I think it is too hard to rehome an animal

[SuperHans]

I bought a puppy a few months ago and I really love him - he was the right choice for us. He cost £100.

He was vacc's and I will pay to have him castrated soon.

He has been such a success that I have been looking into getting him a companion. I would like to help a dog and rescue them but they want stupid amounts of money and loads of home vists.

I am just put off, and it is a shame because I could easily home another dog and give him a good life.

I think I will just buy another puppy I am afraid.

sugarpastefrog - sorry bomb proof was probably the wrong phrase, see a previous thread im on i would never trust my dogs 100% with my kids hence i dont leave them alone in a room together as you never know. The 2 year old could poke the staffy in the eye and she could turn. I dont think she would but you dont know. Shes never gave me a reason to doubt her but like you say on that one occassion she could bite.

as sugarpastefrog said any dog can turn a friend of mine got two rough collie pups when her kids were babies so the dogs grew up with her kids, 11 years down the line one of her kids was just walking past the female dog and for absolutely no reason whatever the dog flew at her face and result was a twenty stitches scar on her,

Learning as i go along, ive got a fab Staffie but the Patterdale cross is a different kettle of fish all together, what a little minx. Ive got the woman from the flat over the roads towel in the washer as shes just pulled it off the line and over the muddy grass, mastered just about everything bar how to stop hr pulling washing of the line Im going to hang it back up and hope non of the neighbours grass us up

lol the words patterdale and minx go together very well lovely wee dogs but are known for been characters in the best sense of the word i had a cairn terrorist for 15 years so know where your coming from

mine looks like a terrorist, its short haired black and tan but got a long black beard only on bottom jaw ha ha (no offence to any terrosrist)

ROFL :)my cairn looked dead cute and he was great with people but hated every other dog that existed he used to face up to rotties, dobies, german shepherds and staffies were top of the hit list in his book, taking him out was a nightmare (always on lead) some poor innocent friendly dog would come over to say hello and his hair would stand on end, exit one confused dog and standing there one smug cairn even when he was old he would still want to have a go just didnt have the back up anymore

Quick question for some people who clearly understand this more then me.

I never knew until reading this thread that Battersea was a pound, rather than a rescue centre. Now my query concerns cats, not dogs (sorry, am a cat person, and proud of it), so obviously there is a huge difference in the requirements of a prospective adopter for a cat, and I feel confident that, even though a home visit wasn't necessary, they did conduct sufficient checks and interviews with me to be sure I was the right home for my old boy.

However, what are your feelings on the money side of things, i.e. the fact that I, through my donation for my cat, was financially supporting them? Should I have tried harder with CPL? I phoned CPL several times and left messages on the answer phone, but didn't get a reply, so decided to go to Battersea instead. I just assumed that, as long as my money was supporting the rehoming of abandoned animals, it was doing far more good than lining the pockets of breeders (not that I would ever have gone through the kitten/breeder route, given the number of abandoned cats in the world). But does finanical support for a pound inadvertently assist in the bad practice and negative cycles described earlier by Val?

issey-mines nearly 9 months old and has my staffies life, she can get quite aggresive with her if i take my eye off them but the staff is 4 stone and has worked out she can just lie on her. When i take her out she runs away from other dogs (stange as shes not at all scared of the staff0, this could change though. I wish the staff would tell her off but she wont she just puts up with it bless

lisa if you hadnt rehomed your cat from battersea she wouldnt be with you now so well done for rehoming a rescue cat, and though battersea is what it is they do rehome a lot of animals so every one they have rehomed is one less PTS, the CPL tend not to have rehoming centers they tend to have cats in seperate foster homes so phoning them is very dependant on someone being there to answer the phone i thought everyone knew that battersea was a pound rather than a traditional center where there is a waiting list, working at a rescue sometimes you have to look at life realisticallyy. there a lots of cats who come in that i could happily rehome but i have 6 cats, a dog, a rabbit and a hamster already so no room at the inn, and my pleasure comes from finding that cat that week another family to live with, vallhalla your siamese cross sounds georgous my blue who is my latest rescue cat is half siamese and hes got the most fab personality of any of them

fifi shes a teenager and like most teens shes testing the boundaries one day she will go too far with the staff and will learn her lesson my cairn was eight years younger than my border collie and did exactly the same things to hiedi and one day she pinned him down sat on him for an hour and he never went for teasing her again, she was 17 when she went (cancer) and skips went looking for her they were friends forever after she put him in his place

Thanks Issey. And to be honest, I'm not sure how easy they were finding it to rehome him anyway. I walked in there and asked them to show me the cat no one wanted. He was old (not sure how old, but to their credit Battersea put 7 years on the documentation, to help me get insurance), had a heart murmur and a bit of a mean old temper. Definitely not one for a house with small children or sensitive wallets! Now I realise they're a pound, it's likely he'd have been PTS.

The problem with CPL is that, even if you leave a message, they don't always call back. I kept trying for about a month, but was approaching the end of summer holidays, and wanted to allow a couple of weeks before uni started up again to get a cat settled, so opted for the immediate response of Battersea.

"Vallhala... You are also offering your opinion and while I'm glad to hear that the centre you are involved with has high standards I don't think going to a rescue centre is by default the best option certainly if the centre isn't well run."

No, MrsH, I am not merely 'offering [my] opinion'. I'm speaking from years of first hand experience.

There is a huge difference between opinion and the facts that I've stated. I'm not havung a go at you I'm pointing out how often the things that you have said are mistakenly said by others too and how those 'rumours', for want of a better word, end up being taken as fact by those with no genuine knowledge of the system.

I have heard so many times, "I won't have a rescue dog because my sister/brother/friend/whatever had one and it was a problem, you don't know their history".

And so the rumour propagates.

You don't know their history" is wrong in so* many cases. Many, many rescue dogs handed directly to the rescue are from family homes and if the rescue is a good one all dogs will be assessed regardless of background or what rescue has been told about the dog.

Also, I advised and always advise people only to go to a rescue which is no kill, which neuters, vaccinates, assesses, chips, homechecks thoroughly, insists on meeting all the household and other pets and which offers lifetime support and advice and which always makes it clear by written contract thet they must and will take the dog back at any stage of his life should the owner not be able to keep him.

I do not advise anything less and certainly have never advised that one turns to 'a rescue which isn't well run.'

ScuttleButter, I went through your last post, saying, "Yep! Yep Yep!" to every point. Excellent post!

(And I'm hugely jealous of impressed with your ability to speak Welsh btw). :)

LisasCat, please, please remember that the CPL are, like me, purely unpaid and rescue in our spare time (whatever that is!).

Unlike Battersea we don't have flashy facilities and we don't have receptionists and switchboard operators paid to take calls. We endeavour to get back to people but we have to feed and care for our kids, work, run our homes and care for our own pets too.

Occasionally, once every 6 months or so, I even like to get the chance to go out for a drink with my best pal too! :o

OP, if you're my acquaintance who ranted to me a few years ago about how you didn't " see why you should let someone in your house" to get a dog, I am truly sorry to see you still haven't grown the French Connection up.

If you aren't my acquaintance, then the same advice ("grow the French Connection up") still applies. It's not about judging you, it's about the dog's welfare.

And I'm not impassioned, or anything like that. In fact, I personally detest dogs and probably will never have one. I still think dogs should be looked after properly, and get veterinary treatment promptly.

So glad I was slobbed on sofa watching tv and not on MN last night, when op posted, as I would have broken my personal vow to not get worked up on here!

Pets are a responsibility.
If you can't afford to pay the bargain price of £150 from a rescue centre, you can't afford to own a pet.
Pets cost money, you have a responsibility to ensure their welfare from the moment you become their owner, not some mythical time in the future when your business takes off.

A responsible owner would welcome home checks, they are in place for the benefit of both the owner and the animal.

And no love isn't enough to make you a good pet owner.
We had a rescued Westie who had been 'loved' by her owners, they kept her in an out house, she wasn't walked, fed properly or taken to the vets when she needed treatment. She was one of many dogs that this couple had, they would tell you how much they loved their dogs, but that isn't enough.

Pets aren't some materialistic procession, just because you want one, doesn't mean you should get one. If you begrudge having to pay a reasonable amount of money to become an owner, then how will you cope when the pet insurance won't cover your pet and the vets bills are adding up. If you can't be bothered to travel over 50 miles to get the pet that might be right for you and your family, don't bother getting a pet.

Pets are a responsibility, if you can't meet all of their needs, don't get one.

Val I completely appreciate that, and was why I kept leaving messages with them, and tried to call at different times of the day, in the hope of better luck speaking to someone. But ultimately I felt it was more important I give my newly rehomed cat the time at home with me before uni started up again. In the end, CPL called me back 6 months after my initial enquiry, by which time the old boy was fully settled, had taken over the neighbourhood, killed many mice and scratched my hand to shreds. Ahh, happy memories (wouldn't have changed a thing!). He went on to have thyroid problems, approximately 8 strokes, and was probably blind and deaf by the time he was finally PTS, but I refused to take that final step until he really didn't seem to get any enjoyment from life any more, costing myself several thousand in the process (once the insurance company started ruling out ongoing problems from being covered). So I fully agree with everything being said to the OP, that times of financial difficulty are never the right time to get a pet.

I think the just of it is many people go to rehoming centres which are actually pounds assuming they are rehoming centres. A lot of people make a decision to get a dog and once they want one they want one now so the pounds the easiest option. (hand the money over leave with a dog) This will probably never change, people are always going to get dogs for their kids because they want a dog/puppy. Id never owned a dog before i got the Springer from the pound. My parents had dogs so i was used to being around them and knew how to behave and thought i could look after a Springer with a baby and a 2.5yr old, obviously i was wrong. Thats not to mention the pound actually giving him to me when he should have went somewhere else.

I totally agree that it is wrong for the pounds to just hand dogs out, not just for the animal but also for the familys they are going to, i dont think anyone wants to take a dog home to find it totally unsuitable to their family and have to return it.

I would be interested to find out how many dogs are returned after being taken from the pound and the £60-£80 handed over which is non returnable.

Having read this i would be much more inclined to get a dog from a rehoming centre with all the vet checks etc for the sake of an extra what £50 (smile)

bloody hell

"I think the adverts saying please give a dog a forever home are just nonsense."

OP the key word you're misunderstanding here is forever, if rescues weren't reasonably picky about to whom they rehomed many more dogs that are already unsettled would be bounced back into rescue, or worse.

If you were the dog lover you claim to be you would appreciate the efforts they make instead of whining like a petulant child because the rescues are putting the needs of the dogs above your whims.

Incidentally I volunteer for the Mayhew and they only do homechecks once a dog is reserved. Why would they waste their time? So I find your account implausible.

"Incidentally I volunteer for the Mayhew and they only do homechecks once a dog is reserved. Why would they waste their time? So I find your account implausible."

As has been the case throughout the OP's argument.

Much respect to you, MothershipG. :)

OP's dog is loved, fed, walked - what's the big deal?