Adopting a dog from an overseas rescue centre. WWYD?

[BogeyNights]

We are looking to adopt a rescue dog after years of talking about it and waiting until the time was right. I don't work and my kids are both going to be at High School in September. We feel that we are ready to take on the responsibility.

We've considered puppies, but think that we'd rather adopt a rescue dog instead. One has come to our attention from Europe. I've seen a video, it's a puppy of about 4 months and he is of course very lovely & cute.

I'm in conversation with the centre, but I want to make sure my eyes are wide open before I commit fully to adopting from overseas.

Can anyone share their experiences - good or bad - with me?

Obviously it's risky as we will never have met the dog. I'm led to believe that the costs are set and include the transport, passport, immunisations etc. Is there anything that I should specifically ask whilst we are still in discussion with the rescue centre?

Thanks in advance.

Black Retriever Cross rescue take dogs from Ireland and occasionally Spain. They're on FB.

I'm a little cross reading some of the 'anecdotal' stories offered by some here. I'm not disputing whether they are true or not, but please don't categorise all foreign rescues in the same bucket. There are the good, the bad and the ugly when it comes to UK rescues too!

We have just adopted a beautiful dog from Cyprus. The rescue are fabulous - she has had more health checks (even a hip X Ray, plus numerous blood tests, plus chipping, spaying, jabs) than she would have done at a rescue here. They spend a LOT of time matching the right family to the right dog, and we have UK support here. We were also home checked - and they were very honest about the breed we were interested in.

OP - I suggest doing plenty of research and not rushing. I followed the charity on FB for several months before adopting. So many positive outcomes with happy dogs and families. Happy for you to PM me if you want details of who we adopted through.

Sorry! I've read your replies, thank you everyone.
I've had my home check today and also spoken to the organiser in Cyprus on the phone. I have felt more reassured by that now and the costs etc have been explained to me. The dogs I'm interested in live in kennels but socialise with other rescue dogs throughout the day.
We may well proceed with the adoption if all goes ok with timings and paperwork.

I have tried UK based rescue centres but haven't been able to find a suitable dog so far. Most that I've been interested in have been snapped up already or aren't suitable for living with children or children of less than 14 years old. Some have looked small on photos but on meeting the dogs they are much larger and I wouldn't feel confident with a larger dog. Looking overseas was just broadening my search area really.

Bogey you're a kind soul to take on a rescue, wherever it may be from. Good luck and hope your Cypriot works out well (we call ours The Immigrant )

We adopted from Hungary via Vizlamentes. Although they mostly rescue Vizslas, ours is a German Wirehaired Pointer. He is exactly as they described him to be, and hand on heart the best dog I have ever owned. He was anxious about being left alone (with good reason) but suddenly settled about 6 weeks after we got him, and is now fine with two hours - we've not tried longer yet. They have a fantastic Facebook group where you can post boasty photos ask for advice - better than any breeder I've bought a pedigree pup from.

Sorry but we had a horrific experience adopting from a Romanian charity. It's not just their fault and I don't blame them, but the dog was nothing like the description, we were told we would be able to leave her for up to four hours as we made it quite clear to the charity that me and my husband both work. When the dog arrived, we couldn't leave her, even for a single second as she would tear up the kitchen and ram herself against the door. She was completely feral- understandable considering she had lived in the streets- but she had no clue how to behave in a house and would jump up on to tables, bark at everything. She did not sleep a wink and having been told she was child friendly, she continually jumped up at and knocked over my toddler. I don't blame the charity as I was completely naive myself at how hard it would be, and after a few weeks when I was on the verge of a nervous breakdown, the UK contact for the charity took the dog and is still fostering it. Even she is incredibly experienced with dogs but has had to get in the help of numerous experts and behaviourists to deal with this poor girl, who has obviously had a very traumatic life. It was an awful experience and I felt, and still feel huge guilt and distress over it and the fact that it didn't work out.
So just be careful! It can be very, very hard adopting from abroad.

I have a gorgeous pup from Bulgaria, amazing support network in the UK, no quarantine. We have had her coming up to 3 years now. Things to prepare for are them being very scared, flighty, and needing a lot of time and patience and love- just like any rescue. We struck gold with our girl and I'd do it again in a heartbeat- currently have a 5 month DS so need to give it some time though! Happy to give more info on the rescue centre I used if you like?

Hi there. I am having similar thoughts about adopting from abroad. I have found a great sounding charity, with a base in Taunton, who bring dogs over from Cyprus to be homed.
I have never looked into it before now and are looking at this option as our local shelters are so strict. We work full time but have the capcaity for a dog walker every day and that is frowned upon. Another shelter stipulates that the garden must be surrounded by at least a 6 foot fence. Ours is 5 foot so....
I thought the process of overseas adoption sounded dodgy as of course there is no opportunity to meet the dog first. The charity I am looking at includes vaccinations, microchipping, spaying/neutering and a variety of health checks and blood tests before the dog travels to the UK. All sounds good but of course there is always an element of doubt.
They also have a support network in Taunton but I would assume that if there are issues the dog could not be sent back to the Taunton shelter as it is too small.
I guess my main concern is unknown behavioural problems or health issues. This charity seem very responsible in giving a lot of info and videos of the dog we are thinking of choosing. I don't think they would be lying about the dog as their aim is of course to find these dogs good homes in the UK.
I am interested to read experiences that other people have had.

I think we got our dogs from the same rescue. I wont put the name up. But I have a strong feeling

@notsomanky. You are completely right. I was warned by a UK rescue not to go through with it. I was guaranteed back up 24/7 emergency. The rescues say the dogs are assessed but they are not assessed in the same way as UK rescues do. I will not tell you what I learnt about my dogs assessment but basically when they told me she was good with babies it wasnt true. The rescue did everything to try andmake ne keep a dog that had tried to attack my toddler, telling me it didnt class as an emergency. They are rescuers and they love dogs and havegood hearts but thry are not behaviour experts and when the chips are down they dont have the manpower or cash to back you up. I have learnt the hard way that uk charities put in age minimums for children for a reason. I can not reiterate how much prep I put into my rescue dog. The dog should never have been placed with a toddler.

I have three rescue dogs. Two are UK rescues, the other came from Romania. To be honest, the Romanian rescue has been much more thorough in their home checks and after care, by miles, than the UK rescues we used. I've now got involved with them, and am happy to say there is a huge amount of support and back up. We've had reunions, a dog show, and have a fantastic Facebook page for support. Occasionally a dog is returned, and they are fostered until a new home can be found. The dogs are micro chipped to both the new owner and the rescue's UK address, and all adopters sign a contract that the dog must be returned to the rescue if it needs re homing. 95% of the dogs settle amazingly quickly and turn into lovely dogs. I could add people to our Dacebook page if they wanted to see.. Page after page of people that adore their dogs.

But I would say that, as with a UK rescue dog, but perhaps even more so, you must take on the dog fully aware that there may be settling issues. They will need time and understanding, and perhaps they may not be right for a first time dog owner.

Picture of my Romanian rescue...

Reminded me of this thread:

www.mumsnet.com/Talk/the_doghouse/2577138-Linguatula-Serrata-tongue-worm

Or aren't suitable for living with children or children of less than 14 years old

Bear in mind that overseas rescues may have different ideas about suitability and different assessment procedures.

OP try to dispassionately ask yourself this: you are struggling to find a suitable dog in a country that has one of the world's leading reputations in terms of dog welfare and rescue, a country with decades of experience in fostering and assessing dogs, as well as world class research in the ethology and behaviour of dogs. Instead you are betting that you will find a suitable dog from countries where dogs are often feral, un handled, used to scavenging for food, kept for months on end in kennels, assessed by people with good intentions but, often, limited experience in less than ideal circumstances (e.g. Assesed over a short period of time in kennels rather than a long period of time in foster care).

You sound like a first time dog owner with young children, the type of owner who most needs an amenable dog and has neither the experience nor the time to deal with resource guarding, dog aggression, separation anxiety, persistent soiling and all the problems that typically come with rehoming a street dog.

The U.K. does not have street dogs and I find the British people can't always understand the conditions these dogs have lived in. Yes they are horrific conditions, but they are also the least conducive to making these dogs well adjusted, family pets.

Not to mention that by rehoming from irresponsible countries only encourages the native population to continue being irresponsible. They can continue buying faddy breeds, breeding indiscriminately and chucking their dog out to fend for itself at the first sign of minor inconvenience (usually the first long summer holiday) because, what they see as idiot foreigners, are there to pick up the pieces.

You will hear success stories with foreign rescues, but the odds will be overwhelmingly stacked against you - ask anyone who works in Uk rescue about it.

I rescued my dog from Dali Dog Rescue in Cyprus, the girls there try to help every dog they can. The adoption route with Dali was fantastic, they arranged a home check, vaccinations,transport,all documentation and castration for Jake. If things hadnt worked out they would have taken him back into foster in the UK.
He had been mistreated and spent most of his life in the rescue kennels where there are 4/5 dogs sharing a cage. They have puppies needing homes as well as older dogs. Jake is the sweetest dog and settled well into my home after a few days of wondering what on earth had happened. Please go ahead with it, the dogs are wonderful and seeing all the happy cheerful dogs on the Celebration page on facebook proves it does work.

They also have dogs already in foster in the UK where the fosterer can tell you all about the dog, AND I CANT SEE THAT THE ODDS ARE STACKED AGAINST YOU AT ALL. GO AHEAD WITH IT

the native population will carry on being heartless and cruel whether we rescue from there or not it just means the dogs will be PTS if they arent rescued. I couldnt agree less with the above poster Booboostwo.

samsam123 are you really saying that people cannot be educated with respect to animal welfare and their responsibilities towards their pets? You think that sterilisation programmes are pointless? So what, you are either born British or you can never grow to treat pets properly? Not to mention that PTS is not the worse thing that can happen to an animal and we anthropomorphosize when we claim otherwise.

I wish that they would PTS the Romanian dogs, but they don't, they fling them (literally) in a cage and leave them to rot. In summer it's 40* I. Winter it's -15 and snow, there are no walls. They suffer a lot and the lucky ones die. They barely get feed or water, at our shelter we have volunteers that go in and muck out/clean and feed on a Sunday. That's the only day they're allowed in. The lady that runs our rescue has actually hired a local kennels and pays £1500 a month to be able to take as many dogs out as possible from the government shelters. So these dogs are assessed and have a lot of vet checks before coming. My little Rommie dog has a passport absolutely full of injections.

It's very easy to say ignore them and concentrate on UK dogs (and I have two English rescue dogs as well) but they are not suffering like the foreign dogs are. You have to have a very cold heart to be able to do that once you've seen it.

No I am not saying that. Did I say that NO. Well said honeyroar .

A lot of the big rescues over here take in Irish strays (dogs trust and rspca taking in a huge number). Personally I'd rather rescue through a UK based group so that there is some support and "come back" if it all breaks down as well as if you go through a major organisation you get their full honest appraisal of the animal

If you work or have children they are fairly flexible we found

It costs £300 to get a pet passport and import each dog. Thats a shocking waste of money, it should be spent on neutering, education and euthanasia campaigns in the home country.

What Booboostwo said is totally correct. If people choose to get upset over the conditions in other countries fine; but the rest of the world is a big place. You cant save them all.

Most rescues also run spay/neuter programmes in conjunction with their rehoming programmes.

£300 is not a huge amount of money when you consider that buying from a breeder will probably be £500/600 at a minimum. If you buy any cheaper, you're helping backyard breeding and nothing else.

Many people have tried every avenue to adopt from UK rescues and have been turned down because of ridiculous rules - no young children, no full-time workers, one woman was turned down because she worked 2 days a week (here on MN) ... what do you expect them to do? They are trying to act ethically and not encourage needless breeding but are refused by many rescues.

A good article here about why she got involved.

And a little story from a lady with a rescue dog from Balkan Underdogs "For almost two years these two have spent nearly everyday together. Their bond is remarkable and it was instantaneous. They communicate with each other without a sound. I am in awe of their connection. To all those rescue organisations in this country who wouldn't allow us to adopt because we had young children, you need to think again. The bond between a child and a dog can be utterly breathtaking, but then again I thank you so much because where you said no, my beloved BU said yes"

Perhaps go to the dogs trust then. We found them to be incredibly flexible and realistic about people's working and family lives. A couple of the dogs said for ages over 14 but if the children were sensible they'd drop the ages etc

300 quid is a huge amount compared to what it would buy you in terms of sterilisation, education and PTS, not compared to buying from a breeder.

If UK rescues are turning anyone down I would beg you to think ten times before going to a foreign rescue with looser standards. UK rescues are not in the business of preventing anyone from rehoming, they are trying to reduce the substantial number of returned dogs and the heartache involved in that process. If a UK rescue worries that a person would struggle with a dog the solution is not to get a much more challenging dog.

If we're going to swap MN stories then there is also the poster with the aggressive pondego who gave up after months and months of trying and bites, the poster with the Romanian rescue who had no support from the rescue when things went wrong, etc.