Greyhound Fostering – How you can help

We are currently not looking for foster homes but when/if this changes and you feel you meet our criteria, please do get in contact, when we start advertising again. 

Greyhound Lifeline uses foster homes for greyhounds that have returned or come from a house environment, a special needs greyhound, one that has medical needs and needs constant monitoring or one that has a behavioural need/destressed in a kennel environment. 

Can you help a greyhound by fostering?

In order to foster for Greyhound Lifeline you will need the following:

A garden, securely fenced to 6 ft high.

You must have a work schedule flexible enough that the greyhound will not be left without human company for more than 5 hours at a time.

You need to be prepared for and be willing to work through and correct a variety of potential teething problems. These might manifest as inappropriate toileting, unwanted noise, destructive behaviour, fretting, pulling on the lead, stealing food or indeed any other type of unwanted behaviour.

We need your guarantee that every time you take the dog out for exercising he/she will remain on the lead and be wearing a muzzle.

We need you to contact us promptly if you are having problems.

We need you to give us plenty of notice if you are planning a holiday or trip where the dog cannot go with you.

We need you to give the dog love and care, but also need you to maintain basic ground rules in order that the dog can be successfully re-homed in due course. For example, we discourage fosterers from allowing the dog to sleep in their rooms/on their beds. Whilst this may be acceptable to the fosterer it may be totally unacceptable to the new adopter. It’s very hard to train a dog away from bad habits and allowing this behaviour also sends the wrong signals to the dog. In some cases it can cause behaviour problems like anxiety on being left.

We need to know that your children (if applicable) will be supervised when they are in the dog’s company and that both dog and child will be corrected if inappropriate behaviour is seen.

We expect you to begin and continue with socialising the greyhound amongst other breeds of dog by taking him/her for daily walks and encouraging supervised canine meetings.

We need you to provide feedback about the greyhound in your care. Has behaviour improved, what is the dog frightened of, is it good with other breeds of dogs, cats. Can he/she do stairs, laminate floor etc?

We need the greyhound to be available for viewings at reasonable times and with reasonable notice. Most viewings are at the kennels, but if your foster home is some distance from there we may suggest another place or perhaps a viewing at your home with your aproval.

You need you to be flexible about how long you can foster for. Short term foster homes have their place (emergency arrivals), but long term are by far the best. We don’t know how long it will take to home a specific dog. We have homed new arrivals within 48 hours and we have some residents who are still looking for a home after 3 years! We therefore have no idea how long you may be fostering any individual for.

We would like you to promote the greyhound in your care and help us to actively seek a good home for him/her.

What can you expect from us?

A home visit (same as we’d give for an adoption).

Help, advice and support.

We will try and pick a dog suited to your needs, experience and domestic situation for you to foster.

All the necessary food and equipment for the dog in your care will be provided or if you are not within easy travel distance we will re-imburse reasonable feed costs on provision of appropriate invoices.

We will ensure that the greyhound gets veterinary and parasite treatment as required (routine vaccination, flea and worm treatment etc).

If a non-routine trip to the vet is required we will agree to the dog going and make arrangements to pay for his/her bill, but with the exception of life threatening emergencies we need to discuss options with you first. For example, blood in stools following an upset tummy is most often not an emergency, it is commonly a normal side effect of an irritated bowel. Many inexperienced people however would rush the dog to the vets creating an un-necessary and expensive bill that takes money away from where it is needed. We are not of course saying that blood in stools is always unimportant. Please just talk to us first, let us ask questions and if we are unsure of the best course of action let us talk to our vet (phone calls are free) to see what is advised in your foster dog’s case.

Third party insurance cover for your foster dog.

What we won’t do:

We won’t pay you to foster a greyhound.

We won’t pay for damages to carpets, furniture, vehicles or any other of your posessions. You need to accept that fostering a greyhound is very much at your own risk before even taking a foster dog home.

We won’t pay for you to have a life long pet free of all responsibility. (Sadly there are a few folk in this world that like to claim for new suites etc from charities, not promote the greyhound for adoption and keep the dog/bitch forever in this way effectively as a free of charge pet.)

We will not pay for steak or premium, very expensive, brands of dog food (unless for medical reasons and on veterinary advice), but we’ll advise you on brands/types of feed and acceptable costs that we will be able to fund if travel to the kennels to re-stock dog food is difficult.

What is the benefit of fostering to you?

You gain canine experience and knowledge.

You can take the credit for our truthful and detailed dog description. Without you we cannot tell people how your foster dog behaves in a home or what his/her specific likes or dislikes are.

Not only have you enabled one dog to experience the joy of a home life, you have also freed up another vital kennel space to allow a 2nd greyhound into rescue for it’s chance of a home.

You are doing something worthwhile and charitable from your own home.

You will develop your own domestic fitness routine (dog walking), you have access to your own relaxation specialist (stroking a pet is thought to be therapeutic and relaxing), you have a special friend to greet your homecoming with absolute happiness whatever time of day or night you may return. Always happy to see you, your foster greyhound really doesn’t care if your hair needs a wash, your clothes are dirty, or you have a streaming cold. He/she will love you whatever you look like.

Adopt a Greyhound from Greyhound Lifeline »

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