You Can Build a Bridge to a Better Life for Dogs Pat Miller’s How to Foster Dogs is the first book on the market to deal specifically with the care and training needs of foster dogs and how the fostering process works when done through a formal arrangement with an organization like a shelter or breed rescue group. Fostering dogs involves caring on a temporary basis for puppies and dogs who for whatever reason cannot be housed with their owners, shelters or breed rescue organizations. Many shelters now have formal fostering programs for dogs who are too young, unhealthy or have behavioral issues and therefore have to be housed with a foster family or face euthanasia. The book also covers informal fostering situations when families move or have some disruption and a friend or relative agrees to care for the dog temporarily.
You will learn • About the various organizations that seek the services of foster families for dogs. • What a typical formal arrangement between a shelter and a foster parent involves including expectations of care and training, and the support you can expect from the shelter including covering expenses and other legal issues. • About the most common behavioral issues facing foster dogs and puppies including fear and separation anxiety, a likely undeserved reputation for what may have been perceived as “dominance,” and irritating but usually solvable problems such as house soiling, chewing and barking. • How to successfully integrate a foster dog into your home if you own other dogs. • While it is possible that you will end up adopting the dog yourself, learn how to prepare to say goodbye to your foster best friend knowing that you have done your best to build a bridge to a better future for him or her.
What experts are saying about How to Foster Dogs Opening your heart to a foster dog is easy; opening your home is much more challenging. In How to Foster Dogs—From Homeless to Homeward Bound, Pat Miller shares her secrets for success. She covers it all, from training techniques to management tips to support when it’s time to say goodbye. It’s like having a good friend in your corner providing help and guidance along the way. Colleen Pelar, author Living with Kids and Dogs
Where has this book been? Pat Miller’s How to Foster Dogs is an important book that should be on the shelf of every trainer, shelter and rescue organization in the country. This clear and thoughtful book will do a lot to help dogs find their forever homes. Here here Pat! Patricia McConnell, PhD, author, Love Has No Age Limit: Welcoming an Adopted Dog into Your Home
Pat Miller is a Certified Dog Behavior Consultant, dog trainer and author of six books on dog training and behavior including Play With Your Dog, and Do-Over Dogs. She offers training and behavior services, conducts academies for trainers at her Peaceable Paws training facility in Fairplay, Maryland, and presents seminars worldwide.
Miler gives great advice on how to give your foster dog have the best chance in life. Helpful suggestions on overcoming problems, and how to help your charge become more adoptable. Recommended.
Not sure you have what it takes to take on a dog - or another dog? Haven’t had a dog since you were a child when your mother probably ‘did it all’? Never had a dog but would love to get one? Want to learn about dogs?
Fostering may just be your answer.
You Want to Foster, But. . . .
The dog world needs more foster families and yours may be just right!
You will have all the help you need if you research rescue/shelter organizations to find the right fit, gain some knowledge via books like How to Foster Dogs: From Homeless to Homeward Bound and from experienced people, and keep at it by asking the right questions for you.
Foster is also a stellar reference for the experienced foster family, answering questions you may never have thought to ask.
Superb Organization, Easy to Read
Foster begins by defining the term, fostering, and by detailing the types of organizations one can foster for (or foster with), as well as the benefits for you and for dogs. Foster then delves into the various kinds of shelters and rescues and how to select one whose philosophy matches yours and which offers a continuing education and support program for foster families.
“Bringing Your Foster Home”
Don’t know how to get ready for your foster dog, how to introduce him to your canine, feline, and human family as well as his new routine? Pat Miller is here to help, and to give solutions for when things go wrong. She also includes sections on socialization and the all-important record keeping.
Feeding, grooming, veterinary care, exercise, training (and training tools) are covered in Chapter 4 while the final chapter will help you say goodbye – if the foster-dog foster-family match doesn’t work out or when you, bittersweetly, turn your foster over to his forever family. It’s OK to say goodbye.
Prevention and Solutions
Chapters 5-9 discuss common issues that fosters (and all dogs) may have – and how to help those dogs. From common problems like barking, escaping and house soiling to the more complex behavior issues of fearful dogs (“Finding Courage”), and topics such as aggression and separation anxiety/distress (“Home Alone,” a dog’s worst nightmare).
Miller defines and offers solutions of management and training but she begins the ‘problems’ chapters with refuting the fallacy of dominance and the myth of the alpha dog, a much needed discussion in every dog book, for every dog family, in every dog class. Miller was one of the first to help the dog training community heal the damage the ‘dominance’ philosophy has caused to dogs and the bond between them and their people.
Foster is a must-read for all shelter and rescue people, all foster families and even new dog people! But, it is not just a book to read once: rather, keep it handy for the life of your dog.
For those who are considering fostering dogs in their home, this is a great primer. Deciding whether to foster, which types of dogs to foster and tips for training and behavior modification are included. Pat Miller is an experienced animal behavior and training professional who is also an experienced foster parent. Worth the read for anyone considering fostering dogs.
First let me say that I have long been a fan of Pat Miller (and her husband). Second, I have been fostering for almost two decades. I could have written this book myself, but I am glad that Pat was the one to tackle the project. This book will stay on my reference shelf to loan to other fosters in my organization.