People are not the only ones walking in Sturgis

STURGIS, S.D. (KEVN) - The 83rd Sturgis Motorcycle Rally is a place for motorcyclists to come together and enjoy the sites and sounds, but the people aren’t the only ones walking the streets.

The rally always brings an influx of people, with the 75th anniversary bringing in more than 750,000 people. Many rally visitors don’t only bring their bikes, but will also bring their pets, and if those animals go missing, it can create a problem for the animal shelter.

“We find dogs running at large. We find dogs in hot cars, that’s a really big problem. Then we also have dogs that come in from people being arrested,” said Autumn Lyons, animal control officer.

Lyons says so far, they have received 15 dogs that were directly rally related. She also stated that when the dogs are brought in, the shelter will check the animals for tags and chips, and if those are unavailable, pictures of the animals are posted on Facebook.

“I would say probably 95% are reunited. Following last year’s rally, we did have two dogs that were never reunited, and we ended up adopting them out,” continued Lyons.

As of Wednesday, the animal shelter had three dogs that were really related, however, one was released back to its owner.

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