koalathebear

Heike is wonderful - so generous with her time, too. It's clear she's in it for the love of the dogs and it's not all about money for her.

I seldom come in this subforum - makes me so sad ... so I just read about Toby. I am so sorry to hear this news. I've always thought he looked like a gorgeous boy and one of my favourite photos of him was the 'kangaroo' photo you posted in the Kelpie thread. Take care of yourself

We still show up to Casey every week at 10am on Sunday with our monsters :) They have a blast. Some photos from the romps they've had. We've seen DOLer Clastic with her dog Pepper, DOLer kumaakita with her dog Kuma and DOLer wuffles with her dogs Satchmo and Ava. The dogs also enjoy playing with a bunch of different dogs that show up.

Photo of Baxter (previously Nova) in his new home Frida in her new home So big now! Dodge's owner was never found so he went into rescue. He is still extremely timid although much improved. He's ended up being our first foster failure

I think people have a strange notion that if you dump the dog on a large property with lots of space, it will magically self-exercise and self-enrich. Annoys me a lot ...

The one that frustrates/upsets me the most is the seemingly sudden realisation that "I can't offer the dog what it needs" because it's letting them say that this is all for the dog's benefit rather than their own convenience. On a related note, I particularly hate it when they rehome a Kelpie or other working breed and say that it would do best on a farm or a large property. I'm not sure why they assume that dumping a dog on a farm or a farmer is going to solve lack of enrichment/training etc ... Then again as people have pointed out to me, it's frequently for the best - the dog's probably better off finding a chance of a new life with someone who loves and values it rather than living with its previous owners ... One dog I fostered was not treated well at all by his previous owners but he is sooooo precious and adored by his new owners. It's just lovely to see that he has finally found the right home ...

So cute!!

Puppy Hoover had his spethal moments ... Hoover having his bum bitten by Ollie, one of our foster dogs and Nova one of our other foster dogs Frida, one of our fosters looking very unimpressed by the bath she received in readiness for collection by her new family :)

We just supervised our two when they were first exposed to the tree and corrected them if they showed too much of an interest. Then they were fine with it and ignored it. Some photos here of the dogs and the intact tree.

I think it's just one of those things people say to make polite conversation - like "how are you?" without pausing to hear your reply or commenting on the weather ... Or every time I say I have Kelpies, people say: "Geez, you must be very active" etc.

Hullo, here's a list of the AWDRI dogs being fostered in Vic.

Hi Burkes - youtube used to block them outright because they are owned by third party rights holders but now they seem to have a more sophisticated approach of identifying the song and then placing ads on the page i.e. I get a notification that the song belongs to so and so, there is to need to take it down but they will put ads around the video and presumably the revenue goes to the rightsholder. Practically, although the enforcement risk is pretty low, if there were any issues, I'd just take the clip down and use a crappy golden oldie song that no one cared about anymore.

Hi Clover, not a silly question. I believe in New South Wales you have to hand the dog in to a pound or a shelter. In the ACT, if there is no ID, you can hand the dog into the pound or keep the dog at your house for the owner to contact you directly so long as you notify the rangers and post the details on the TAMS website. Information here: This dog has no microchip or identification. Impounded dogs are held for seven days while DAS try to locate the owner and for the owner to come forward and claim the dog. Unclaimed dogs may be sold or euthanised by DAS after this seven day period. Dogs in a home have longer. We have been monitoring the Lost Dogs page and he is also listed on the pound page called Dogs Found by Members of the Public. The dog is also listed as found on riotact (an ACT chat forum), gumtree, RSPCA ACT and here on DOL. We've also sent emails out about him. Thanks for your concern about my dogs. I wouldn't let him stay here if we had any very young, very old or sick dogs - or any foster dogs. As we foster dogs, we keep our dogs up to date with their vaccinations and their flea meds. There is, as you say, a risk in exposing him to our dogs but he appears healthy and our dogs met him for the first time at our local dog park and he had been staying for the last day or so with a couple and their two small white fluffies. He had already fallen in their pool once and their fence was low and I agreed with them that this dog would probably not do very well in a pound environment so we're going to see if we can find his owner this way - which we have done before. With Snoop the dog, earlier this year, the pound website enabled us to located him and get him to pick up his dog from us past midnight on the same day.

First of all, good on you for considering a rescue dog and giving a dog a second chance at a better life :) Secondly - sorry this is so long :) Before I started fostering, I have to admit I also had the same perception that rescue dogs were more likely to have problems/behavioural issues than other dogs but now, several fosters later, I would be very happy to recommend the right rescue dog to the right family. I'm relatively new to fostering but I have been reading and observing for a long time and even now, I get to see a lot of what happens with other people's fosters, both within my group and other groups. Choosing a Group. As everyone has mentioned, it's important to find a good group that has a good reputation for not turning its back on you after the adoption is finalised. The group I'm with allows trial adoptions for non-puppies i.e. you can return the dog and not have to pay the adoption fee if you decide no to take the dog after the trial is over. Breed. If you have a preferred breed, then a breed specific rescue will often have the sort of experience you need to select the right dog. For us, fostering was a lot like applying to adopt as was very important to us that we only get given dogs to foster that were compatible with our existing two dogs and our lifestyle. We have a very good relationship with the coordinator and she makes sure that only suitable dogs are given to us to foster - she has a very good idea of what we handle. Usually smart, crazy, untrained Kelpie-ish dogs that have been dumped because their owners did not train them :) We are not equipped to deal with dogs with severe behavioural issues (fence jumping, resource guarding, aggression etc). Reviewing applications. When adoption applications come in, the carer has a lot of say in whether they think that the family is suitable for the dog. With the applications I review where I have very strong reservations about the suitability of the dog for the family, my views have always been taken into account. With my group, they will tell applicants either in the description or in response to the application that a dog is not suitable for certain types of family. For instance, I do music videos for other people's foster dogs as well as my own. With Ellie May, made it clear that she could not be in a home with chickens. With other dogs, I've made it clear that they can't be in a home with cats or other dogs etc.Learning about the dog. After that, it is very much a dog by dog/foster carer by foster carer approach. For some carers, they choose to provide a loving home environment and feed and care for the dog and leave it at that. Other carers choose to do more training with the dogs - it's really a decision for the carer so you will need to talk to the carer of your chosen dog to find out that dog's 'status'. It should be a detailed discussion right down to what sort of food is the dog used to eating, where is the dog used to sleeping, has the foster carer let the dog on the furniture, has the dog been an outside or an inside dog etc. For us, we like to do some training with the dogs and we have a checklist of all of the training requirements we want all of our foster dogs to leave with. This applies to older dogs as we do not have such high expectations of very young puppies :) This is just our personal choice - my view is that a lot of people who want to adopt a rescue are either: (1) wanting to do it for altruistic purposes; and/or (2) not wanting to deal with training a brand new puppy and so have an expectation that the dog comes to them with a set of basic house manners and basic training. Toilet training an older dog. In my experience, the older dogs have been easier to train than the puppies because: (1) our two resident dogs are so good about showing the new dog the ropes; and (2) older dogs have more bladder/bowel control so it's so much easier to get them to hold on in the night etc. The house training principles are the same as with a puppy though - no unsupervised access to the house, be on hand to correct them and section off parts of the house you don't want them to go and gradually give them increased access - or keep them on a leash whenever they are inside. Boundaries. Our dogs are allowed on the bed and day bed when invited and parts of the sofa (covered by a dog sheet). We 'discriminate' against our fosters and they do not have the same privileges that have been earned by our resident dogs. This isn't to be mean, it's simply because I have no idea what the new family is going to permit in the dog and while it's easy to teach a dog to get upon the furniture, it can be harder to train it to get down. Some people might be very angry if the new dog jumps up on the furniture. Thus, we train our fosters not to go up on the furniture and leave it to the new family to give whatever privileges they choose. Funnily, one family who applied for a dog initially wanted him as an outside dog but we convinced them to crate him inside at night - he was given nightly bed and sofa privileges from day one!!! The Right Fit. I am very anxious to avoid bounce back dogs because I think that it's very unsettling for the dog so the dogs never get rehomed with a family until I feel that there's been full disclosure and consideration of requirements depending on how dog savvy the family was. For instance, one of our younger fosters was more cute but had more training to do so out of two applicants, I chose the family with the more dog savvy handler who was prepared to do formal obedience and already had a dog that was obedience-trained. With the less experienced family, I placed a not-so cute dog with them (still lovable though! :) but much more trained, requiring less effort from them. With one family, in addition to the trial period, I let them have the dog for a weekend to see what sorts of things they liked/didn't like so that we could take him back for another week or so of training in the areas identified. With one dog, the family was patient enough to wait until we had finished addressing the dog's nuisance barking when left alone in the yard before taking him on and they also followed our instructions for the first week he was with them to make sure the extinguished behaviour was also extinguished in their yard. Some people like/want a challenge so even the naughty dogs can have a perfect home as long as you find the owner who WANTS a project like that - as long as they know that they are getting into :) Crate Training. We make sure our fosters are crate trained. They sleep in our bedroom but before we adopt them out, we move them to different rooms of the house so that they won't cry if the new family chooses to put them in a different room (eg kitchen/laundry/lounge/family room etc). We lend the new family a soft crate to help the dog settle in and to date the families have always then gone out and bought their own crate for the dog. Resident Dog. If the family has a resident dog, this is very much taken into account. Ollie was going into a home with a 9 year old female cattle dog so we went to great pains to make sure that their first meeting went smoothly and we maximised their chances of getting along. If there had been any thing of concern, I would not have let them have Ollie on trial. We also let them know that if during the trial there were any issues, they could call us at ANY time of day and we would come and take Ollie away. Being honest. We also make full disclosure. For instance, one of our dogs had a bad habit of nudging humans when he wanted pats :D We could have trained it out of him but the family felt that this was something that they could work on. We advise the families if the dogs have/have not experienced a thunder storm, fireworks, razor scooters, lawn mowers etc. We expose the dogs to noisy kitchen appliances, children, cats, other dogs (big, small, fluffy), strangers, car travel (crate and in a harness). We take them to a friendly dog park in controlled circumstances. Don't just love them and leave them. I let the families know that they can always contact me if they have any issues about the dog and if I can't help, I can put them in touch with someone who does. My group has a right of first refusal to take dogs back after the expiration of the trial if the owner doesn't want them anymore but I also give adopters a promise that if at any time they do not want the dog anymore, I will take it back and refund their money. It's a personal promise from me rather than the group but I cannot bear the thought of any of my fosters being dumped at the pound. Share information. Finally, I keep a very detailed blog about our fosters over here. It's very funny because all of the families in the lead-up to adoption follow the blog very religiously and will even email me to remind me if I haven't posted an update :) Before the dog even arrives, they are already very familiar with the dog's pluses and minuses, quirks and temperament. I find that because they have been involved in the dog's fostering/training 'journey' and are aware of the dog's shortcomings, they adopt with their eyes wide open and formulate strategies for addressing any issues before the dog even arrives. At the end of the day, it's about you getting as much information as you need to feel comfortable about the dog. It's similar to finding the right breeder of the dog for you - so ask a lot of questions and don't take on a dog that someone is just trying to offload but adopt a dog that is truly the right fit for your home.

Of course I don't mind! All the dogs in the videos in the link I've sent you have found new homes or had applications for them. Kimba had an application within a day of the video going up and Ellie May within the hour :laugh: People want to know/see as much as possible about the dogs so the videos help. It's always easier doing it for my own fosters though because I can make sure we have good photos and video and we also teach all of our fosters some tricks that make the video a bit more entertaining. It's always hard for me to do much when the dog is untrained and all of the video is just the dog sniffing the ground :p

Rozzie - I thought possibly Koolie, too :) Sometimes I see spaniel in him, too. He's very interesting-looking. Heh heh my husband was joking we should call him Spotify because of the dots on his nose :) Thanks for posting! I've done some more videos but not for my own fosters so didn't post them here. The videos are here. Hope you enjoy!! :) The videos really seem to work at getting a dog notice but alas, petrescue doesn't allow videos uploaded now so all we can do is a link to youtube.

Very cute! How many foster failures do you have so far? We have been strong so far but it's still early days :p

At Casey Dog Park this morning, we met a couple who had found a lost dog in Florey. He is not desexed, not microchipped and had no name tag. He also appears very timid. They've listed him on the TAMS website, RSPCA ACT website and gumtree as 'found' to maximise his chances of being found. He is totally fine with other dogs and gets along well with Elbie and Hoover. He appears a bit shy of new people although not hand-shy etc and once he has settled, is very affectionate. Absolutely no signs of aggression. Someone has suggested he might be a worker which might explain why he is shy but not frightened. We are babysitting him until his owner is found/a new owner is found because the lovely people who found him have low fences and a pool. He's a funny-looking little dog. We're guessing border collie cross but he could be anything really :)

If a fear is irrational - then who knows how someone will respond? Also, there are heaps of posts here on DOL that talk about how DOLers would react to a strange dog rushing them and their dog - these range from using boots to kick them to whips, cattle prods and sticks ... The OP already admitted to making an error of judgment. My dogs are always on leash when out in public (except at the dog park). I'm not so fussed if the dogs go running up to people at our favourite dog park because the dog park is slightly different from an offleash area that is shared with doggy and non-doggy people.

What a horrible experience for you. I'm not trying to justify the man's actions, but some people are desperately afraid of dogs, regardless of the size - some people are born with it, some people are still traumatised by previous bad experiences with dogs. I have a relative who is absolutely terrified of dogs - we had a tiny, very cute border collie foster puppy recently who was about as unthreatening as you can imagine, but just the sight of it terrified my relative from several metres away ... We found it inexplicable because of how we feel about dogs but for her dogs, are very frightening ... For my own part, when I'm out walking with my dog, I get very nervous if an offleash dog rushes up to us, too - you frequently don't know if the dog is friendly until it gets close. Anyway, sorry you had such an unpleasant experience.

Awww, thanks Weasel :laugh: I'm a lazy sloth about many things, but not about dog training. I normally wouldn't even post in a 'prong collar' thread because these threads tend to go in endless circles, no one convinces anyone, people get snotty, someone goes too far, Troy has to intervene and the thread just gets locked but I just wanted to let people know that the prongs aren't just used by people with Big Strong Dogs or people who are Not So Zealous About Dog Training. Working with different dogs, I've seen that some dogs are much easier to teach certain things than others. Just randomly, one of the fosters we had was sooo smart and we were able to teach him heaps of the basics (including loose leash walking) and we were even able to teach him a bunch of tricks but we could not teach him shake hands which is usually the easiest of the tricks!!!