Adopt a Shelter Dog Month 2018: Essential supplies to have when bringing home Fido
Alright, so you've decided where you're getting your new dog from, chosen the lucky pooch, and prepared for the car ride home. What now? Did you plan ahead and make sure to have all supplies waiting at home so that you could make the transition as stress free as possible? NO?! How could you?!?! Just kidding, it's pretty common that we get home with our new addition and have forgotten to pick something up from the store, but it does always help to think ahead, so here's a list of my favorite tools and items to help make the transition into the new home as seamless as possible!
Side note: A lot of people think that bringing their dog straight from the shelter to a pet store to look for harnesses, treats, etc. is a good experience, but I urge you to reconsider this decision! The adoption process is extremely stressful for dogs; when you think about it, they have no way of knowing they're going to their new home, they're surrounded by unfamiliar though well-meaning people, and they're about to have everything familiar pulled out from under them. Taking a stressed out dog you don't know all that well to a public place could very well end in disaster. Do your best to head straight home with your new pup to avoid any trouble.
Another side note: It will help tremendously if you can choose to bring your dog home and then use some vacation time, or if you are one of the lucky souls who work from home maybe work from home for several days. In a perfect world everyone would be able to take a full week off to help their dog adjust, but sometimes that isn't the case, so even if you can pick them up Friday afternoon and then take Monday off, those three and a half days of helping your dog acclimate can make all the difference!
This will depend on the dog you're bringing home as well as if you know the dog is trustworthy to have some freedom in the home environment. Some older dogs who have lived in foster homes don't need to be crated, but if you're bringing a younger dog home or a dog from a shelter that may have never lived in a home before you probably want to be able to leave your dog and not worry about your house being destroyed while you're out. The crate should be at least big enough that your dog can stand up and turn around comfortably. Please note, it's important that you don't simply throw your dog into the crate and hope for the best. Some dogs will tolerate this, particularly if they have been crate trained before, but for other dogs this can poison the crate as something negative or can even cause behavior that looks like a panic attack (screaming, biting bars, drooling, urinating or defecating in the crate). To read more about crate training