One abandoned dog Lt. Mary Lou Respess can't get out of her mind is a Chihuahua.

He'd been tied up so long, said the Gwinnett County Animal Shelter manager, his collar had gotten embedded in his skin and had to be surgically removed.

He's one of hundreds whose owners have left them behind.

Gwinnett County animal advocates say they've seen a marked increase in the number of abandoned animals that they believe is linked to the spike in foreclosures. According to Equity Depot, the county had 8,191 foreclosures last year, up from 5,122 in 2005.

"We're seeing three times as many owner-surrender calls compared to two years ago," said Joan Sammond, director of the Georgia SPCA. She currently has 50 adoptable animals, more cats than dogs.

"A lot of people don't even want to admit it's because of foreclosures," Sammond said. "Most of them are established families with kids. . . . They say they're having to move in with relatives or to a rental that doesn't allow pets. We're just doing the math."

Joey Brooks, one of two cruelty investigators with Gwinnett County Animal Control, said he's definitely getting more calls about abandoned pets — usually dogs.

He responded to one call about two weeks ago, he said. The power was turned off and so was the water. But three labs were tied up in the back yard.

Neighbors had been feeding the dogs in this "decent neighborhood in Duluth," he said, but there was already a real estate sign out front.

"That's what's weird," Brooks said. "We'll come across ones where [For Sale] signs are already in the front yard, but pets are still tied up out back."

He usually checks in with the neighbors, he said, which is how he found out that the family who'd lived there have been foreclosed on, but had no place to take their dogs.

Even that's preferable, Brooks said, to finding former pets trapped inside houses, without food or water or any way to get outside to do their business.

The shelter currently has between 80 and 100 dogs in need of homes, Respess said, and about 25 cats.

Gwinnett County's shelter gets hundreds of calls a day, Brooks said, on everything from how to get squirrels out of the attic or to remove dead animals from the road (another one of their jobs), in addition to reports of stray or abandoned animals.

On a good day, Brooks said, Animal Control has four officers out on the day shift and four out at night, responding to about 100 complaints a day.

Steve Miller who lives outside Norcross in unincorporated Gwinnett, said the problem of abandoned dogs hit too close to home last week.

On Friday, a pair he believes were left behind by a neighbor killed one of his cats.

He'd been calling animal control all week, Miller said. But it wasn't until he reported the dogs had killed his cat Curly that an officer came out and caught one of the dogs, he said. The other dog hasn't been seen since.

Respess said she felt bad about Miller's loss, but wasn't sure how it could be avoided.

With so few officers responsible for the 437-square-mile county, they have to prioritize. Reports about animals attacking people or being injured have to come first.

Officers came out looking for the dogs, she said, but were unable to catch them.

"We get calls a lot where people say I think this dog is going to kill my cat, or I think this dog is going to jump the fence," Brooks said. "If we went on all the 'I think' calls, we'd never get anything done. It's like the cops. Of course it's not good. It's just unfortunate."

Sammond said animal control often gets a bad rap. Gwinnett County is one of the more rescue-friendly shelters her group works with, she said.

"They're cleaning up the mess the public has left behind," she said.