From the people that have had a dog from the SVDR
This is just a VERY SMALL sample of the stories we had had from people that have Fostered and Adopted a dog from the SVDR, we have so many and we will be posting all of them as they come in.
If you are thinking of Fostering or Adopting a dog then do yourself a BIG favour and look somewhere else.
We got our dog from a very poor foster that SVDR used .
He came to us in such a poor condition and covered in fleas and have never heard anything from them since to see if everything was ok, no follow up only our post letting them know that he was doing ok.
A friend and I were having a conversation the other day about SVDR regarding the recent concerns surrounding the 'rescue' and the apparent lack of ongoing support for those who have adopted/fostered dogs and gone on to experience problems and how they have or have not been handled as the case may be. It is my understanding that even though an adoption fee has been paid that SDVR state that if for any reason you are unable to provide a home for the dog that it be returned to the rescue for re-homing. I was just wondering how many owners would now feel comfortable relinquishing their much loved pet back to them to face who knows what kind of future? Knowing what I know now? I know I wouldn't!
Sharon was after a foster for a dog called Herbie. By his photograph, he looked so adorable and sweet. He was probably about a year old, but I can’t remember that for sure.
Ian and I said that we would foster him, as it was only for 2 weeks, whilst his current foster carers went on holiday.
So arrangements were made directly between us and the foster carer for a drop off/ handover day & time.
The chap arrived with Herbie & we introduced him to our 2 very laid back & chilled Lurchers. That all went fine.
The bombshell was when we asked the foster carer when he was coming back to pick Herbie up. He wasn’t picking him up. Herbie had bit his wife not once but TWICE!!
Sharon knew about this, obviously, as the chap had contacted her and told her that Herbie had bit his wife & that they couldn’t foster him any longer. Sharon FAILED to pass this information on to us. There was also no mention of this on the SVDR facebook page / post that was appealing for a “temporary foster”.
Herbie had to stay. We had no choice. There was no one else. No one that wanted a dog that would bite them.
Herbie had massive issues. He was space guarding and food guarding. He was terrifyingly vicious if, once his bowl was down, you were in the same room as him. I tried everything that I could think of, as despite having had many dogs myself, I had never experienced food or space guarding. I told Sharon of this problem, but she had very little in the way of help. It obviously was NOT her problem. It was now ours. She gave me a maze bowl!!
I researched dog food guarding on the internet for hours upon hours. Eventually I found a system that worked for Herbie and for me. I put a little bit of food, both wet & dry (this was supplied by my husband and I as Sharon gave us NOTHING to help, quite literally ) in his bowl, in a separate room from my dogs, I hasten to add, or it might have been a story of total carnage if I had not had the foresight to do this in the first place, from the first feed, at a time. Asked him to sit. Placed the food down. Gave him permission to eat. Repeat. This took about 1 hour per feed each time.
Over several days it got easier. Larger portions each time, same structure of the commands.
I did take a video of Herbie when he first showed me signs of his food guarding. I really wished I had kept it now, but needless to say that it was all growls and teeth baring.
Now to address the space guarding. Herbie had his own bed in our large living room, as did our own dogs. They also had the choice of 1 of 3 sofas. Our dogs had their spots, one on the empty sofa, one sat with Ian on his sofa & I have a sofa to myself. I was pleasantly surprised when Herbie joined me. It was actually a lovely moment. He’d obviously been from pillar to post in his short life.
HOWEVER, I moved to get up. I must have brushed him with an arm or a leg. Without warning he snapped. He lunged himself towards me and I was very fortunate that he only bit my finger, as he was very close to my face. There was lots of blood & he’d actually bitten through my fingernail, which I later lost entirely. Guess what: Phoned Sharon, eventually got hold of her that is. She really couldn’t care less. As I didn’t need a hospital, she said I was OK & that I’ll live.
Next incident: I was a few days after Christmas. I was wearing a brand new cashmere cardigan that I had received as a present. I went towards Herbie, and for no reason at all, he had full sight of me, he lunged at me again, this time tearing a HUGE hole in my new cardigan. Same M.O. Phoned Sharon, told her what had happened etc. “You’re not hurt. You can always buy another cardigan.” OMG. I may not have been physically hurt, but emotionally I was getting more and more wary of Herbie. No offer of being compensated either as SVDR does not have, or to my knowledge, ever had public liability insurance cover.
Fortunately, as lovely family came along to see Herbie, in the hope to adopt him. I was a lady with 17 year old twins. I was straight with them from the first moment I spoke to them on the phone & when they arrived, I showed them all the video I had taken of Herbie & I explained the “ritual” on how to feed him & not to disturb him if he was chilling. They stayed here a good few hours. We also took him on a walk with our 2. He didn’t have any issues on the lead.
They went away & a few days later called me saying that they would like to adopt him, so arrangements were made & off Herbie went to his forever home. I kept in touch with the lady via messenger & regularly checked that all was well. This was until about a month into the adoption.
I had a phone call from the lady who had been to the pet shop to buy dog food, however she also thought she’d treat Herbie to a beef bone, you know the synthetic kind with added flavour to keep your dog “interested” for hours. Big mistake. He took it into her lounge & wouldn’t let her go into the room. It was the snarling, growling and teeth exposing all over again.
She sounded terrified. I told her to give him an early meal. So she did & called Herbie after putting the bowl down on the kitchen floor, with a louder than “normal” bang on the floor. I told her that as soon as he was engaged with his food, to go into the lounge, retrieve the bone, and throw it into an outside bin.
Fortunately that solved the problem, however if I hadn’t been on hand, if she had tried to get through to the HEAD HONCHO of SVDR it might have been a very different story.
I have known Sharon, Maxine and Ruth from before when they were running bingo to raise funds for Adam Baileys animal rescue.
When they started the SVDR rescue I gave them my full support & helped donating items for them to sell at the stall they ran or bingo prizes, helped run the bingo selling the books or checking the bingo numbers.
With my busy work schedule I had to attend less bingo sessions and when covid hit stopped altogether, Although I did drop off things when she sold items. Plants, dog toys and brought face masks.
I offered to adopt Finn in February 2023 and waited on having a home check but ended up eventually receiving a message asking me to foster one of the puppies they were receiving.
We ended up taking in Blossom. She was ok to begin with but began to snap at my children aged 13 and 11 so not little children friendly and they grew up with a siberian husky who had sadly passed in August 2022 so they were very dog experienced.
After trying to call the number (Sharon's I think) which didn't work and then getting hold of Maxine on one of the numbers I had, she gave us a different number = Sharon's number. My husband called and spoke with her she was convinced that we should hold onto Blossom and just put her in her place.
My husband wasn't happy with this response and told Sharon he would be bringing her back.
The thing was Blossom had a viewing that day which I cancelled, She was then put back onto Facebook like we had done wrong to return her and she needed another home with another dog.
This is what made me stop supporting them. I will send you the messages between myself Sharon and the rescue.
There isn't enough help and support from the so called rescue for fosterers and yes it's just run by Sharon these days.
She can't do it all, It is far too much for one person and I personally told her in the beginning there are plenty of dogs in this country to try and help and I didn't think bringing in dogs with unknown histories was a good idea.
I think if she wants to continue further it should be purely fundraising to support all the dogs that are here currently, help the fosterers and then send money to Romania for spaying if that's what she wants but to stop bringing more dogs over.
Any how this is my experience I thought I would share. Good luck with getting the truth out.