We have taken in several “charity cases” over the years: not shelter dogs, but ones we heard about who were on their way there if they didn’t find a suitable home. All of them came with baggage that we couldn’t overcome, despite our best efforts, and all of them ended up being outside dogs. They got food, water, shelter, vet care (and neutering if needed), grooming, attention, and company from the other pets (cats and dogs), but we just could not promote them to “free-range house dogs.”
We do love springer spaniels. The first, purchased by Mr. S before we were married, was kind of an impulse, but we quickly grew to love the springer personality. That first springer is gone, and now we have two more. It just seems to work better for us to raise a dog from puppyhood and know her history from day one. (We also prefer females – spayed as soon as they’re old enough, of course!)
We did try adopting a shelter springer once, but the conflicts between him and our two resident springers turned out to be too upsetting for everyone, and he went back to the shelter. Taking him back broke my heart and was the hardest thing I ever did – we never thought we’d give up a dog – but we did not do so without a lot of soul-searching and hard questions about how much we were really willing to take on. (And a lot of tears. A LOT.) We did provide the shelter with lots of notes on his behavior that we observed, and our opinion that he might work out better as an “only dog.” (He was an absolute sweetheart when he was by himself with us, but both he and the other dogs just did not mesh.) He was adopted, I believe for good, a few weeks later, into a home where he had his new owner(s) all to himself.
Other than that shelter springer, every dog we have taken in has stayed with us for the rest of its life.
So we’ve decided that from now on we’ll keep raising springer pups from scratch. I visit the national springer rescue organization site now and then, and every so often they have dogs that need a home together. Since we prefer to have at least two dogs to keep each other company, we might – MIGHT – consider adopting such a pair after our current two are gone, if the time and the dogs are right. But we may just continue with pups. We do donate generously to springer rescue every year.
If that makes us bad people in someone else’s eyes, because we choose to raise our dogs from pups instead of seeking out animals with unknown problems, so be it. We’re doing the best we can, and it’s what works for us. There are no easy answers.