Urgent Advice needed re foster dog

The rescue have now found her a new foster home which has passed their home checks, but it is in Wales and I am in Sussex.

I have agreed to keep her til she goes there as they have assured me it will be this weekend.

I now have an incredibly strict no food anywhere policy and only let her out with the two dogs she doesn't seem to fight with too badly. My beautiful bitch she tries to savage I am not allowing out at the same time as her but it makes life difficult and stressful and couldn't go on long term.

My dogs are quite stressed by her and when I let her out last night the old boy and the pup hid in a cage together!

My EBT has decided to distance herself completely and has taken to living in my bedroom. She comes down for meals and wee breaks and then sits by the door to be allowed back up stairs. It is like having a teenager in the house again!

She is very good in the car but that is a long journey for her. If I sent her blankets that she has in her crate so she knows the smell do you think that would be comforting for her?
 
Jodie that would be a very kind thing to do, I think you have certainly had a rough deal, how much info were you given on this dog prior to fostering. From what you say it sounds as though she has been passed around without anyone actually discussing her problems and accessing the right home for her.

I also foster but the dogs are assessed at the kennels first before being passed on to foster homes, even doing it this way its a huge learning curve for you and the dog when they come into your home, the fact you couldnt get hold of the rescue in an emergency is also a worry. I in your situation wouldnt foster for this rescue anymore.
 
I wasn't given very much info about her at all. The first thing I asked was if she was good with other dogs and I was assured she was. Her aggression has got worse since she has been here. She isn't too bad with the pup and the old boy although she has had a go at them both and they have the wounds to prove it.

I have just been looking back at my notes to the rescue and she was always very food proud but easily sorted by feeding her away from the others. She had actually been with me nearly a month before the serious aggression started. I wonder if it is because she was beginning to feel settled and wanted to establish her place in the pack and Diva was the weakest so the easiest one to attack and rise above? Dog psychology is not my strong point so I could be completely wrong.

I feel I have learnt a harsh lesson and definitely won't be fostering again and potentially upsetting my dogs.
 
Honestly for the couple of days that's in it I would not feel guilty about keeping her completely segregated just to be on the safe side. It won't do her any harm in the long term and you are keeping your own dogs safe, it only takes a second for things to go wrong.

You've done a very good thing and I am glad you've found a solution.
 
Ok my apologies, I remember watching a few programmes and one of the first things assessed is food aggression and they work with them for a while and if it did not improve then they would never be rehomed (although its been a while since I watched one of those programmes)

Glad she has found a new foster home, I hope they have been informed of her food aggression and she can be worked with, poor girl being passed about.
 
Update for you - Lunchtime today Diva Dalmatian was safely in her crate and the others were in and put of the garden. Foster EBT came up on my lap for a cuddle, all happy and sweet. Five minutes later all hell broke loose. Foster dog came trotting into living room with my guinea-pig dead in her mouth. She dropped it on the floor and immediately attacked my old boy who just happened to be in the same room as her. I managed to get him into her crate and shut the other two in the garden out of foster dog's way. Then took them and shut them in a stable so they were totally safe. I went back in the house and she tried to have a go at me too.

I got straight onto the rescue and said that her aggression was now totally out of control and in my opinion pts was the kindest option for her but apparently no decision could be made til all the senior coordinators have been contacted. She eventually calmed down and I got her in the car and she is now at the kennels where they had arranged space for her. ( not at the rescue kennels who fostered her with me) She was always wary of new people but she got out of the car and was all happy and pleased to see them. It is like she has a split personality.

I think I can safely say that was my first and last go at fostering a dog!!

Just to add, I obviously didn't know the g-p had escaped or I wouldn't have let the dog out but this g-p escaped once before back in the summer and it took me a week or so to recapture him (lots of nettles!) but all my dogs knew where he was and kept coming to tell me and pretending to be pointers but not one of them harmed him at all.
 
Last edited:
Oh dear, what a shame it had to end that way - CC gave good advice when she said it would be OK to completely separate the foster dog for the last few days to avoid any incidents. So sorry about your guinea pig :(
 
I am so glad Diva was shut away or goodness only knows how badly she would have been attacked.

When I took her to the kennels the rescue didn't seem to have told them anything about her behaviour at all.
 
Well to be fair to the rescue, the situation when dogs are in kennels is completely different - they are kennelled alone (or should be) and will only interact with other dogs through the wire fences of the kennels (if there are any). Also dogs will behave very differently in different circumstances, depending on the stressors that are triggering the behaviour. Today, for example, the rescue would have attacked your other dog because she had food (albeit your poor GP!)

I'm glad things will be able to settle down back to normal for you now, hopefully the rescue can find an experienced foster home where perhaps the EBT will be an only dog to see if they can correct her behaviour
 
I hadn't been home very long but was thinking how nice it would be to have things back to normal when Vega my youngest spotty came trotting in to the house with one of my ducks in her mouth.................
 
Jodie3 I've been following your saga, I'm so sorry at what you've been put through. The 'rescue' you fostered the dog from sounds very irresponsible.

If I came across a dog with as many issues as that one had, I would be taking it on a one way trip to the vets. There are plenty of less screwed up dogs desperately looking for homes.

Hope all your menagerie will settle down now.
 
Oh good grief, you poor thing, sorry to hear about your GP and duck.

I'm not having a go but if the rescue are taking all things into account - a dog now known to have food aggression and now known to have attacked other dogs - on a sofa, in an elevated position when there are other dogs around, she had (unfortunately) access to a small furry prey item, with other dogs around - those are all things that can end in fights for dogs who have all their senses, let alone one with no hearing.
The added tension and panic and resultant melee will have probably had an impact on her trying to have a go at you.
This is a dog that needs really, really firm and clear boundaries, everything very black and white, with an experienced person in a single dog household. Anything else would be cruel to her and her next potential new owner.

Has anyone checked this pup out for a medical issue? In the head I mean, or other issues apart from deafness.
 
Last edited:
The rescue have failed this dog big time, they have passed it around until it came to the op who as I understand it it is her first foster, she is so delusioned she is not going to foster again. All the rescue have done is made this dog virtually unrehomeable, who is going to want to rehome this dog? There are so many lovely dogs in rescue chasing too few homes so what chance does this dog have.
 
Dobiegirl- that is my point exactly. She has already been in five homes, six if you count the kennels today, and I just have this horrible image of her being shoved from home to home and back to kennels. She has already been let down so badly and also as she isn't a year old yet and not fully grown how much more powerful and frightening are her attacks going to get? She has three strikes against her already - she is a bull terrier, she is hugely food aggressive and she is deaf. There are thousand s of problem free dogs desperate for a home, realistically what chance does she have? I would have much preferred to have been able to take her to the vet and have her peacefully pts while I held her.

CaveCanem - the guinea had escaped from his cage in the garden, which is where she killed him and brought him indoors. Only my old boy was in the room and he didn't make any move towards her, she just dropped the body and launched herself at him. There wasn't really any panic and the other dogs weren't in the house.

(I personally have no problem with either deaf dogs or bull terriers as I have both, before anyone shouts at me!)
 
Hi Jodie, you know that and I know that because we are humans and we can rationalise things - the only thing the dog will think, especially given her past behaviours is - I'm a big girl, I'm allowed on the sofa - this is my gaff, I can wander around where I want - this is my small furry thing - there's another dog - he might take my small furry thing - get him, quick before he takes it. This is why there should be no ambiguity about where she is and isn't allowed, what she can and cannot have and which dogs she can or cannot be around wherever she goes next - it's too much of a risk to other dogs and humans.

I agree that PTS may be the best option but some rescues think 'healthy' extends to physical health only.
 
I did wonder if her aggression got worse as she became more settled with me and felt the need to either push her boundaries or exert her authority over the other dogs?
 
This is all me just surmising, but she may have just learned, or had it unwittingly reinforced, that she has to fight and get in there first, for everything, and that's how she gets what she wants, and the quicker she reacts, the less warning given, is the way that works out for her best. Other dogs go away, she gets left on her own in her own space, preferably with her thing, whatever that thing may be (person, toy, food, place on the sofa) without anyone else annoying her or (her perception) threatening or scaring her or trying to take her thing.
 
But the strange thing was that most of the time she would be fine. She never minded if I was stroking her and the others came up. When she first came and I was walking them all together I would always have treats for their recalls and that never caused a fight.

Poor girly, I suppose we will never know what caused it.
 
I do agree that after the initial settling in she was probabley trying to exert herself over the other dogs, the rescue should have assessed her after the problem was identified by the original home and a more experienced fosterer should have been used with behavioural advice back-up.
 
I think they were just desperate to find any home for her. They had placed her in a home who apparently had deaf dog experience but they kept her less than 24 hours and then told the rescue she had to go. The rescue didn't know me or my dogs, the person wanting rid of her brought her to me. I don't know what she had done there but the woman said she had so many issues she didn't think they should be re homing her anywhere.
 
I'm sorry to hear about your GP :( I will never foster again after a bad experience. Fostered 4 dogs before the one that put me off. Now my OH and his friend have scars as a permanent reminder of last foster dog! I thought he should be pts but rescue didn't agree and he is back in kennels. It isn't a question of if he will bite, it is when and I do not think a dog like that should be re homed.
 
Copperpot, that is horrible. Your poor OH and his friend. I do think that some of the rescues have a very strange attitude when it comes to trying to rehome some of these dogs that really should be going nowhere.
 
Yes it was Winnie. Diva seems ok, just very scabby!

It is amazing what a relief it is to do simple things like feed the chickens and not have to worry about it starting a fight if I dropped any near her. My four have all happily eaten their chicken necks from bowls on the floor together, not a cross word to be heard!
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Top