This Is What You Need to Know about Fostering a Shelter Pet for the First Time

Adopting new pets can be a rewarding experience. If you’re an animal lover, you might already have a home with one or more pets. Maybe you’ve considered adding a new animal companion to your home but aren’t sure if you’re ready yet to make the emotional and financial commitment.

Let’s say you want more animals in your life but you’re not yet ready to make a long-term commitment to a new dog or cat. You should consider working with rescue organizations to foster homeless animals.

You can make a huge difference in animals’ lives and help them find their perfect homes. Foster homes are especially important for no-kill shelters, which often have limited space available. With no space to house them, some no-kill shelters are forced to turn away animals in need.

Foster homes make it possible to house adoptable animals off-site until they can be chosen by the perfect family. In the following, we’ll go over what to expect when you become a foster parent and how you can help shelter pets get ready for their new homes.

There are many reasons that foster homes are needed for animals. Many shelters experience severe overcrowding. Foster homes can help relieve that strain by providing a temporary home for shelter pets waiting to be adopted. During natural disasters, loving pet owners often rely on foster homes to keep their pets safe while they prepare to return home.

Military personnel might need foster homes for a long deployment, if no family or friends are available to keep their pets. Regardless of the reason a particular pet is being fostered, shelter or rescue organizations will do their best to match animals with an appropriate foster home. They take into account the experience level and preferences of the foster parent.

There may be reasons a particular animal must be placed into a foster home rather than right into a shelter environment that go beyond shelter overcrowding. Some puppies or kittens will be too young to enter a shelter, needing extra care from their foster parents. Nursing cats or dogs might need a special home placement situation until they can be adopted, and the puppies or kittens weaned.

There may be animals that are sick or injured and need medical care and supervision in a foster home setting. Some animals need extra socialization, both with people and with other animals, in order to be considered ready for adoption. And some animals experience extreme stress in a shelter, particularly older pets. These will do much better awaiting adoption in a foster home.

The first step to becoming a foster parent for animals is completing the application process. You’ll likely need to complete an application on paper or online and possibly have an interview with the foster coordinator at whatever shelter you will be working with.

Volunteers are sometimes asked to complete online training to help prepare them for bringing home a foster pet. Some rescues or shelters will even provide parents with food and supplies, access to a veterinarian, and an emergency number to call if something goes wrong.

Preparing Your Home for a Foster Animal

Before you bring a foster pet home, you’ll want to prepare your space for your new (temporary) addition. You should have a contained space away from your personal pets and family members where the foster pet can feel comfortable and secure. This way, if things get too stressful, they will have a safe and cozy retreat.

Fill the area with some comfortable pet beds, blankets, and maybe a few toys. Keep the area clear of anything breakable or anything with small pieces that your temporary pet might accidentally swallow.

If you already have dogs, it is perfectly acceptable to walk your pets together as a pack with the foster pet. This is good for foster pets and for your own dogs because it provides all of them with important socialization skills.

Your current cats may have no interest in going near the new foster pet. Be sure they have adequate escape routes and an area the foster pet can’t access where they can go. Feeding your animals at the same time and in the same general area is a good way for the foster pet to practice important skills as well.

Spend lots of time socializing your temporary foster pet, taking them to dog parks or introducing them to other pets and people (in the case of cats, too). This will help the foster pet get comfortable around pets and humans, making them much more likely to get adopted in the long run.

Foster “Failures"

Though it sounds like a negative phrase, foster failures are actually something most shelters and rescues look on with joy. This means that the foster home ends up adopting the pet they are fostering in the end, giving them a permanent forever home. Stay open minded; it might happen to you!