At the Blue Cross in Burford, we have hardly had any Cockers in during the last 2 year I have been there. When they have come in, even if crosses, they are very quickly re-homed.
Our policy is that if a dog is brought in as a stray, we assess it and can, if the Staff feel it is appropriate, re-home to famillies with children as young as 5 years.
If it comes from a home and we can take a history and ask about the reasons for re-homing and the dog's behaviour whilst it was in the home, then we profile it accordingly. If the dog has never lived with children and is older, then we would perhaps judge that it would not adapt well to a young and busy household ... we do our best to get to know each dog, and try to profile them to find the sort of home in which they would be the happiest. If they have lived with cats and have been cool with that, then we would re-home then with a cat-owning family. If they haven't had much contact with cats, and a potential adopter comes along who also owns cats, we take the dog for a 'cat test' when we show it (through mesh!) one of our Cattery residents who is known to be dog-friendly (ie not a hissy wussy pussy!) and if the dog shows little or no interest, or is merely inquisitive and waggy, then we would judge that their living with a cat would not be a risk to the cat (in my experience, the dog always comes off worst in an encounter anyway!).
We do get a certain amount of greyhounds and lurchers, who, in their 'past lives' have been raced or used for hare-coursing etc. and we sometimes have a hard time explaining to very forthright ladies of a 'certain age' that you cannot simply re-train such an animal to live compatibly with their darling cats .... Oh woe !!
I think that the basic thing with any re-homing agency is that the animal in their care has already had at least one failed home, and we aim to provide it with the best home possible which will, we hope, last for the rest of its natural life. If dogs or cats were simply passed out to the first person who showed an interest in them, they would doubtless end up back at the Centre, or worse, out on the street, and we feel that we owe it to them to give them the best possible chance ... With the best will in the world, some of the re-homings do not work out, but that is mostly because adopters are shall we say somewhat economical with the truth when they complete their registration forms and when we try to find out exactly why they want to adopt that particular animal. Some of the breed-rescue people are absolutely brilliant, and there are more than a few who are completely hopeless in that they are totally over-dogged in a small home with no proper facilities, and do not know the first thing about vetting owners ...
You can feel despair, but basically I think we all rely on our own common sense and the British mindset which makes us daft about our little hairy companions ...
To conclude, I think any reputable rescue organisation will put it's potential adopters first and foremost - we would not re-home a dog which was over-boisterous or had shown any aggressive or potentially problematic tendencies to a family with young children - we don't want any accidents to happen; we don't want toddlers banging their heads because someone jumped up at them and knocked them flying; we don't want young mums with a collie to exercise and keep stimulated all day, as well as a 2 and a 5 year old; we don't want (really nice) people who have never owned a dog before to take on a guarding breed or a dog which needs lots of grooming or may have behavioural problems which need a more experienced person to unravel to get the best out of it ...
People say it is easier to adopt a child than it is to adopt a dog from the Blue Cross but then that is because they think they can walk in and say 'I'll have that one!' !!
