Introduction to Fostering

What is Fostering?

Fostering involves caring for a dog in your home until it is ready to be adopted! This can be anywhere from a few days to a few months.

During this time we ask that you integrate the dog into your daily routine and life, helping it to adjust to what may be its first time in a home environment.

What Does Fostering Involve?

Fostering means caring for a dog in your home until it is adopted.

While in care, a foster carer is responsible for providing food, flea/tick/worming, shelter and training. We have a lot of training videos and information to help you with this and each dogs needs will be slightly different. The training we recommend is generally beyond what would be taught in basic obediance and involves things that will help the dog in it's daily life. Place training to help develop impulse control is just one example, while activities to build confidence is another. We strongly believe that both physical and mental stimulation is essential for all happy dogs and as such we encourage our foster carers to provide mental enrichment, typically with excellent results! Foster caring also means taking good photos of the dog, liaising with coordinators about the dogs temperament, transporting the dog to-and-from an approved Vet (the rescue pays for vetwork) and helping to assess potential adoptive families.

Why Do Some Dogs Need Fostering?

Dogs who are in council operated pounds need fostering because it is the only way they will make it out of the pound alive.

Most council operated pounds do NOT deal directly with the public, meaning that there are two ways a dog will leave the pound: after having been euthanised or into a rescue group (like ours).

A dog will end up in a pound in roughly three ways:

It is surrendered for X reason (owners are moving, owners got a new puppy, owners are having a baby, etc).
It is found wandering and is brought in by a ranger
It is seized by a ranger from a property because a) the owner had too many dogs or b) the property wasn't safe for the dog.

Once at the pound, the ranger will conduct an "assessment" of the dogs temperament. They will assess if it is dangerous to people or other dogs. If a dog in a pound is deemed to be "dangerous" it will be immediately euthanised.

If it is deemed to be of safe, sound temperament, then it is put up for rescue. A rescue group like ours has between 3 and 11 days to remove the dog from that pound, or it will be put to sleep. Most pounds will give us a "due" date, which is when it needs to be removed by. It does not matter how great the temperament of the dog is - if they have X number of pens and they do not deal with the public, then a rescue group must take the dog or it will be put to sleep.

But will the dog be ok with my cat, chooks, guinea pigs, horses, pet lizard...

We're not sure. The dog has probably never met any of those animals before.

The vast majority of dogs who come from pounds are simply adolescent dogs who were mostly ignored by their previous owners. In a lot of cases they have never seen a cat before!!

This means the may jump up a little to begin with, or get very excited. Most dogs need to be taught these skills as they generally aren't born with them! That's why we are here to help. We have plenty of resources to help you to introduce your new foster to cats, dogs, kids, chickens etc.

Pounds do not typically release animals who are deemed to be people or dog unsafe.

- I'd Like to Foster A Little Dog Please

I'm sorry but we do not regularly get little dogs (like terriers) into care. The smallest dogs we would have in care would be puppies or dogs of about 12 kg (typically little working breed mixes).

- I'd Like to Go Meet The Foster Before I Decide

That is not possible. Most of the dogs are coming from distant rural pounds, it is not possible to meet them before they arrive. They will usually be on transport for between 8 to 24 hours before arriving at your home.

- What Breed Is That Dog? Is it a kelpie? I only want kelpies because they're cute...

In rural areas, many dogs are allowed to roam freely. This has meant that over generations there is sometimes very little "specific" identifiable breed in a dog. Where possible, we try to advise what we feel the dog is MOST like, but it is often a guess!

We do not discriminate about breed types, since there are so many complete mix breed dogs available (who are usually great dogs with very few health issues!). We also encourage our fosters to branch out of their normal "specific" breed mindset, typically with excellent results.

What Do I Need to Do To Sign Up?

1. Request to join our Facebook Group "Team Eavings Rescue".

2. Complete the Foster Carer form.

3. Sign our Foster Carer Agreement.

4. Go through our online training information and followed the steps both above and on Team Eavings Rescue.

Before You Are Assigned A Dog You Need to Have

Have undergone our application process for foster carers as per the above.
Have read our Induction Process Paperwork & Completed the Quiz.
Have sourced a collar, leash, extra bedding, food, flea & tick treatment, worming tablets.
Agree to meet the transport (either at a fairly local designated stop or at their home - depending on the transport).

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