DURHAM — A deep discount helped more than half of the Durham County animal shelter's cats and kittens find a home over the weekend.

Now it's dogs that director Shafonda Davis Price is worried about.

Twenty-seven canines came in between Friday and Monday afternoon, pushing the number of dogs and puppies to 190. The shelter has just 100 kennels.

"I was like, 'How is this happening'?" Davis Price said.

The Animal Protection Society of Durham, which runs the shelter on Club Boulevard, cut its normal $95 cat adoption fee to $10 Friday and Saturday to save more of the 142 felines it had Friday morning.

By closing time Saturday, people had put deposits on 78 of the cats and kittens, Davis Price said.

The normal $95 adoption fee helps cover a health exam, rabies shot, spay or neuter surgery and other care that cats and kittens get when they go to a new home.

The APS will try to raise funds to make up for the lost revenue.

But now shelter staff members are doubling dogs in kennels, sometimes closing the sliding door between sections of a run and putting a dog on each side.

"It's not ideal," Davis Price said. "When I'll really worry is when we run out of the ability to double [up]."

Last week, Dr. Kelli Ferris, assistant clinical professor of community practice at the College of Veterinary Medicine at N.C. State University, said the economy has affected shelters as people put off sterilizing their pets or counties hold animal control positions open to save money.

Sixteen of the 27 dogs that have come in recently were given up by their owners, Davis Price said.

mark.schultz@newsobserver.com or 919-932-2003