Refused to rehome a dog ...aibu to think it's a ridiculous decision?

[brettsndsal]

We are a massive dog family.
Over the years we have had a lurcher,a border collie and a poodle all lived a happy long life.
They are part of the family and spoilt rotten.
Birthday ,Christmas presents,taken to the park daily and walks etc etc
We love them like a child basically.
Our last dog Lucy passed away aged 16 six weeks ago.
She was a rescue dog and had a bad start to life.
Anyway I've applied to rehome a dog through two rehoming places.
Both Declined us because we don't have a garden.

We have never had a Garden but that hasn't affected the dog in anyway.
We love opposite a huge park and 5 mins away from the beach.
They've refused to even do a home check because it's not suitable home for a dog.

We applied for a Jack Russell and another poodle.
Even if we had a garden I wouldn't let the dog out alone.

I'm really upset and I don't understand how a garden makes any difference.
They have lots of dogs in at the minute crying out for a new life.
We couldn't love them anymore if we tried

Aibu to think it's a bit shit?

[Thefaceofboe]

The whole system is ridiculous, we couldn’t adopt a Yorkshire terrier a couple of years ago because we didn’t have a 6ft fence. The dog had been in the rescue for some time too.

[liveforsummer]

Oh and I work 5 days a week too, another reason I'd not be considered with no attention paid that ddog goes to my parents every day and is never left for any length of time alone

[Maestoso]

It's rehoming policies that have meant we buy puppies rather than adopt. We work full time. So much better for a dog to be kennelled for weeks, months, years (or PTS) than placed in a loving family home that makes arrangements for daytime care and , in our case, has 5 securely fenced acres for morning and evening exercise when we take care of our horses. Utterly stupid inflexible policies are driving breeding (and keeping rescues in business).

[Lelliebellieboo]

@cheesychip

If you've no garden where will the dog go to the toilet?

We have a garden that our dog can freely go into but he refuses to go to the toilet at all out there. He likes to hold it in until we go for our walk.

[MarisPiper92]

Agree with looking further afield, hopefully some rescues are a bit more reasonable. If you're happy with overseas rescues, I can recommend RANA (www.ra-na.com/).

[flotsomandjetsome]

DB & SIL are both vets. DB was in fact the vet the local RSPCA shelter were using at the time.

DB works full time & takes his dog/s to work, where they have free reign in a large secure barn / field with the other staff dogs and DSIL works 2 days a week.

They were point blank refused a rescue dog by the shelter as they both worked!

When DB was asked to PTS animals they couldn't re-home he declined to work for them any more

[Thefaceofboe]

If you've no garden where will the dog go to the toilet?

Put it on a lead and nip outside with it. My family dog used to refuse to do his business in our garden anyway.

[EmeraldRaine]

Have you considered a foreign rescue? They're normally a lot more realistic about who they rehome to.

[littletinyboxes]

I know someone who is connected to this place www.justfordogsrescue.co.uk Might be a bit far from you but they specifically state that they don't have a one size fits all policy on who can adopt, but rather try to match dogs with suitable families. It sounds like any dog would be lucky to be adopted by you!

[RandomMess]

Just hang on in there, one will come up where you don't need a garden especially as they are expecting a deluge of teen dogs!!

[VeryLongBeeeeep]

OP if you're prepared to travel to Stoke and you like spaniels, try CAESSR. They don't have a tick box form, they try to match the right dog to the right home by actually talking to people on the phone (a novel idea, I know...)

CAESSR

[Needingadvice2021]

We were turned down because we both work full time. But I work from home and we are both homebodies so no active social lives to worry about either. The dog would never be left alone save maybe the occasional hour if I had to nip to a GP appointment and we live near 3 parks, a woodland and the beach. A real shame.

I don't know who could have adopted from these two shelters as their rules included no other animals at all, no children under 10 and must have experience of owning the breed you wanted.

[liveforsummer]

@cheesychip

If you've no garden where will the dog go to the toilet?

On walks like they are meant to I assume.

[Soubriquet]

It’s such a shame this has happened

Rescues can be so strict and it’s ridiculous because it just sends people to buy puppies and those who really are not suitable…those puppies could end up in that rescue that denied them in the first place

What about Many Tears rescue? They are based in Wales but seem to be really flexible when it comes to homing their dogs

[GuppytheCat]

@Flowers500

They regularly give dogs to totally unsuitable people with no experience or understanding of dogs, and refuse them to people with long histories of responsible dog ownership

Our local shelter rehomed a strong, lively, fear-aggressive 3-year-old dog to our 87-year-old neighbour.

[VeryLongBeeeeep]

@cheesychip

If you've no garden where will the dog go to the toilet?

One of our old rescues refused to relieve himself in the garden. We'd pop him on the lead and take him round the block every time he asked to go out.

[GuppytheCat]

She is known as ‘psycho dog’ to the rota of neighbours who walk her because he can’t.

[NutellaEllaElla]

They don't seem to balance the quality of life for the dog that is currently in the rescue for god knows how long, compared to quality of life when rehomed. Bizarre.

[Carboncheque]

A secure garden is a pretty low bar.

[PerseverancePays]

Try the classified ads or gumtree, there’s often unwanted dogs there.

[RandomMess]

It's true you may have more success with going direct to welfare and rehome for individual breeds.

[knittingaddict]

This is going to be a very unpopular opinion, but I tend to agree with the rescue place. I think you do need a garden for a dog to use on a daily basis.

Having said that I think some rescue places are unnecessarily strict. Years ago we couldn't get a dog from the RSPCA despite passing their checks. We got one from the country annex of the Battersea Dog's Home in the end. They accepted the home check from the RSPCA because they knew how strict they were and (after a lot of training) we had a lovely dog for over 10 years.

[Inclinedtochatter]

We have been turned down in the past because of our postcode (a council estate) we are big dog lovers with a lovely garden and plenty of green space to walk them and the vets check they carry out proved we are responsible. The animal shelter is in a 'posher' part of the area and they obviously just assumed we weren't good enough. We have two amazing boxer dogs now that we essentially rescued from Gumtree.

[Berkeys]

We adopted from a reputable Romanian dog charity with UK base. Both our dogs have varying degrees of nervousness and one needed a bit of toilet training and is a bit reactive on the lead but they are actually really sweet girls. Wouldn’t recommend as easy pets for dog owners who aren’t willing to be patient and do some rehab/training but for us they were perfect.

[GalaxyPostcard]

This is exactly why we adopted from abroad. We went with a little Bulgarian rescue where our friends were volunteering as foster for a family of 12 puppies - we ended up adopting one and she's wonderful. Our other dog is adopted from a foster who got her from a vets... her original family had her taken to be put down because she was scared of everything. She's from Hungary originally.

I'd really recommend going abroad. Yes there are some behavioural issues we have to work through but you get that with rescues from anywhere.