Dogs We've Fostered & Re-Homed ~

[A-Jay]

Fostering dogs for the local animal shelter and even previous owners, is very rewarding.  No doubt it’s a big commitment and while I wouldn’t call it a lot of work, there needs to be a mindset & a certain level of determination to be even remotely successful.  Some fosters last a few days, others can be a several weeks and we’ve even done one or two that lasted over a year.  Each deal is different, there’s almost always some twists & turn along the way.  And being adaptable is key.

  We’ve been doing it for a long time and I wish we’d taken more pictures.  For the folks who care to, we always keep in touch with the new owners that these animals are re-homed to and so that’s pretty cool. We started with mostly larger northern breeds as that’s what we were most familiar with.  But have since branched out to several others.

Managing our own pack while ‘training’ an often mostly feral canine can be daunting.  But we’re set up for it here and have a ‘system’ that we’ve developed over the years that works for us but more importantly, eventually places these special dogs in a safe & thriving new home.

The New Owner smile when they first meet and then drive off is almost always a watery eyes thing.

Social media has improved this entire process tremendously as we are able to reach perspective owners far & wide.  People are often very willing to travel several hours for the right dog: I know we have many times.  Just goes to show how important that bond can really be. 

 

Finally there’s Foster Failures.  It happens and there’s two kinds.

First one is we bring in an animal that it just too much.

Meaning they either need training beyond our abilities,

Or turn out to be dangerous or even flat out crazy.  Like people, there are crazy dogs.  We tap out of those early.

The other ‘failure’ is when we fall madly in love with the dog and just keep it. Had a few of those. We love them all, but have learned to respect the process and hold back a little of ourselves for our own dogs.  The satisfaction then comes when they leave with their new owners. Has to be that way and it took a while to figure that one out. Either way every dog always takes a piece of our hearts with them.

 

Below are pictures of some of these dogs . . . . .  More pics in post below 

A-Jay

 

So many memories  . . . . 

A-Jay

We are sort of due for a few more foster deals.

We do most of our training & socialization outside,

but this winter has been brutally cold and super snowy.

We'll see what the summer brings us.

A-Jay

 

[BassKat]

What a rewarding and admirable endeavor! Great work A-Jay! Food for thought for my soon-to-be empty nesting days!

[wdp]

ABSOLUTELY AWESOME!!! Great work you are doing @A-Jay.

[Mike L]

Even tho we’ve owned and trained more Great Danes over the years, our Husky’s left a soft spot each time 

 

 

 

 

Mike

[BassKat]

My brother had a Keeshond that was really cool. Pets just add so much to life.