Aphra

Try Rescued with Love. They do a wonderful job with older, small breeds.

The simple difference between rescue groups and shelters in Victoria is a premises for the purpose of rehoming animals. A rescue group uses a network of foster carers, a shelter has a physical place of business maintained for that purpose.

The simple difference between rescue groups and shelters in Victoria is a premises for the purpose of rehoming animals. A rescue group uses a network of foster carers, a shelter has a physical place of business maintained for that purpose.

Why would there need to be a difference between a rescue group (as generally understood) and a breeder who does breed-specific rescue? Unless you're of the "all breeders are evil spawns of Satan" rescue ilk, I can't see a lot of difference, apart from the fact that breed rescues often get a lot of support from their breed clubs (like the mighty Stafford Rescue in Victoria). Most state governments have legislation which covers shelters (so in Victoria the Code of Practice for Pounds and Shelters), but not so much for rescue groups. The Victorian legislation around community foster care networks is a bit vague when you look at it closely. Most Victorian animal welfare legislation tends to be like that though, lots of nitpicking detail and not much substance. Perhaps if you explained the context in which you need a definition we'd be more successful in coming up with some definitions?

I don't think it's about rescue as such, it's about a cause that insufficient personalities can use to inflate their sense of self-worth. Being a keyboard warrior for animal rescue is all about the drama, and not about having to get your hands dirty. The concurrent rise of rescue and social media has given these people a cause to justify their hysteria and a medium they can use without actually having to talk to people or get their hands dirty. I'm old enough to have been on the internet back in the days when news groups were the latest thing (LOL) and it wasn't that much different really.

I'd actually agree with you. She's shown a staggering lack of judgement and sensitivity, but my experience with people who are very passionate and commited, but not very thoughtful (or bright), suggests that they respond to any criticism with anger out of all proportion to the nature of the criticism, because in their highly coloured world, you are attacking their central reason for existence. It becomes a very much, "the whole world against us" kind of thing, which is typical of immature young people, even if they seem old enough to know better. Pound Rounds people seem prone to a kind of hysterical sentimentality that is ripe grounds for offensive self-righteousness - their leader promulgates the idea that all other rescues are doing it wrong. I'm uneasy with the idea that you'd intervene into someone's professional life because of something they'd done in their personal life. We all make mistakes in our personal lives, and sometimes say nasty and intemperate things. A better approach would be to just tell her she was rude and badly behaved and you want nothing to do with her, or her organisation in the future/

Dear Pound Rounds, Thank you for your application to join "Online dating 'r' us" (our motto: "there is no pot so crooked it cannot find a lid"). We guarantee to find you the perfect match or we flush your fee into the garbage disposal. Luckily that won't be necessary today. Now, have you got a pen and paper ready? Good. Please contact The Animal Rehoming Service. We found that using our advanced psychological algorithms and an old pencil and edge of an envelope you two have received a 98% correlation in customer relations; reputation management; communication skills and batshit crazy behaviour unprovoked. We hope you will have many happy years together. Yours sincerely

Check your PMs. :-)

Check your PMs. :-)

Try us. We've got a couple of very cute little terriers and two more coming in next week. And we love active retirees for adopters. Get your MIL to drop us a line at [email protected] or check my sig for our website. The little guys aren't listed on Pet Rescue yet, but happy to send photos.

Fingers crossed that Gnarla and babies get healthy and strong and go on to better, happier lives.

Cheryl, nobody would ever doubt your commitment and care. This tragic little family are so lucky to have you.

I looked them up on Facebook. Thanks for the info everyone. I haven't heard anything about them, good or bad, I'd just never heard of them until the candidacy post popped up on my feed. Sounds like they do some good work (but might reconsider the tired, old rant about the irresponsible public for something a bit more modern and strategic, but that's just me).

I was talking to a young woman in the rescue zone who had a Lab-sized dog with a lovely blue coat. I asked what breed was it and she declared "Mastiff X". I gently suggested Weimeraner X. No sale. LOL

I've never heard of them, but their head honcho is running for Senate as part of the new Animal Justice Party. This is just curiosity, another sensible voice for rescue and reform would be a good thing, but this group have never crossed my radar. They rescue wildlife/livestock and seem to specialise in Northern Breed dogs.

I went and enjoyed meeting the dogs. We rehomed a Griffon last year and I was totally in love with her, so nice to see the Griffons, they deserve to be much better known. I kind of concur with the opinion that the breeders on some stands could have been a bit more outgoing. The woman with with gorgeous Clumber Spaniel was great, and the guys showing the AmStaffs did a wonderful job of showcasing their breed. as did the Chow Club. All of the dogs were wondeful, particularly the Shar Pei who was party central all on her own, a great ambassador for Shar Pei Rescue. I'd level the same criticism at the Rescue Zone. Lots of young and passionate rescuers, but not much in the way of people skills. So instead of drawing people in, they just waited for people to talk to them. I'd rather like to have seen a bit more depth in the education and in the commercial stalls. It was all very "Joe Public" and I'd have liked some of the specialist book sellers, or even individual products. At Equitana there's a lot of depth in the education segments, which are worth the price of admission all on their own. Still, it was a nice day out and I saw some lovely dogs and caught up with friends.

I'd urge everyone who has even the most passing interest in the topic of animal welfare to respond to this legislation. I'm a rescuer, not a breeder, but I've read the proposed legislation with alarm. I'd suggest people particularly read the RIS where it is made clear that this legislation is being proposed without any base of evidence at all, in fact the RIS says the government doesn't even know how many commercial dog breeders there are in Victoria. I think the intent of the proposed legislation (to do justice to the DPI) is to ensure that the conditions for dogs in commercial breeding operations are good, and to ensure that puppies going out into the community are healthy and well-socialised. I think all of that could be achieved by outcomes-based legislation - I'm thinking definitions of healthy, well-socialised puppies and healthy, well socialised parents. The kind of detail in this legislation is going to be impossible to police anyway. The RSPCA will ask for more donations to "stop puppy farming", but they will go after small scale backyard breeders or registered breeders - the big, commercial breeders will be left alone. As I said in another post, the definitions of cruelty are being broadened to include parasites (worms, fleas, etc) and lack of grooming, which is all very well, but experience might suggest that once those definitions are in one piece of legislation, they'll be included in another, and they give the RSPCA more power than they already have, without any concurrent accountability. There was an infamous case on DOL where the RSPCA seized (and killed) some little dogs from a good rescuer, on the grounds that they had parasites. The dogs were only recently in from the pound, but the RSPCA took good people to court, drove them out of rescue and made a huge hole in their lives. In general I'm not opposed to the idea of animal rights (as opposed to welfare), but I'm at heart a libertarian and I always opposed to legislation which is not based on evidence, is proposed on the basis of public outrage and hands more and greater power to organisations which are not accountable or transparent. If you're a good breeder doing the right thing, I think you need to care about this legislation and make your voice heard in a logical, consistent and intelligent manner.

Before I start I'd like to acknowledge that this isn't very scientific, the results won't be scientifically valid and I'm sure there are lots of things wrong with the survey, the format and the questions. However, in the absence of any better information I've done it anyway. Recruiting and keeping foster carers is a big issue for most rescue groups; we're like other groups, we regularly call for foster carers and generally are lucky to recruit one or two a year. Rather than assume there's something wrong with the community, I thought it might be worth having a crack at finding out a bit more about what attracts people to fostering or what the barriers are to starting or staying. Rescue on the whole doesn't have much of an evidence base, which frustrates me quite a lot. :-) So I put together a brief survey and I'd be really grateful if people would fill it out or pass it on. It's for people who foster, have fostered or haven't fostered but might have thought about it. If you have ideas about how the survey could be improved (it's DOL, of COURSE you have ideas :-), let me know and I'll incorporate them into another survey we could run next year. I'm just going to leave it open until I've got got a decent sample (I'd like a hundred or so responses) and then I'll collate the results and share them around. http://www.headingforhome.asn.au/someone-like-you-our-foster-care-survey/

We often take Heelers, Border Collies and Kelpies or Kelpie Xs and my experience has been that they rehome well. They can take a couple of weeks more to find a home than a cute fluffy, and you generally won't get the number of applications to choose from. But the upside is that people who are looking for the working breeds tend to have some knowledge and experience, so the quality of applications is often better. Sweet little dogs like 377 rehome really easily. If you're worried about taking the plunge perhaps sign on as a foster carer with Australian Cattle Dog Rescue or SLK Rescue who both specialise in working breeds. ACDR are great outfit and always desperate for carers for the cattle dogs.

First suggestion is a vet check to make sure there's nothing physically wrong. Second suggestion is to bring in a professional behaviourist to evaluate the situation. There could be any number of explanations, including health and eyesight issues, but you need someone who can actually look at your dog and its interactions with your family to diagnose the issue. If you tell us where you are located people will be able to suggest the right person for you to consult. Good on you for wanting to sort things early.

You can download documents with the proposed draft Oreo's Law, which is based on the Hayden Act, legislation which is already law in California. It's a mature piece of work. The central problem for Oscar's Law is that its basic proposition is untenable. Commercial dog breeders lawfully constructed as domestic animal businesses are quite legal. We might disapprove of them, but as long as they have fulfilled the planning permits and infrastructure requirements they are legal. It is unconstitutional for a government to seize a legal, private business, so the only way the government can impact on these breeders is through really punitive legislation. But of course the commercial breeders are financially able to fulfill the requirements because they have lots of resources, and are also realistic enough to know that most of the nit picking provisions of this kind of law are never going to be policed. So closing down "illegal" puppy farms might, or might not happen, depending on what the RSPCA is interested in that day, but the big breeders will just get bigger. On the interwebs I believe they call this epic fail. And yeah, what Steve said.

I'm not a supporter of Oscar's Law because although it has achieved some good (a raised awareness of the problems with pet shop puppies), it's actually had an effect quite the opposite of what it was trying to achieve, at least in Victoria. Last year, alongside our draconian BSL legislation, the government, under the influence of public support for Oscars Law, introduced legislation which allowed for much more punitive measures against "illegal" commercial dog breeders. That was all very well, and we're probably all happy that those organisations are coming under fire. The problem is that the legal puppy farms, those commercial dog breeders which operate as domestic animal businesses and fulfill all the requirements of local planning and DAB Code of Practice are now in a good position to control the market in farmed pets. The new legislation released for review in Victoria is aimed at legislating the ways in which animals are kept by animal breeders (and that's a pretty broad definition), again, in response to public outrage. Apart from the fact that the legislation has no evidence-base at all (quite clearly pointed out in the RIS) and in fact states that the DPI doesn't even know how many commercial pet breeders there are in Victoria, what people have failed to notice is that it broadens the definition of animal cruelty to include things like having worms and fleas or being ungroomed. The point made is that the RSPCA can't act against puppy farms because their legislative powers don't go far enough. I think most of us would see a big difference between a dog which is matted to the skin and covered in flea nests and a dog who has missed a clip, but legislation doesn't differentiate. Legislative creep would suggest that at some stage, in the not too-far-distant future, the RSPCA will lobby for such things to be included in all of the animal welfare legislation, at which point they will have a big hammer to use. I don't think I'm being at all paranoid to suggest that in the current climate where some state RSPCAs are getting into bed with the PIAA and endorsing commercial pet breeders, at the same time as their own practices are coming under scrutiny and being challenged by the rescue movement, the RSPCA will act against rescue and small breeders to preserve their own reputation and economic base. At the same time, the big commercial pet breeders will comply with the legislation because they can afford to, and keep churning out hundreds of puppies. We missed a big opportunity to promote an Australian version of Oreo's Law, which would, I believe, have made a much bigger difference and been a whole lot more useful than the vague and incoherent Oscar's Law.

The Springers I've know have been super active, super smart dogs - a challenge to keep up with if you're not really active. We've just rehomed a Brittany, and she is the most adorable dog. I've never thought of owning one of the spaniels, but she completely changed my mind. Smart, active, strong willed but really companionable. That's my only experience, but if she was indicative of the breed as a whole, that would be my choice.

My cattle dog has taught several litters of rescue puppies manners for me. In general he's a very friendly dog and enjoys the young ones, but he's quite firm with them. If they get over the top he will growl, snarl and then snap at them if they don't get the message. He never escalates the behaviour to the point of hurting a puppy, but he makes his point about manners very clear. He's really behaving very appropriately with naughty babies and although they clearly get the message and back off, they're clearly not frightened of him. But if your dog really doesn't like puppies, rather than giving them a lesson in manners, I'd just be keeping her out of their way. Not all dogs need to get on with everyone and unless its your own puppy there's no reason why she should put up with interactions she finds stressful.

From a rescue perspective it's all about the relationship. A puppy is often a really good way of introducing a new dog into a home with an existing dog because they're non-threatening to the current dog and puppies will usually defer to an older dog. However, some older dogs with no experience of puppies find them a challenge, particularly bouncy terrier puppies. So it depends on the level of experience and tolerance of your current dog. An older dog who has come out of a foster care situation, so has a known personality can also be a good choice, you'll already know if they are good with other dogs and you'll have a good idea of their adult personality. I think that the active, smaller terriers a great match for the working breeds, you'll get similar levels of activity, but not two bigger dog tearing about. A lot will depend on your current dog and her temperament, you need to look for a dog who is a good match. If she's naturally quite assertive a softer natured dog would be a good choice. The male/female pairing is less important than compatibility. Like humans, dogs get on better with some dogs than others, so you're looking for the right chemistry. Being terriers Jacks can be reactive and some can be a bit dog aggressive, but there are lots of them out there looking for homes, so you're sure to find one who is suitable. Depending on where you are, Jack Russell Rescue would be a good place to start. Jill is an experienced breed rescuer so will be able to offer good advice, and probably the right dog. :-)