Hello.
I did answer this morning but was timed out and lost the text
. So here goes again!
How I understand your experience with boarding. In an earlier post on this thread I related a similar horror story that happened to my little 5 pound Yorkie.
In both our cases we arrived earlier than expected and found sick and neglected dogs. Do these bad places put our dogs in a cage and forget them until the scheduled pick up day, and clean them up for us?? I wonder?
I am so sorry that your babies were in such bad shape, you must have been devastated. Thank God we both came early or we may not have had dogs to pick up. I still feel the guilt of leaving my little shy, innocent girl in that place, but I thought she would be happy and well cared for.
After what happened I never dared to leave her again, she just came with us or we didn't go. Our present boy is not such a well behaved traveller and now and again we had to find a good place for him where he would be treated right. Not easy!! No more kennels, however fancy and vet run they appear to be! Even home sitters cannot always be trusted, as I also posted above. After a long hard search I found that a daycare/ boarding facility run by qualified and caring people was the way to go for me. I tried it out by having my boy there for day care first and then for a night or two. I visited at various hours and checked out the place. The real test is when my dog loves to go there and hates coming home! There's gratitude for my 24/7 loving care! LOL!
I agree it is important to secure a boarding place where one can trust our dogs will be happy and safe. We should do it in advance for future use, especially in emergency.
I feel a very important requirement is close to 24/7 supervision. I do not go for short visits for feeding, walks etc and then being left alone most of the day and night. Getting those requirements is not easy!
Hoping our experiences will help others to be cautious in trusting some boarding facilities. All that glitters is often not gold!
Good Luck!