Set up a rescue or foster for a rescue?

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Gems

Gems

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Well for a while now I have been thinking about possibly setting up a small scale rescue and I'm just weighing up the pro's and cons and trying to decide whether to go ahead and do it or offer to foster for a local rescue instead. The issue is I'm from Durham and the only other rescue I know of in the area is Laylas in North Shields ( where I got most of my piggies from ). There just seems to be a huge lack of rescues in the area so I think it would be beneficial to have another one, I just know it's such a huge commitment both in time and money.

We have the wedding in November and obviously Steven is still having to travel regularly for treatment at the moment so realistically it would be perhaps 2 years down the line before I'd be in a position to do this. I was thinking about having a shed in our garden but was wondering what others do to make sure it's warm enough in winter but kept cool enough in summer? Do you need permission from the local authority to do this and there must also be tax implications for any donations or money raised from events? Is it wise to have correspondance with the local RSPCA branch? Then there's also the issue of what if we wanted to have a holiday or weekend away, it's unfair to expect someone else to have the responsibility of however many guinea pigs, but could we really cope with not having a break

If I were to foster then obviously it would get rid of alot of the issues, except for how I would make the shed a good enough piggie house!

I've read through the rescue sticky on this which did answer alot of my questions, I guess I just wanted to get this all down and get a bit of feedback really. I know it's a huge financial burden, and a big drain on time, but I get so much pleasure out of keeping my own and have loved nursing the two boy back to health and see them flourish. I just want to do more to help I guess
 
Maybe start fostering for the next two years and see how it goes :)

It'd be great to set up a small rescue, you could always start with taking in just a few pigs and rehoming them yourself and seeing how it goes, before officially making it a rescue :)

Good luck with it, it sounds like a great plan. :) I really want to set up a small rescue for guinea pigs too, when I have the money, there are none around here at all.
 
Having been on the forum for over a year, I would say that the biggest challenge in running a rescue is the financial side of things.

Since I have started fundraising I have seen many rescues close their doors because of lack of resources so I would say that the biggest question to ask is 'how am I going to pay for it?'
 
Yeah I know, and it's difficult to anticipate the costs really as every case will be different in terms of what treatment each pig may or may not need. At the moment most of our spare cash is taken up with the wedding which is why I'm not considering doing this just now as I know I have to expect to pay for everything myself and any financial help I do receive is an added bonus.

I am good with money though ( I have to be, I'm the FD of the company I work for! ) but really I would like an idea of the running costs, overheads etc of other small rescues to see whether I could realistically afford to do it or not. As I said I would start off very small to begin with ( maybe taking in up to 10 piggies to start with ) work out my outgoings based on this and make an informed decision as to whether I can realistically continue to do it and if so whether I can afford to expand on this number. Obviously there's going to be a large start up cost initially as well to cover a shed if I bought one, caging, food bowls etc which I'm putting money aside for now should I decide to do it
 
I would strongly recommend getting more experience by fostering first; many rescues have started out that way. The financial aspect should not be underestimated and neither the time issue - apart from regular feeding and cleaning, you will also be faced with a big influx of piggies in a very bad state that will take a lot of time to treat all at once. You may also have to face round the clock nursing for babies or very ill guinea pigs. You will need the full support of your future husband and need to be aware that the rescue can put a strain on your relationship.

Here is a very good thread that lists what you are facing if you want to set up a rescue: http://www.theguineapigforum.co.uk/showthread.php?t=31743
 
It's really interesting. I think that sometimes the most successful ventures are run in a team so that the workload can be shared if necessary. I know that there is a very good rabbit rescue called Fat Fluffs who have a whole team of people involved and it means that it doesn't just depend on one person's resources.
 
Thanks Wiebke. Whilst I haven't had experience in fostering as such before I'm all to aware of the time a sick piggie can take up and have had my fair share of staying up all night to syringe feed or medicate a sickly pig! As I said I was thinking about fostering for maybe the next couple of years until I'm in a financial situation to be able to set a rescue up should I decide to, that way I should have a good idea of whether I really want to do it or not. Even fostering will have to wait until we've got the garden sorted and rehomed the two boys I took in in September though. It's not something I've just though "oh wouldn't that be fun" on a whim or anything either, it's something I've been thinking long and hard about over the last 18 months or so and I'm not naive in thinking that it's all going to be easy and end in happy stories.
 
I Hope noone minds me asking this I dont want to hijack the post but as it's along the same lines I am hoping people wont mind. I would love to set up a small scale rescue but think I need to gain way more knolage of piggies first dont think I can do it all myself just yet but I would love to start a small rescue when the kids are at nursery and I think a great way to start this would be via fostering but what is intailed like do you need to cages for the piggies or does the rescue help with that? How about food and bedding and vet care do people come and see the piggies at the fost house? any info would be great.
 
doglovinpiggylover said:
oooh how exciting but how scary, whatever you decide i wish you all the best x
Click to expand...

Thanks hun, it's early days yet, alot of thinking and planning to do yet

eva - here's a list of rescues http://www.theguineapigforum.co.uk/showthread.php?t=118 you could see if there's a one in your area that need's fosterers and go from there? Each rescue will vary as to what they provide you with etc it's probably all down to funds and what they have available to be honest. I know that most I have come across provide the hutch/cage and cover the costs of any vet bills but I'm not sure what happens with food. If you contact your local RSPCA branch then I believe they cover all costs for you so that will include food etc There's alot of very useful information on this forum and depending where you are you could look into the Cavy Cambridge Trust as they offer courses designed specifically for piggies. Peter Gurney has also written some very useful books and there's additional information on this site http://www.oginet.com/pgurney/

I do think alot of knowledge comes with experience. I know 4 years ago when I first got mine, even though I had looked into them a bit, I knew very little. I'm not saying I'm an expert now, far from it infact, but I know so much more now than I did due to having to treat various illnesses in my own pigs so now actively research into illness and try to improve my knowledge all the time.
 
Oooo i just wanted to say, i have no idea about running rescues or fostering i'd imagine fostering would help you get an idea of looking after a large amount of piggies and the cost/time/commitment involved :) anywhoos back to my point I'd love to see another rescue in the North East, I'm from Middlesbrough and there is no rescues of any type in the boro, great ayton is our nearest RSPCA centre and thats a good 30 min drive away! I also know about Layla in Newcastle (?) but thats also a fair drive away, but would love to see more rescues in the north east. Setting up a rescue (far off in the future) has crossed my mind too. :)

Its bizarre that there is hardly any rescues in the north east, i know the estate near us has so many stray dogs but theres hardly any spaces in the nearest pounds for them all so they just wonder the streets which is sad too see and the dog warden can only take so many a week. There is quite a lot of people in our area who have pets/would like them and i think people feel that their only choice is pet stores,when i first got my boys there was no piggies in the RSPCA great ayton so i went to what i thought was ‘rescuing’ which was the PAH adoption center, and i know quite a few people in my area/street/family/friends use the PAH adoption center for smaller animals. :(

Anyways good luck and keep us updated if you decided to go ahead!
 
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