OUR CLASSIFIED SPONSORSHIP SECTION
In order to take our work further with the shelter dogs, not only have we become a NPC registered company, we have opened our website to both our Classified Sponsorship Section as well as limited Sponsorship on the main website. As we are primarily an education based website, and not a business, you will find that what we offer is very affordable at only R500 per annum which can be paid in 3 installments - we want to help the smaller businesses to promote their products at an affordable price as well. An additional bonus is that not only are you aiming your product/services at the pet related public, you are giving back by helping to improve the life of shelter dogs!
Our Stats are excellent - currently an average of 7500 unique visitors per week, which translates into over 21000 pages read. This is currently growing and we do daily marketing. FOTD is about to celebrate it's 7th birthday and is growing from strength to strength.
To see what your Classified Sponsorship spot would look like EXAMPLE
If you would like to find out about any of our website sponsorship options, just click on the Button above.
Thank you, Scotty and Charmaine
Our Stats are excellent - currently an average of 7500 unique visitors per week, which translates into over 21000 pages read. This is currently growing and we do daily marketing. FOTD is about to celebrate it's 7th birthday and is growing from strength to strength.
To see what your Classified Sponsorship spot would look like EXAMPLE
If you would like to find out about any of our website sponsorship options, just click on the Button above.
Thank you, Scotty and Charmaine
ABOUT FRIENDS OF THE DOG 7 SHELTER INIATIVE
Some History
Friends of the Dog is the brain child of Scotty Valadao. Working full time in the Canine Industry, over the years, Scotty realized more and more, that many dog owners were totally confused by the proliferation of information on the Internet, with its mixed messages and dubious experts and very often, more harm than good was occurring. In order to remedy this, she decided to put together a ‘one stop’ site full of reliable information, written by professionals, to help dog owners with their dogs with was ‘birthed’ on the 14th February 2011. Charmaine du Toit joined Scotty as a co-founder.
FOTD has grown from strength to strength and now features over 1400 articles and continues to increase these. Features are FODS Shelter Initiative; Recommended Puppy & Dog Schools (ensuring that the instructors have the knowledge and qualifications to teach a pup at such a crucial time of its life), Free E-Books by world renown Dr. Ian Dunbar, Educational Downloads, Breed Compatibility, Dog Breeds, Puppy Page, Dog Stuff Page, Health Page, Alternative Health Page, Recommended Courses, Rescue/ Shelter and a lot more.
Our Stats our excellent and continue to grow daily. We average between 5500 – 9000 unique visitors per week which translates to between 17000 – 21000 pages read per week. We market the site daily to increase knowledge and education.
Additionally we post a dog-related article daily, during the week on our Facebook page. As we share our articles with several other dog related sites, we expose the article (which links back to our website) to over 80,000 people.
We have opened the Tab on the website FODS Shelter Initiative where new owners and potential owners of shelter dogs have access to a wealth of information, including Questionnaires to help them with the decision of which dog is the best for them.
Scotty and Charmaine have always had a passion for working with dogs in the shelters and improving both their quality of life and their adoptability and over the last two years this is where their main efforts have been concentrated, and is the area where financial assistance is needed to do more. We have provided you with a section on the Aims of this Initiative further down. Shelters do receive assistance to help them with the dogs’ daily needs, however so much more is needed to improve the life of these dogs.
According to PETA (People for Ethical Treatment of Animals) “Experts agree that after as little as two weeks in a traditional shelter, animals can begin to deteriorate psychologically and shelter dogs can become de-housed trained, noisy, anxious, hyperactive, fearful, lonely and even depressed or aggressive.
If adopted, animals that have been confined for extended periods are often repeatedly returned because of behavioural issues – a traumatic yo-yo experience that makes them even less adoptable”.
To help with the education and knowledge of people working in shelters, as well as volunteers and those that would like to assist more, Scotty and Charmaine have been presenting the Canine Behaviour Shelter Course over the last year.
The course is presented at a very affordable fee to ensure that the people that need the help receive it. On average, at least 2 of the people working in the shelter are awarded a free place on the course. We also take extra time to train the staff who are working daily with the dogs doing the feeding and looking after the dogs wherever this is possible. This course consists of 6 full day practical sessions for those participating, as well as Theory which is done over a 6-month period and is incredibly comprehensive.
We have started training our first team of 5 people who will be able to teach others in the same manner once fully qualified, always under the umbrella of FOTD.
Additionally, in addition to the work that will be done with the dogs, we started the Canine Behaviour Coach Course so that people working in shelters can do more work in: -
Fallen Angels (Cape Town): Woodrock Animal Shelter (Gauteng) : Wollies Animal Sanctuary (Pretoria): Adorabull Rescue (Pretoria)
Our Aims
To take our work in the Shelters even further. Scotty will be spending time down in Cape Town at the beginning of 2018 working at Fallen Angels and other shelters during the week to increase the knowledge and tools of those working with the dogs and bringing in all aspects of the Program.
Our main aims are below and to bring these into as many shelters as we can.
Some History
Friends of the Dog is the brain child of Scotty Valadao. Working full time in the Canine Industry, over the years, Scotty realized more and more, that many dog owners were totally confused by the proliferation of information on the Internet, with its mixed messages and dubious experts and very often, more harm than good was occurring. In order to remedy this, she decided to put together a ‘one stop’ site full of reliable information, written by professionals, to help dog owners with their dogs with was ‘birthed’ on the 14th February 2011. Charmaine du Toit joined Scotty as a co-founder.
FOTD has grown from strength to strength and now features over 1400 articles and continues to increase these. Features are FODS Shelter Initiative; Recommended Puppy & Dog Schools (ensuring that the instructors have the knowledge and qualifications to teach a pup at such a crucial time of its life), Free E-Books by world renown Dr. Ian Dunbar, Educational Downloads, Breed Compatibility, Dog Breeds, Puppy Page, Dog Stuff Page, Health Page, Alternative Health Page, Recommended Courses, Rescue/ Shelter and a lot more.
Our Stats our excellent and continue to grow daily. We average between 5500 – 9000 unique visitors per week which translates to between 17000 – 21000 pages read per week. We market the site daily to increase knowledge and education.
Additionally we post a dog-related article daily, during the week on our Facebook page. As we share our articles with several other dog related sites, we expose the article (which links back to our website) to over 80,000 people.
We have opened the Tab on the website FODS Shelter Initiative where new owners and potential owners of shelter dogs have access to a wealth of information, including Questionnaires to help them with the decision of which dog is the best for them.
Scotty and Charmaine have always had a passion for working with dogs in the shelters and improving both their quality of life and their adoptability and over the last two years this is where their main efforts have been concentrated, and is the area where financial assistance is needed to do more. We have provided you with a section on the Aims of this Initiative further down. Shelters do receive assistance to help them with the dogs’ daily needs, however so much more is needed to improve the life of these dogs.
According to PETA (People for Ethical Treatment of Animals) “Experts agree that after as little as two weeks in a traditional shelter, animals can begin to deteriorate psychologically and shelter dogs can become de-housed trained, noisy, anxious, hyperactive, fearful, lonely and even depressed or aggressive.
If adopted, animals that have been confined for extended periods are often repeatedly returned because of behavioural issues – a traumatic yo-yo experience that makes them even less adoptable”.
To help with the education and knowledge of people working in shelters, as well as volunteers and those that would like to assist more, Scotty and Charmaine have been presenting the Canine Behaviour Shelter Course over the last year.
The course is presented at a very affordable fee to ensure that the people that need the help receive it. On average, at least 2 of the people working in the shelter are awarded a free place on the course. We also take extra time to train the staff who are working daily with the dogs doing the feeding and looking after the dogs wherever this is possible. This course consists of 6 full day practical sessions for those participating, as well as Theory which is done over a 6-month period and is incredibly comprehensive.
We have started training our first team of 5 people who will be able to teach others in the same manner once fully qualified, always under the umbrella of FOTD.
Additionally, in addition to the work that will be done with the dogs, we started the Canine Behaviour Coach Course so that people working in shelters can do more work in: -
- Make the most of their Volunteers and really give them the tools and knowledge they need to really help the dogs.
- Educating those that are fostering dogs.
- Working with dogs with behaviour concerns
- Giving a session to new owners bringing in all the basics before taking the dog home, so that the chances of success are higher.
- Helping owners in the home environment before giving the dog up for adoption
- Helping owners after the dogs have been adopted in the case that behaviour problems do arise.
Fallen Angels (Cape Town): Woodrock Animal Shelter (Gauteng) : Wollies Animal Sanctuary (Pretoria): Adorabull Rescue (Pretoria)
Our Aims
To take our work in the Shelters even further. Scotty will be spending time down in Cape Town at the beginning of 2018 working at Fallen Angels and other shelters during the week to increase the knowledge and tools of those working with the dogs and bringing in all aspects of the Program.
Our main aims are below and to bring these into as many shelters as we can.
- Improve the life of dogs in shelters in general as in the Aims section both in the short term and long-term scenarios.
- Supplying additional knowledge of dogs in general to shelter staff, volunteers and those undertaking the course.
- Teaching those in the shelters how to interact with dogs to help to calm them down and decrease stress in the shelter environment.
- Assist with providing ideas to provide stimulation and enrichment to the dog's in the shelter, thus reducing stress.
- Help condition dogs to enjoy people’s company which will make them more adoptable and improve the dog’s socialization skills with people - this will also help the dogs to be calmer around people.
- Teach those working with the dog’s basic obedience exercises and behavioural solutions which will result in the dogs being more adoptable.
- Teach those working with dogs the basic rules and procedures for when the dogs go to their new homes and encouraging a private session with the new owner explaining the basics.
- Give shelter staff and volunteers the knowledge and tools to be able to teach new owners the basis of obedience and the House Rules prior to taking their new dog's home.
- Reduce the noise levels in the shelters which will reduce the stress.
- Give shelter staff and volunteers the knowledge and tools to help dogs overcome basic behavioural concerns.
- To be able to pay some monies to people already volunteering in shelters so that they can do more.
- To build some appropriate runs where dogs can be kept at a maximum of 2 dogs per run. These dogs will be worked on daily to make them more adoptable. At least one of these runs will be used for dogs with fear of people issues - by isolating them and keeping them with a confident dogs, they will be able to learn how to interact with people in a positive environment.