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Wednesday, February 22, 2012

Creating more successful Fosters

    It is surprising how many people have never heard of fostering an animal. It's even more amazing how little information there actually is on the topic. There seems to be a gap between the rescue community and those who want to help. Its a communication gap.

   Over and over there are people who want to help but just don't know how. Rescues are great at creating a strong community of supporters out of their close volunteers, but repeatedly rely on the same sources of support and become,accidently, closed groups.

   With the developing of social networks this is changing but it's changing too slowly and has not spilled out into the mainstream.

   One of the most awesome sources of information has come from a great rescue activist who I have the pleasure of calling friend. She's become my rosetta stone of the rescue world. And I turn to her every time I want information on a rescue topic. Sandy Unger has experience working with rescues and is part of the revolution of rescue attitude. She spreads the word wide and far to anyone who listens. Branches out to new groups and looks for fresh people to spread the knowledge she has accrued over the years. She was great at recommending some awesome groups who look for fosters and list great foster FAQS on their sites. Sandy and those in rescue like her are a breath of fresh air in a community that desperately needs to gain new support in order to help animals everyday.

   Another little gem I have found is Foster Dogs NYC. Founded in 2009 by Sarah O. after being inspired through her own foster experience. She has also gone on to create Thedogmatchmaker.org which helps prospective adopters find the perfect match. Sarah and her team understood that there was a need in both these areas. A need to pair the right people with the right pet, a need for one friendly place where people could get information on how to help. Petfinder.com is an excellent database of animals needing homes but the concept presented by fosterdogsnyc.com and thedogmatchmaker.org go even further.

   Fosterdogsnyc.com offers a great FAQS section for the prospective foster parent. It lists answers on questions like who will cover costs, how long will they be responsible for the pet and what impact does fostering really have on the pets life.

   Fostering can be a great experience once you get over the scary first step of making the decision to open your home to a pet who will eventually call some place else home. The greatest danger you stand is of losing your heart to a furry friend and becoming a foster failure. If you become a foster failure you will suffer the terrible fate of keeping this companion and possibly being licked to death.

Check out the links below and hopefully you will find the answers you need to taking the plunge and saving a life. Because that's exactly what fostering does, saves a life.

Great resources:
http://www.fosterdogsnyc.com/2011/04/fostering-faqs-for-potential-foster.html
http://www.thedogmatchmaker.org/

Awesome Rescues looking for foster :
All these rescues have facebook pages you can reach out and give them a "like"

http://www.reboundhounds.org/foster.html
http://waggintrainrescue.org/fostering.php?title=Fostering%20%26%20Sponsoring
http://amsterdog.org/
http://www.evessanctuary.org/
http://rescuzilla.com/
http://poshpetsrescue.org/category/adoptadog/

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