This dog IS just for Christmas: meet the pets that are going to foster homes
ANIMAL lovers have embraced the Christmas spirit by fostering pets in need of a home.
The Dublin Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals’ Christmas appeal encourages people to rehabilitate pets over Christmas to get them ready them for the many families who go looking for a pet in the new year.
Abbie, a four-month-old border collie who was found in a shed, will be spending Christmas with the Solan family in Ballyogan, Dublin.
Orla Solan, 46, said: ‘We’ll have her here until the third or fourth of January, just to get her settled so she can be re-homed.
‘It’s important to get them used to the noise of the washing machine, children, the car, the television, that type of thing,’ she explained.
The family have two other dogs that were fostered from the DSPCA before being adopted. ‘Abbie really is lovely, she’s gorgeous,’ she said. ‘She’s very nervous – she hasn’t had the best of starts. She might have been slapped, because she steps back when you come near here,’ said Ms Solan, whose daughter Isobel, 15, is pictured above with Abbie.
The DSPCA said it had had a good response to its Christmas appeal but was always looking for more volunteers.
The organisation provides the food and bedding for fostered animals and a weekly check-up with the vet.
Animals normally stay with a foster family for three or four weeks before returning to the shelter.
Among the other animals finding foster homes are an adult doberman named Nemo who is with a family in Carrickmacross, Co. Monaghan. Fluffy the kitten will spend Christmas with a foster family in Finglas, and Suzy the adult terrier has been taken in by a family in Templeogue. Three labrador puppies, Bubba, Roy and Elvis, have been fostered by families in Dundalk, Tallaght and Clondalkin.
Gillian Bird, spokeswoman for the DSPCA, said people who wanted to foster animals ‘need to be at home most of the time and be available to bring the animal into us once a week for a check-up’.
For more information on fostering, contact the DSPCA on (01) 499 4700.