Foster

Simply complete this foster care sign-up form and you will be contacted shortly by a PAWS team member from fosterhotline@phillypaws.org. Please check your spam folder! The next step will be to watch our onboarding video and then you’ll be ready to get started.

You can also contact us at foster@phillypaws.org with any additional questions and we are happy to help match you with a pet who suits your needs, abilities, and lifestyle. There are always animals at the shelter who need foster care!

Even if you have pets of your own, you can still safely foster by doing a few easy things! Check out a few helpful tips on how to properly introduce PAWS cats and dogs to your resident pets:

When fostering cats and kittens, you’ll need a small room that is separate from your resident pets, A bathroom or spare room is the perfect place for a new foster!

• ● If you decide you’d like to introduce your foster cat to your resident pets, we ask you to keep them in a separate space for at least two weeks to ensure they’re healthy and to give them time to slowly decompress and adjust to a new home and to new people.
• ● If you’d like your resident cat to meet your foster cat, make sure all of the cats have been tested for FIV/FeLV. Cats who are FeLV+ should not be introduced to cats who test negative for FeLV. Learn more here.
• ● Plan for slow introductions between foster cats and your resident pets to set everyone up for success! For tips on how to safely and slowly introduce your foster cat to your resident pets, plan to chat more with our foster team.

Fostering dogs can be safe for your resident pets with the right management and slow intros!

• ● First we’ll ask you to bring your resident dog to the shelter where we can have them safely meet your potential foster dog match. If that goes well, you can plan to take the foster dog home. Be sure to plan for transporting both dogs home safely. We can provide you with a crate!
• ● At home, you should plan ahead and have the ability to keep them separate if needed, even if just temporarily. Baby gates and rooms with doors are useful tools for creating a separation while all pets in the home are adjusting to one another.
• ● Your resident cats should have a space that can be separated from your foster dog by a baby gate or door so they can choose to be separate or you can safely separate them if needed. 
• ● Sick or injured dogs may need to be kept separate from other pets in the house; the foster team can tell you about the dog’s specific needs and precautions you’ll need to take to keep your pets healthy and safe.

Our goal is to support you through the foster process from beginning to end! PAWS provides all medical care, ongoing support from our foster team to talk through any issues that pop up, behavior support including dog training, and resources including videos, reading materials, a Facebook group with other foster parents, and more! 

For supplies, we’re very grateful if foster parents are able to provide them, but we are also happy to provide any supplies needed to get started or throughout the foster process! We never want the cost of supplies to be the reason that you aren’t able to foster.

A foster parent should plan to provide a safe, secure home where animals can have all of their basic needs met. We ask for regular communication with our team including timely replies to our check-ins. We ask that you take initiative to reach out with any questions or concerns, ensuring your foster pet is getting the care they need and preparing them for adoption. 

You’ll need to be able to get to our Grays Ferry foster clinic for medical care. It’s rare that a pet remains completely healthy throughout the foster process, so you should be open to learning to medicate your foster pet if needed. We are always happy to talk through medical care so you feel comfortable! For any behavior issues that pop up, we’ll provide guidance and ask that you use positive reinforcement methods.

Once your foster pet is ready for adoption, we’ll ask you to submit quality photos, videos, and personality info for adoption promotion and you should be prepared to chat with potential adopters about your foster pet and meet them to finalize the adoption. If talking with adopters doesn’t seem like your cup of tea, we can aim to match you with a friendly cat who will be a fit for our adoption centers once they’re healthy.

We provide all PAWS foster pets with routine medical care as well as any medical care and treatment needed for an illness or injury at no cost to the foster parent. A foster parent just needs to provide a safe home for them to recover in! Most veterinary care for PAWS foster pets is provided at our Grays Ferry clinic location so you should be able to get to this location during our daytime foster clinic hours. We are open 7 days a week!  This includes routine care like vaccines, spay/neuter surgery, and vet care for illnesses or injuries.

Vaccines and spay/neuter surgery can be scheduled at our Grant Ave clinic, but vet care for illness and injury is only provided at our Grays Ferry location.

Once your foster pet is medically cleared, you’ll help us start their adoption promotion and work together to find them an adopter. The adopter will be asked to pay an adoption fee that covers just a small portion of the medical care and resources provided to each rescued pet in our care.

Our Adoption-Foster team is here to provide support and guidance throughout the foster process, from start to finish! During orientation we’ll touch on how to reach out about urgent and non-urgent questions and issues. Email is our main form of communication because it allows us to better prioritize urgent issues, but you can always ask for a phone call when needed! It’s important to us that you stay in close communication with our team when you take a PAWS’ pet into your foster care. We also have an emergency phone for true medical emergencies.

You don’t need to pay to foster a pet since fostering is a volunteer role supporting your community! PAWS provides medical care to foster pets at no cost to the foster parent and we can also provide any supplies that you need support with. If you’re able to provide supplies yourself, we greatly appreciate it and it allows us to redirect those resources to rescuing other pets, but we never want the cost of supplies to be the reason you aren’t able to foster!

Matchmaking is our specialty and we do our very best to match you with a pet that will be a good fit for your home and schedule! We just ask that you be clear about your foster space, availability, and commitment. 

For cats, we start by asking you to identify a few cats or kittens on our list that you feel could be a good match and then we help narrow it down. We may have you meet a few cats during your foster pick-up appointment and talk in a little more detail about their needs and your comfort level so that you’re feeling good about taking your foster cat home!

For dogs, we’ll first talk in detail about a specific dog that you and our team feels is a good fit for your home. If we all agree that they seem like a good match, we’ll schedule an appointment for you to meet them and take them home!

The biggest thing to keep in mind is that part of fostering is helping us get to know the pet’s needs and personality, which can take some time, patience, and a little hard work! We will always tell you as much information as we have and aim to match you with a pet that we feel could be a good fit based on our experience and our conversation with you.

Length of stay in foster care typically ranges anywhere from 3-8+ weeks depending on the needs of the particular animal. We ask fosters to expect at least a 3 week commitment if not a bit longer, but we also have other short term options! 

Some pets turn out to have medical or behavioral needs that may take a few months to work through as we help them heal and find them the right adoption match. If you’re open to long term fostering but have a schedule conflict or travel, we can talk more about finding a sitter!

It’s most helpful to plan to foster a pet until they’re adopted with no definitive timeline or end date set, but we also understand that fostering is a temporary commitment and we have several short term options! If you have a set date that you can foster until, let us know and we can decide together if we have a match for you!  

“FAST” fostering is a short term commitment where we aim to find a social cat or kittens who have mild medical issues that we hope will clear quickly and they’ll be ready for adoption within 3ish weeks. Once cleared for adoption, these cats can be placed at our adoption center!

Pet sitting for other fosters is also very helpful along with providing temporary foster for surprise kittens not eating on their own while we look for a long term foster. 

And for any dog that has been at our shelter longer than usual, you can give them a break from the shelter and help us get to know them better by taking them home for a few days or for the day!

There are lots of opportunities to find a loving home for your foster pet! Once they’re cleared for adoption, we ask you to send high-resolution photos, videos, and details about your foster pet’s needs and personality. Then PAWS creates their adoption profile on our website and other adoption websites, plus we include them in our weekly adoptable pets email to our approved adopters. If your foster pet is social, you can attend adoption events. A great way for you to help promote your foster pet for adoption is to share them on your social media. We also encourage you to promote your foster pet to your own friends and family to widen the adopter pool even further! Lastly, if your foster cat is social, you can place them at a PAWS adoption center. This can be a good way to increase their exposure to adopters while also opening up your foster space to help another.

While fostering is not meant to be a trial adoption, you may potentially adopt the pet you are fostering as long as you submit an adoption application and notify our team before we start adoption promotion. If adoption promotion has been started and there’s an approved applicant for your foster pet, they will be given priority to adopt. 

As much as we understand wanting to keep your foster pet, keep in mind that foster homes are such a crucial part of our lifesaving work and goodbye is the goal so that you can foster more. If you do adopt your foster pet, we hope that you’ll plan to continue fostering if possible!

If you’re specifically interested in adopting, our staff can work with you to find a good fit for your household: matchmaking is our specialty!

Litters of kittens come in all sizes and we can help match you with a litter based on your space and preference! 

For kittens who are orphaned without a mom, we can split larger litters into pairs or trios for foster placement, but we do not split a single kitten from a litter. We do rescue single kittens who can go into foster care alone, but kittens benefit from companionship and socialization of at least one other kitten as they grow. We recommend keeping an eye out for another single the same age, or if you have a playful cat of your own, consider introducing them after being tested for FIV/FELV and the 2 week quarantine period. While we hope you’ll consider taking home the entire litter to open a kennel so that we can save another, you will be making a tremendous difference even if you can only foster two or three!

For kittens who are nursing from their mom and are too young to be separated, the entire litter will need to go home with her. It’s incredibly helpful to foster a large family from start to finish, but once the kittens are eating on their own, they can be separated from their mom. If caring for a large litter as they grow becomes too much for your foster space, we can chat about finding a new foster for some of the kittens.

Yes! First, check with your tax preparer to get a list of all eligible items for deduction — then make sure to save any and all related receipts. If your fostering expenses add up to over $250 for the year, PAWS can provide a letter confirming that you are an active foster parent during a particular calendar year. (To request this letter, please contact foster@phillypaws.org with the subject line “Active Foster Tax Letter.”) This letter can then be used for tax purposes to support claiming related expenses as deductions. Please note: PAWS is unable to provide any legal or tax related advice — always consult with a professional if you need any clarification.