Road to Rescue: Dog Rescue Best Practices Manual

Introduction and Definitions

The nation’s largest pet adoption database, Petfinder.com, showcases well over 10,000 adoption groups listing hundreds of thousands of adoptable animals at any given time. Many of these groups are private animal rescue organizations that are operated out of people’s homes, with a network of transport and foster volunteers who support the immense number of animals these rescues save each year. Despite the fact that this industry is obviously sizable and growing, it is virtually unregulated without even a best practices handbook for rescues to use as a reference.*

To create this manual, Up For Pups collaborated with numerous experienced, diverse private rescue organizations and animal welfare societies. After developing the project outline, each rescue wrote about two or three topics, which were subsequently posted on the Up For Pups blog for public discussion. The beginning of the discussion can be found at http://upforpups.org/2011/02/best-practices-manual/. The entire data-collection and editing period spanned six months, and Up For Pups continues to monitor comments on these blog posts for information to add to this manual.

The purpose of this manual is to

Help new rescues do it right from the beginning.

Give existing rescues a measuring stick and guide for maximum effectiveness.

Present a foundation for evaluating rescue effectiveness for those interested in donating and providing grants.

Careful observation of the practices outlined in this manual will help rescues save the most lives, spend the least money, and ensure a good experience for both volunteers and rescued animals. Up For Pups recognizes that dog rescue is not a one-size-fits-all effort and that some upstanding rescues may have policies that differ from those listed herein, but regardless of size or breed, some practices are better than others, which is what we’ve set out to highlight.

*Manuals and standards are available for shelters, but rescues generally run very differently from shelters and cannot necessarily follow similar practices.

Book Organization

Several rescues have been kind enough to provide us with examples of their contracts and documents to give you a foundation for creating your own documents. The Appendix symbol is used throughout the book to indicate when we have included examples of documents in Appendix A. We ask that you use these examples as learning tools only. Using them verbatim is plagiarism, and you’ll need to adapt them for your rescue’s use anyway.

Appendix B includes documents that have been created specifically for rescue use. They are provided in .doc format, so as to be easy to edit as necessary.

Because of the format of the documents in Appendices A and B, we were not able to include them in the eBook version. Instead, at the end of this book, you’ll find links to download the files separately.

Underlined text indicates hyperlinks to websites and chapters. Click on these links to follow them. In case you are reading this on a device that does not allow you to access hyperlinks, we’ve also included all pertinent links in the Resources section at the end of the book. The Resources section additionally includes a hyperlink called Rescuers Ring In. This link points to the first post in the initial blog discussion that served as the foundation for each chapter. Follow these links to see what experienced rescuers have to say about each topic.

The last page of each chapter also includes do’s and don’ts about issues of particular importance.

Disclaimer

Road to Rescue focuses on decentralized dog rescue organizations that function primarily through foster homes. Up For Pups is considering subsequent manuals for other types of organizations, like cat rescues, mixed-species rescues, and centralized rescues with common facilities housing their adoptable animals.

Road to Rescue is not exhaustive. Rescuers will encounter situations not outlined in this manual and will need to treat specific situations differently than discussed herein. Rescuers should consult professionals for their specific needs, especially for legal and financial items.

Definitions

Breeder: A person who mates dogs. Animal welfare organizations generally refer to several different kinds of breeders. Note that the AKC (American Kennel Club) may provide certification to any of the following, so AKC certification is not necessarily an indication of good breeding practices:

Backyard breeder: A person or family that breeds dogs without comprehensive knowledge of breeding. Sometimes people breed dogs to show children the miracle of life, while other times people do it to make money. For whatever reason, the resulting puppies, be they mutts or purebred, generally are not of particular good breed stock and tend to have a high incidence of undesirable physical and psychological characteristics.

Commercial breeder (puppy mill): One who usually breeds multiple breeds of dogs and has profit as the primary motive for existence. Canine health and environmental cleanliness vary among facilities but are known for being substandard. The dogs usually are not screened for genetic diseases, and the breeding stock is generally not carefully selected for resemblance to the breed standard or for good temperament. Most commercial breeders sell their puppies to pet stores or to brokers, who then resell them to pet stores. Many puppy mills have hundreds or thousands of breeding dogs at a time.

Reputable breeder: A breed fancier who usually has only one breed (but may have more); follows a breeding plan in effort to preserve and protect the breed; produces only a few litters per year; breeds only when a litter will enhance the breed and the breeding program; raises the puppies with plenty of environmental and human contact; has a contract that protects the breeder, dog, and buyer, including a clause about taking the dog back for any reason; runs a small, clean kennel; screens breeding stock to reduce hereditary defects from the breed; works with a breed club or kennel club to promote and protect the breed; supports the work of rescue organizations; and cares that each and every puppy is placed in the best home possible.

Breed club: Breed clubs are organizations formed by fanciers around a specific breed of animal. Breed clubs engage in many breed-related activities including defining breed standards, compiling a list of breeders and rescues, and hosting breed-related events. The clubs may or may not be associated with the American Kennel Club (AKC) or other national organizations. Some breed clubs have volunteers engaged in rescue under the management of the club itself.

Distributors:

Broker: An organization (or person) that buys puppies from commercial kennels and sells them to retail outlets. Brokers ship puppies throughout the country by the crate-full using planes and trucks. Brokers must be licensed by the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) and must abide by the shipping regulations in its Animal Welfare Act.

Buncher: An organization (or person) that collects dogs of unknown origin for sale to laboratories or other bunchers and brokers. Bunchers are suspected of buying stolen pets, of collecting pets advertised as free to a good home, and of adopting unwanted pets from animal shelters and then selling them to institutions that use dogs for research.

Guardian: A term often preferred by rescues when referring to the primary caretaker of a dog. The difficulty with this term is that it has certain legal implications that do not actually apply to the relationship between caretaker and canine. Nevertheless, many feel that the term guardian is better than owner because it implies that a dog is more than just a thing people own.

Independent rescuer: An individual who plays a role in the care and re-homing of needy animals but is not officially associated with an incorporated rescue organization.

Owner: While the terms guardian and owner are used somewhat interchangeably throughout this manual, owner generally refers to a person who has a dog but does not provide the proper care to him or her.

Rescue: For the purpose of this manual, the term rescue, when used as a noun, refers to decentralized dog rescue organizations – organizations housing displaced dogs in foster homes as opposed to a central shelter – which is supported by charitable contributions. When used as a verb, the term relates to the act of taking a dog into a rescue organization.

Forever home: A term used to describe an adoptive family.

Foster: This term is used for several ideas associated with temporarily housing an animal in a home. A foster home is a home that provides a safe environment for an animal until a suitable adoptive family can be found. A foster dog is a dog currently housed in a foster home. A foster parent is the person charged with caring for a foster dog. Fostering is the act of caring for animas in one’s home until they are placed in forever homes.

Re-home: To take dogs from one situation and find them a new, more suitable, permanent home.

Shelter: An establishment, usually supported by charitable contributions and/or municipal funding, which provides a temporary home for dogs, cats, and other displaced animals. Examples of shelters are local humane societies and facilities associated with the American Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals (ASPCA). Shelters are also sometimes referred to as pounds, specifically when the shelter has a relationship with the local animal control office.

Shelter/rescue categorizations: Shelters and rescues are sometimes identified using the following terms:

Kill: This term is used to describe shelters and rescues that euthanize animals for a variety of reasons:

Illness (major or minor)

Disabilities

Age (too young or too old to re-home)

Temperament (treatable or untreatable issues)

Overcrowding

Breed

No-kill: A no-kill shelter or rescue does not euthanize animals for population control and only euthanizes animals if they are too sick to be treated or too aggressive for adoption.i However, the definitions of incurable illness or aggression are sometimes defined to fit individual organizations’ agendas. There are very few shelters in the country that truly uphold no-kill standards as they are meant to be.

Limited admission: A shelter or rescue that turns away animals that do not fit its parameters (e.g., a dog is too old, too sick, or the wrong breed).

Open admission: A shelter or rescue that takes in any animal it receives.

Spay/neuter: The removal of an animal’s reproductive organs. This procedure is recommended for population control and for the health and safety of the pet, unless the animal has a preexisting medical condition wherein anesthesia would put him or her at an unreasonable risk of death. If performed at a young age, this procedure helps reduce the occurrence of certain maladies and aggressive behavior.

Other Vocabulary Notes

In this manual, you’ll notice that dogs are always referred to as he or she, as opposed to it. Dogs obviously have gender, thoughts, and feelings. Referring to dogs as who instead of what is not only appropriate, but it reinforces the idea that dogs are not just things.

The Road to Rescue is written using terms that reinforce a mutual respect between dog and guardian. When talking with people about their pets, you can carefully choose your words to do the same. For example, house training is a much more positive term than house breaking, which to some may imply that harsh methods must be used. Word choice may seem simple, but it can completely change the way people think about their relationships with their dogs. 

Chapter 1: A Brief History of Dog Rescue Organizations

The animal welfare movement is well-documented in books and on websites. Even so, pinpointing the impetus for the growth of private dog rescue organizations is difficult for several reasons:

Rescues are generally private entities requiring limited recordkeeping.

Most non-profit animal welfare organizations do not have time or money for comprehensive archiving.

There is no one entity governing private rescue organizations or recording their activities.

Despite a lack of documentation, by studying the development of animal welfare organizations throughout history, we can draw several conclusions about the origins of private rescues:

Animal Exploitation

At least some private rescue organizations were formed in response to post-World War II trends that caused the increased exploitation of animals. For example, some of the first documented private animal rescue organizations were for Greyhounds. Greyhound racing started in 1912, when the mechanical lure was invented. The first circular track opened in 1919.ii The sport was most popular after WWII but experienced a decline after the 1960 Betting and Gaming Act permitted off-course cash betting. The sport again soared in popularity in the 1980s, at which time many press articles about Greyhounds emphasized that they were unsuitable as family pets by showing pictures of them wearing muzzles and describing them as bloodthirsty killers.

Before Greyhound rescues existed, these dogs almost invariably faced euthanization at the end of their careers. In the United States, the first documented rescue organization was founded in 1974, when a Connecticut woman named Eileen McCaughern adopted a Greyhound, a