1. Transport a dog?
2. Donate a dog bed or towels or other bedding type items?
3. Donate MONEY?
4. Donate a Kong? A nylabone? A hercules?
5. Donate a crate?
6. Donate an x-pen or baby gates?
7. Donate a food dish or a stainless bucket for a crate?
8. Donate a leash?
9. Donate a collar?
10. Donate some treats or a bag of food?
11. Donate a halti or promise collar or a gentle leader?
12. Walk a dog?
13. Groom a dog?
14. Donate some grooming supplies (shampoos, combs, brushes, etc.)?
15. Go to the local shelter and see if that dog is the breed the shelter says it is or go with rescue to be a second opinion on the dog?
16. Make a few phone calls?
17. Mail out applications to people who’ve requested them?
18. Provide local vet clinics with contact information for educational materials on responsible pet ownership?
19. Drive a dog to and from vet appointments?
20. Donate long distance calling cards?
21. Donate the use of your scanner or digital camera?
22. Donate the use of a photocopier?
23. Attend public education days and try to educate people on responsible pet ownership?
24. Donate a gift certificate to a pet store?
25. Donate a raffle item if your club is holding a fund raiser?
26. Donate flea stuff (Advantage, etc.)?
27. Donate hw pills?
28. Donate a canine first aid kit?
29. Provide a shoulder to cry on when the rescue person is overwhelmed?
30. Pay the boarding fees to board a dog for a week? Two weeks?
31. Be a Santi-paws foster to give the foster a break for a few hours or days?
32. Clip coupons for dog food or treats?
33, Bake some homemade doggie biscuits?
34. Make book purchases through Amazon via a web site that contributes commissions earned to a rescue group?
35. Host rescue photos with an information link on your website?
36. Donate time to take good photos of foster dogs for adoption flyers, etc.?
37. Conduct a home visit or accompany a rescue person on the home visit?
38. Go with rescue person to the vet to help if there is more than one dog? 39. Have a yard sale and donate the money to rescue?
40. Be volunteer to do rescue in your area?
41. Take advantage of a promotion on the web or store offering a free ID tag and instead of getting it for your own dog, have the tag inscribed with your Club’s name and phone # to contact?
42. Talk to all your friends about adopting and fostering rescue dogs?
43. Donate vet services or can you help by donating a spay or neuter each year or some vaccinations?
44. Onterview vets to encourage them to offer discounts to rescues?
45. Write a column for your local newspaper or club newsletter on dogs on dogs currently looking for homes or ways to help rescue?
46. Take photos of dogs available for adoption for use by the Club?
47. Maintain web sites listing/showing dogs available?
48. Help organize and run fundraising events?
49. Help maintain the paperwork files associated with each dog or enter the information into a database?
50. Tattoo a rescued dog?
51. Microchip a rescued dog?
52. Loan your carpet steamcleaner to someone who has fostered a dog that was sick or marked in the house?
53. Donate a bottle of bleach or other cleaning products?
54. Donate or loan a portable dog run to someone who doesn’t have a quarantine area for quarantining a dog that has an unknown vaccination history and has been in a shelter?
55. Drive the fosters’ children to an activity so that the foster can take the dog to obedience class?
56. Use your video camera to film a rescue dog in action?
57. Pay the cost of taking a dog to obedience class?
58. Be the one to take the dog to its obedience class?
59. Go to the foster home once a week with your children and dogs to help socialize the dog?
60. Help the foster clean up the yard (yes, we also have to scoop what those foster dogs poop)
61. Offer to test the foster dog with cats?
62. Pay for the dog to be groomed or take the dog to a Do It Yourself Grooming Place?
63. Bring the foster take out so the foster doesn’t have to cook dinner?
64. Pay a house-cleaning service to do the spring cleaning for someone who fosters dogs all the time?
65. Lend your artistic talents to your club’s newsletter, fundraising ideas, t-shirt designs?
66. Donate printer paper, envelopes and stamps to your club?
67. Go with a rescue person to the vet if a foster dog needs to be euthanized?
68. Go to local shelters and meet with shelter staff about how to identify your breed or provide photos and breed information showing the different types of that breed may come in and the different colour combinations?
69. Go to local businesses and solicit donations for a club’s fundraising event?
70. Offer to try and help owners be better pet owners by holding a grooming seminar?
71. Help pet owners be better pet owners by being available to answer training questions?
72. Loan a crate if a dog needs to travel by air?
73. Put together an Owner’s Manual for those who adopt rescued dogs of your breed?
74. Provide post-adoption follow up or support?
75. Donate a coupon for a free car wash or gas or inside cleaning of a vehicle?
76. Pay for an ad in your local/metropolitan paper to help place rescue dogs?
77. Volunteer to screen calls for that ad?
78. Get some friends together to build/repair pens for a foster home?
79. Microchip your own pups if you are a breeder, and register the chips, so if your dogs ever come into rescue, you can be contacted to take responsibility for your pup?
80. Donate a small percentage of the sale of each pup to rescue if you are a breeder?
81. Buy two of those really neat dog-items you “have to have” and donate one to Rescue?
82. Make financial arrangements in your will to cover the cost of caring for your dogs after you are gone – so Rescue won’t have to?
83. Make a bequest in your will to your local or national Rescue?
84. Donate your professional services as an accountant or lawyer?
85. Donate other services if you run your own business?
86. Donate the use of a vehicle if you own a car dealership?
87. Loan your cell phone (and cover costs for any calls) to s/one driving a rescued dog?
88. Donate your used dog dryer when you get a new one?
89. Let rescue know when you’ll be flying and that you’d be willing to be a rescued dog’s escort?
90. Donate a doggy seatbelt?
91. Donate a grid for a van or other vehicle?
92. Organize a rescued dog picnic or other event to reunite the rescued dogs that have been placed?
93. Donate other types of doggy toys that might be safe for rescued dogs?
94. Donate a roll-a-treat or Buster cube?
95. Donate clickers or a video on clicker training?
96. Donate materials for a quarantine area at a foster’s home?
97. Donate sheets of linoleum or other flooring materials to put under crates to protect the foster’s floor?
98. Donate an engraving tool to make ID tags for each of the rescued dogs?
99. Remember that rescuing a dog involves the effort and time of many
people and make yourself available on an emergency basis to do whatever
is needed?
100.Do something not listed above to help rescue?

gently-used dog equipment is always welcomed.

Thank you and I posted that on the CKCS forum that I frequent!

Fantastic post … I will be volunteering to do fund raising and event booths here at the MSPCA in Boston, MA. So many people genuinely want to help, but don’t really know how to help. I made a post under the forums called “Shopping for Rescue”, i.e., sites people can buy their leads, dog supplies, etc. from that they will need to buy anyway. Proceeds go to Rescue. Great post!! (Check out in the Forums under “Shelters & Rescues” the subject “Shopping for Rescue” and add your own sites that you recommend or other ways to shop at places that help rescues!)

Great post! I’ve heard of several people that want to do something, but don’t want to (or can’t) go so far as to foster or adopt… turns out, there’s plenty that ANYONE can do!

That’s a great list. We tried adopting another dog recently from the shelter, a 11 year old mixed breed but it didn’t work out. We donated a harness and leash, as they didn’t have any at the time. Next time I go to BJ’s I will pick up a 50lb. bag of Pedigree.

I’m sure they would love that!!! Thanks for supporting rescue!

I am so sorry it didn’t work out for you. What happened? Maybe I can help…Annette

Great ways to support rescue! I want to adopt another dog (probably an Aussie or Aussie mix) so badly but cannot due to our circumstance. Supporting local rescue made me feel that at least I did little for the doggies who don’t have a forever home yet…........

A little??? I have worked with rescue for some time and let me tell you…Every single thing done is VERY important!!!! Those of us who are passionate about rescue (I know not everyone is) have personal lives. That life dictates what we can and cannot do, along with our hearts. I have done almost every job there is to do from fostering 2 dogs and 15 puppies (plus my personal dogs), to repping, being the SE Coordinator, to doing almost nothing. Right now my priority is my grandchildren, my health, and my dogs. My dogs are getting up there and after fostering 150+ dogs I think they deserve a break. They have given up alot for my passion.

But if there is one thing I can tell you, it’s that every single piece of the puzzle is just as important as the other, and don’t ever feel like it’s not. So if you can do ANYthing to help, it’s a help. There is a saying that goes “All I can do is all I can do and all I can do is enough”. Trust me, you CAN help.

Terrible fire at Safe Harbor Rescue, in Jupiter, FL, this morning. This is the shelter, I worked with, at my last two Jupiter events, with StarBarks. Fourteen cats perished, 38 were saved. All dogs were moved to safe space/fosters.

It’s all over the noon news. Many, many people showed up offering foster space, donations, crates. To end on a happy note, a little pup got adopted by one of the firefighters, she named her Patty.