Meet the Rescue Groups and Celebs Who Are Sharing Their Hearts With Animals in Need

 

Meet the Rescue Groups and Celebs Who Are Sharing Their Hearts With Animals in Need

In July of 2019, a hound mix named Banjo with a severe leg injury wound up at Pet Adoption & Welfare Services in Rutherford County, Tenn. The facility didn’t have the resources to fund the reconstructive surgery he required, and the 1-year-old pup was in danger of being euthanized. But Bonaparte’s Retreat, an animal rescue founded by singer-songwriter Emmylou Harris, paid for the dog’s treatment and placed him in foster care. Nashville-based publicist Paula Erickson nursed him back to health until a family stepped up to adopt him. Without the fostering program, Banjo’s story would not have had such a happy ending.

And Banjo is not alone. Nearly 6.5 million companion animals enter U.S. shelters every year. Senior, shy, stressed and injured dogs and cats are often the first to be ignored and, sadly, put down if space is limited. When the coronavirus pandemic struck, the picture became even bleaker. Many rescue organizations were forced to close and found themselves scrambling to find homes for their animals.

That’s where foster parents come into the picture—and drastically improve animals’ chances of survival. We celebrate some of the bighearted people—including Patrick Stewart, Amanda Seyfried and Beth and Howard Stern—and the programs that are giving abandoned animals a chance at a new life with a loving family. (Check out the gallery above for some wonderful fosterers!)

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Great Animal Fostering Organizations

Named after one of founder Emmylou Harris’ dogs, Bonaparte’s Retreat has been saving the most neglected dogs—seniors, large breeds or dogs who need surgery or medical care—at Metro Nashville Animal Care and Control and at municipal shelters in the area since 2004. Harris has a staff that runs the daily operations at Bonaparte’s, but she is responsible for meeting and naming all of the dogs. While writing song lyrics can be pretty involved, Harris says there’s more at stake when coming up with a name to pique the interest of a potential adopter. She named Banjo in tribute to her former bandmate and friend Rodney Crowell, who had a dog named Banjo. “I always thought that was a great name for a dog,” Harris says, joking that she doesn’t always hit it out of the park. “I’m a big baseball fan, and I once named a dog ‘Jeter’ after Derek Jeter,” she recalls. But the rescue organization he came from was headed up by a Red Sox fan, and given the Yankees/Red Sox rivalry, the name was not approved!

New York City’s PupStarz Rescue, which has successfully rehomed 2,300 dogs since 2015, is also foster-based. “We do not have a brick-and-mortar space, so all of the animals that come into our care are placed in foster homes,” says co-founder Robyn O’Brien. Fosters care for pets until they are adopted, providing them with food, exercise “and, most importantly, love,” she says.

Cat Town, a rescue in Oakland, California, that also runs the country’s first cat cafe (patrons pay a fee to hang with cats; the money supports rescues), takes felines primarily from Oakland Animal Services and places them into foster homes. Since its 2011 founding, the organization has been instrumental in lowering the area’s euthanasia rate from 43 percent to 10 percent and has rehomed 3,500 cats, says development director Quinn White. “The cats we focus on are the shy, stressed, sick and seniors, because other organizations will walk right by those cages,” says foster coordinator and deputy director Dawn Pieper. Since effective fostering comes down to pairing the right people with the right pets, “The biggest part of my job is matchmaking,” she says. “I’m not going to take a very fractious, hissy, spitty cat and put it in a home with somebody who’s never had a cat before.”

More proof that fostering works: In 2019, Audra Farrell, foster coordinator with Friends of Oakland Animal Services, and her team got 700 of their 5,100 incoming animals out to fosters—and all 700 were eventually adopted. When the pandemic forced the group to close its doors, Farrell and her team posted a plea on social media and received 180 applications in return. “I’ve worked in the field for 10 years, and this was one of the most incredible things I have ever seen,” she says.

The tools you need to foster a dog: Time & patience

Organizations like North Shore Animal League America, in Port Washington, New York, provide volunteers with everything necessary to care for a pet: food, bedding, medications, medical treatment and toys. “We also give them markers to hit as they work with the animal to make sure that they’re succeeding in the home,” says senior volunteer manager Victoria Gravina. In addition, volunteers are given contacts to reach pet behaviorists/veterinarians on a 24/7 basis. But wooing an animal can take a lot of patience. For instance, working with a fearful puppy is probably going to be a process, from providing positive reinforcement to working toward eventually coaxing the animal into being petted.

The biggest commitment from fosters is their time. Julie Castle, CEO of Best Friends Animal Society, headquartered in Kanab, Utah, says pets stay with a foster anywhere from “several weeks to a few months, depending on the needs of the pet and a foster’s ability to care for him.” Kittens are typically a one- to seven-week commitment, while adult cats need a month to decompress. And pets with more complicated medical issues may require longer healing times. Says Pieper, “Patience is key.”

Why you should foster a dog

Fostering gets an animal out of the shelter, where a dog or cat may be severely out of its element, says Harris. “Imagine being in a home or on the street, and all of a sudden you find yourself basically in jail,” she says. “Animals need time and a place where they can become the pet that they really are. And a foster home is the best possible place for that.”

Fostering allows a pet to relax and reveal its true colors. “That information that a foster family can give us is helpful in finding the appropriate placement for that animal,” Farrell says. Once an animal is placed in a home, a foster can alert her to things like, “This dog loves to fetch. This dog is crate-trained. I taught this dog 16 tricks.” Says Farrell, “Then we can tell our adopters, ‘This is what we saw in the foster home.’”And the truth is, says Farrell, “When you foster an animal, you’re saving two lives— the life of the one that’s in your home and the life of the animal that can take the space that opens up in the shelter.”

You’re also part of some very happy endings. When Banjo was adopted in November 2019 by radio promoter Anne Yarbrough and her retired husband, Barry, the couple was very aware that their pup could have ended up euthanized if Bonaparte’s Retreat hadn’t stepped in. “It feels good to know we saved a dog. And he’s given us a lot in return,” says Barry. When Erickson visited her former foster dog in his new home several months later, she recalls, “It was the most gratifying thing you could imagine!”

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