Donegal Animals in Need - Tips for settling in your new rescued pet

Adding a pet to your family always means allowing them the time to settle in to their new environment, but for a rescued animal who often comes with a sad back story, patience is even more important.

Arriving in a new home where everything is unknown can be scary for any cat or dog.

Studies have shown that it takes at least three weeks for an animal to decompress in their new environment and to begin to show their real personality. 

Introducing your new arrival to other pets who are already resident has to be carried out slowly and carefully. Throwing animals together and expecting them to immediately get on rarely works. The animals need to assess each other and work out their respective places in the household.

AIN'S Dog foster homes are full

Dogs and Cats adopted from Animals In Need (AIN) go to their new home with a pack that includes advice on how to settle them in but unfortunately this advice is not always taken.

A lovely ginger cat called Grace was adopted recently but her new owners did heed AIN’s advice and consequently gave up on her and returned her after only 10 days.

This was not Grace’s fault and all this upheaval is very stressful for an animal.

Grace is only a young cat and she is now looking for a new owner who will have the patience to help her to settle in properly. She is a lovely cat and her details are on AIN’s Facebook page.

On Thursday last, AIN rescued an adult cat and her young daughter. 

The volunteers had been warned in advance that there was something wrong with the big kitten’s eyes, but they were not prepared for what they found upon their arrival.

Now called Alice, the kitten has limited or no vision in her badly damaged eyes. She may have been born with defective eyes or it could be the result of a long term untreated infection, but either way this poor kitten is in a lot of pain.

Following a vet visit, Alice is receiving treatment at her foster home, but realistically, she will probably lose her eyes.

Although it may sound drastic, blind cats compensate for their lack of vision by using their other senses and can live long, happy lives as indoor cats and, most importantly, she will no longer be suffering.

Alice and her mother, Kendall, are friendly, tame cats, who appear to have be dumped near a house in a remote area.

They will be wormed, spayed, vaccinated and microchipped and Alice is booked in to have surgery on her eyes this week. Both will be found loving homes when they are ready.

Alice arrived with badly damaged eyes

AIN’s dog fosterers are under a serious amount of pressure at the moment, with another five dogs rescued from Letterkenny Pound this week.

Many of the dogs currently in their care are elderly or sick and cannot be rehomed yet, which means the foster homes are at bursting point.

One dog currently in foster care with AIN is a lovely, black collie-cross pup called Lucy, who arrived at the Rescue a while ago with a fractured pelvis. 

Lucy is making slow but steady progress in her recovery and has a vet visit scheduled this week so that she can be x-rayed to see how well the fracture is healing.

John Joe, an elderly collie, will also be having a trip to the vets to have his monthly injection for arthritis, his treatment having being sponsored by a kind gentleman called David.

Finally, AIN would like to say a huge thank you to Connelly’s Redmills for their donation of food for the rescued dogs, which is much appreciated.

To help AIN’s animals, please donate €2 to AIN’s ‘Help Us To Help Them’ fundraising appeal via your phone by texting the word ‘KITTEN’ to 50300.

Every last cent goes directly to the rescued animals for their food, bedding, vet bills, worming treatment and vaccinations.For further information on adoption, fostering, volunteering etc, please contact the main helpline on 087 1356188.

For cat/kitten enquiries please call 087 7644420. Animals In Need Donegal is also on Facebook and has a website at http://www.animalsinneeddonegal.com.