Your local shelter needs help, and you can help them by donating, adopting, and volunteering. Another option you might not have heard of includes fostering too. Below, we’ll go into what fostering is, things to consider before fostering, and the many rewards of fostering a dog.
What is fostering?
Fostering, or taking in and taking care of a shelter animal while it awaits adoption, provides a more loving environment for an animal awaiting adoption. Fostering can last for a predetermined amount of time or until your foster goes to their forever home.
What do I need to consider when fostering?
1. Other animals in your home
Take your pets into consideration when considering fostering. When fostering, there’s a chance your foster dog might be traumatized or reactive to other animals. If they’re not reactive and your pets are OK with other animals, awesome! If they are, consider keeping them separated at all times. Regardless of your decision, once the social aspect is good, consider their health too.
Although a veterinarian will look over your foster dog before you get him, there’s still a chance they can get sick due to previous illnesses or infections. Additionally, your foster dog might have ticks or fleas, and treatment can last a while to get rid of them. To prevent any illness from spreading to your pets, it’s a good idea to quarantine your foster dog for about two or more weeks.
2. How much free time you can spare
Foster dogs often come from less-than-ideal situations. Your foster dog will likely require more attention than the average pup, whether that’s just basic shelter anxiety, abusive homes, hoarding situations, or simply being young, old, or sicker. This will mean taking them to veterinary visits, behavioral classes, adoption day events, or just spending time to get them comfortable in a new setting- foster dogs can require a lot. If you don’t have the time necessary to take on a foster, perhaps you could benefit your shelter in other ways.
3. Whether your home is animal friendly
As we’ve discussed above, you may require a quarantine room in the introductory fostering period. This means you might need to set aside another room for your foster dog. But additionally, as a foster, your house shouldn’t have loose pups that can chew on or other dangerous pitfalls. Additionally, white rugs and furniture might not be the best thing to have around a teething puppy or incontinent dog.
Anything breakable or valuable? Yeah, maybe move them to storage or someplace far out of reach. Lastly, make sure everyone in the house is fine fostering. If you have roommates, spouses, children, whathaveyou, their lives will also be affected by the addition of a new foster dog.
4. Your emotional costs
As a foster, you’ll spend a lot of time with a new dog, giving them a ton of love, watching them come out of their shell, and helping heal any sort of injuries, physical or emotional. So when it comes time for them to get a forever home, expect there to be tears. While many foster parents say it gets easier with time, expect an adjustment period. If, however, you feel you won’t be able to give your foster dog up when it’s been adopted, reconsider whether you can handle the emotional burden of fostering a dog.
And with the bittersweet moments, there are also just the moments of great upset you’ll feel too while fostering. This could be due to potty training accidents, learning about your foster dog’s past, dealing with behavior issues, and/or so much more. Ask yourself if you have the patience and resiliency to tackle these problems head-on and whether you can be consistent with implementing necessary training.
5. How capable you are of handling special needs
We’ve touched briefly on puppies and older dogs, but foster dogs come in all shapes and sizes, and sometimes they have special needs. So what is a dog with special needs? Well, it’s basically just a dog that requires a little extra attention. This can be due to:
-Illness: Foster dogs can come from less-than-ideal homes. This might mean they have issues with ticks or fleas, be malnourished, or have some illness such as kennel cough or some other canine illness. With some medication, time, and love, your foster dog will get better. (In the beginning, you may need to take your dog to the vet more often than normal.)
-Disability: Diabetes, blindness, deafness, and more are some disabilities you may see. These will never go away, but that doesn’t make them any less perfect. They might just need a more unique approach to training, socialization, or daily care to live long, healthy, happy lives.
-Recovery from Surgery: More often than not, if your foster dog needs to recover from surgery, car accidents likely brought your dog to the vet. After they’re released from surgery, your dog may require help moving around or getting up, administering pain medications, and/or bandage changes.
-Recovering from Abuse: Physical abuse along with shelter life can sometimes leave your foster dog traumatized. If you are fostering a dog, your job might involve bringing your foster to behavioral classes or just giving your patience and love. Traumatized dogs can display aggression at first, so it’s imporant to rebuild your dog’s trust with people and animals again.
What’re the rewards of fostering?
By fostering dogs, you open up more space at shelters for other animals in need and save additional lives. Not only do you contribute to the number of lives spared, but you earn great rewards such as fuzzy cuddles, love, and companionship that only a grateful pup can bring. If you’re interested in working with animals, fostering also builds your animal expertise and gives you the quick hands-on experience you might not get easy access to otherwise. (Overall, a pretty sweet deal.)
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