Pet ownership is on the rise! Many RDMs have added a pet to their family in the last 18 months and lot’s of them have been rescue pets! Here’s the story of 3 local mums who found Rescue Dogs and how they did it!
Carolyn
Finding a rescue dog is a long and, at times, heartbreaking process. We started seriously looking in January 2021, checking out every possible rescue organisation, pound, shelter within 100kms of us, then even further afield!
After a while searching, we applied for a greyhound via Greyhound Rescue and even got as far as the home visit before we withdrew our application. Our home backs on to Bushland and the fauna would have been too stressful for a greyhound. Plus we have a lot of stairs and our fence in places wasn’t high enough to meet a greyhounds safety needs.
Continuing our search, we knew we didn’t want certain breeds/mixes and age was a factor too. We have a lot of friends that have rescue dogs, so they were a wealth of knowledge and recommended we hold out for what we wanted. One tip is that it’s great to have your ‘pitch’ ready, as rescue places are really strict when placing hounds. We missed out on so many!
At one point we thought we’d just try a breeder, but a long waiting list for thousands of dollars was a real turn-off and we really didn’t want one ‘to order’, we really wanted to rescue. But we were getting desperate!
Every day I was checking Pet Rescue, a website that a lot of rescue organisations post to. Then one Sunday morning our pup was there! I emailed immediately and completed the ‘initial’ forms, then by 11am the rescue organisation phoned me! After a 1/2 hour chat (interview) we were deem acceptable to do a ‘meet and greet’.
It was the start of this recent lockdown so I contacted NSW Health and they deemed it a reasonable excuse (to drive 100kms with documentation). So off we went. We were so thrilled when we passed the meet and greet test!!
After that we had another week wait for paperwork, desexing and payment of course. We used the time to buy puppy items and hoped our online purchase of a puppy starter pack would arrive in time! (It did thankfully).
Finally, he was ready for pickup! There’s a 2-week trial/cooling-off period, so once that was finished we were sent the remaining paperwork. Many organisations have a lot of red tape and processes to pass. We were lucky ours was so simple. With lockdown, the Pet Rescue organisation couldn’t come for a home visit, which they usually do within the 2 weeks trial period but we spoke on the phone. Also, rescues now get a one-off council registration which lasts for life (no annual payments).
He’s just had his final (16-week) vaccinations he’ll be ready to venture further than our street next week.
We intend on joining the Brush Farm Dog Training Club, but with lockdown, that’s a bit far off yet. Thankfully they were great at sending information and directing us to free online puppy training courses to get us through this time.
We still are on the Lab Rescue waiting list, we’re number 1500 now!!! (That’s serious too!)
Here is a photo of our lovely boy Khobi.
Julie Perik
Our rescue boy is called Kimba, he is a Bull Arab with the cutest smile and sweetest nature.
We started looking around November last year for a pet for our two kids, we wanted a younger dog so they could grow with it. I searched on many rescue sites or vets that had ads up but none that suited our budget or was fitted to our family.
We had a look at an organisation called Animal Adoption Agency – they have many rescues categories by size small, medium and large. I saw Kimba (his name was Pluto online) and his smile was infectious. So 2 days before Christmas we went out and met him – he was the sweetest playful baby, nearly 11months old.
He was originally a ‘COVID pup’ – the owners didn’t realise how big he would get so left him at the Dog Sitters house and never came back. The Dog Sitter couldn’t keep him and he ended up in Liverpool pound.
Animal Adoption Agency took over and took him to their farm so he wouldn’t be killed as he had been at the pound for nearly 3 months. Now he is coming up on 18 months and is the most playful, cheeky baby there is. He loves people and loves to play with other dogs.
Many people just look at him and walk away from us because he looks ‘scary’ but they don’t even try and say hi to the most gorgeous boy around.
Kimba isn’t my first rescue, but he is my first big dog and I don’t regret getting him! He is part of the family and is a best friend to our kids.
If you are on the lookout for a forever fur friend, I really encourage you to have a look at adopting before going through a breeder – it’s a very rewarding process.
Joanne Nelson
We have been long supporters of Animal Welfare League and I always check out their pets available for adoption. We have an older dog aged 9, a Purebred Staffy costing about $2000 when we got her. She is really anxious with separation anxiety so we thought another dog might calm her. But we had to get the right fit so we couldn’t get an older rescue dog because it would cause too much tension and fighting. It had to be a young dog who would not challenge authority!
I had been sort of looking for a dog for a while, but nothing suitable really came up until one day a litter of Staffy puppies appeared on the Animal Welfare League NSW Facebook page. Their mum had been dumped while heavily pregnant and the pups were born at AWL.
I connected with the story and we immediately called AWL for a meet and greet. I took the older dog with us to check she and the new pup were ok together and I ended up coming back home with a beautiful addition to our family!
Before we officially adopted her from AWL, we were first required to foster her until having her desexed at about 16 weeks. The adoption fee was about $300 and that included her desexing surgery.
Krispy – as in Krispy Kreme (her original rescue name was Crystal) – is now 18 months old and a beautiful cuddly big ball of happiness. She’s about double the size of our purebred Staffy so we are not sure what breed mix she is, but I would take our rescue pup over any purebred dog any day!
