT ID tags.
They help confirm vaccination, but they don’t tell anyone who your dog belongs to or how to reach you.
Our city law enforcement doesn’t enjoy impounding dogs, but they’re required to enforce the city ordinance. Having a current rabies vaccine and city license is also a legal requirement.
Here’s how impound works within Baker City limits:
🐶 Only dogs running loose within city limits are impounded.
🏥 Impounded dogs are taken to Baker Veterinary Hospital. We have no shelter here, so we are grateful for this partnership.
💵 To reclaim your dog, all fees must be paid at City Hall before pickup — this includes:
• an impound fee
• boarding ($35/day)
• a current city dog license (if not already purchased)
💉 If your dog needs a rabies vaccine, that’s paid at Baker Vet Hospital.
Dogs are held for up to 5 business days. If no one claims them, Best Friends of Baker, Inc. may step in if the dog is deemed adoptable. Unfortunately, aggressive dogs cannot ethically be placed in someone's home and are potentially euthanized.
🐕🦺 Outside Baker City limits:
The county does not fund or have an impound agreement, so rural stray dogs aren’t taken to the facility. That’s why ID becomes absolutely critical.
Just this week, we’ve had several dogs found wandering in rural areas. We simply don’t have the foster resources to take them all in.
We can help with microchip scanning, food, social media outreach, and advice — but remember, we’re an all-volunteer organization. We’re people with jobs, families, and big hearts, doing our best to help the community’s animals. ❤️
Of course, when a dog is injured, starving, or in danger, we step in immediately — getting them medical care or boarding when necessary.
💖 A happy example:
Just yesterday, two hunters found Lily, an emaciated lost dog near Sparta. She was brought to Baker Veterinary Hospital, where Bobbi, the practice manager, immediately offered to take Lily home and personally see to her recovery. Best Friends planned to help with her adoption once she was healthy again — but a quick microchip scan changed everything.
✨ Her owners were found! She’d been missing for a month — and they were overjoyed to be reunited. Without that microchip, they might never have known what happened to her.
🐾 In honor of Lily, Baker Veterinary Hospital is running a Microchip Special for November!
💰 Regularly $80 — now just $50 for the entire month.
We are so grateful for Baker Veterinary Hospital’s continued support of our community — from spay/neuter specials to helping reunite lost pets.
Let’s make sure every lost dog finds their way home.
Please ID your dogs — always. 🐶💗
