Fostering a homeless animal involves providing them with love and daily care, usually in your home (but not always), until they are ready to be adopted. Most shelters and rescues provide supplies such as food, toys, bedding, cages and vet care and you take care of feeding, cleaning, affection, exercise, socializing, medicating, transporting and a little training, if you like.

When you foster for an animal shelter or rescue, you are helping to save lives, reduce heartache, find purpose, create joy and save non-profits loads of money.

If an animal is going into foster care it is usually because they’ve been uprooted and need a safe place to land. Some animals are happy to see you no matter what they’ve been through but the rest are usually stunned, scared and want to hide. They don’t know what is happening to them when you pick them up and they have no idea how good they are about to have it living with you. Creating a calm, comforting experience from the beginning will make your foster’s transition into your home much easier for everyone.