My Nonprofit Reviews
Heartache
Review for Toy Poodle Rescue, Dover, MA, USA
Just because you believe you can offer the perfect home, and you are highly experienced with Poodles, and you are highly experienced with rescue dogs, and you are an incredibly responsible and safety-conscious person--that does not mean you will get one of her dogs.
Start by studying her contract (we didn't); my impression is that it is confiscatory. In fact, she told us that she had actually placed a little dog the day before, but apparently on his first night in his new home he was disruptive, and the unsuspecting new Poodle "owner" set him up in the kitchen for the night. Sue said she went to that home the next day and "reclaimed" the dog because he had been put in the kitchen. These are "her little girls" and "her little boys."
She called our vet. She did not call any of the other four references we provided. But we passed the fence test. We are both at home, one retired and one working at home. We are very active.
We were denied the dog who visited because she discovered our previous Poodle had been off leash in the middle of a park playing with her tennis ball. She was elderly, had a limp, couldn't run fast or far, (we'd finally bought a dog stroller for her). She was nowhere any cars or roads, and she was highly trained and responsive. Worse yet, we were accused of letting her "swim in ponds." This was because we let her play with her ball in clean clear shallow water at a beach in Ashland State Park--maybe a mile from a road. Our dog loved it! If that were not enough, we have stairs in our house! At first the visiting Poodle hesitated at them, but then she zipped up to the bedroom so Sue could see where the dog would sleep, whereupon the Poodle hopped up onto our high bed effortlessly!
This dog has been in foster care with Sue for three years.
The process caused us tremendous stress and heartache. That we are highly responsible adults with sound judgment did not seem to count.
The dog they were applying for needs a fenced in yard as she is young and runs like the wind, we have a video showing how fast she runs. So a fully fenced in yard is imperative for this dog. While we were at the home visit the gentleman asked if the dog liked to swim, as he used to take their old dog to the park and then played ball with her, their dog was old and had arthritis. So the dog was allowed to be off leash in a public park area. The problem we always have is people think a new dog is going to behave just like their old dog, these were also elderly people and could not have chased this dog, that they were clearly going to do the same routine as their old dog and exactly what they have stated in their review and let the dog off leash. We reserve the right to decline any adoption, and it was declined based on this issue. There is no point in us requiring a fenced in yard and they take the dog to a public park and let it off leash. We have a responsibility to protect the dog.
