FIRST WEEK
The vet visit
A full exam, core vaccines, deworming, and a blood test for heartworm and the tick-borne diseases that are common in the Capital Region. New York requires every dog to be vaccinated against rabies by four months old.
Our work
A rescue that lives in other people’s houses.
ABC Animal Rescue has no kennel building. Every dog we take in goes to a volunteer’s home and stays there — on their floor, on their walks, around their family — until the right adopter comes along.
That makes us small, and it makes us careful. We can only take in as many dogs as we have foster homes for. In exchange, every dog we place has spent weeks being known by somebody, and every adopter gets to hear about it.
What a dollar actually buys
A dog does not leave us half-done.
Before any dog goes to its new home it has seen a vet, been vaccinated, and been spayed or neutered. Some of that is our standard. Some of it is New York law.
BEFORE ADOPTION
Spay or neuter
New York law bars rescues from releasing a dog for adoption unless it has been sterilized or the adopter signs an agreement to have it done. We do the surgery before a dog goes home whenever it is old and healthy enough.
EVERY DAY
Food, a crate, a ride
Fosters give their time and their homes; we pay for everything else. Food, a crate, a collar and leash, any medication, and the miles driven to every appointment.
The adoption fee covers part of that bill for a healthy young dog and very little of it for a dog that arrives with an infection, a skin condition or a bad leg. Donations cover the difference — which is what lets us say yes to the dogs that cost more.
Why foster homes
A dog in a house tells you who it is.
A dog in a kennel is a stressed version of itself. A dog on a living-room floor shows you whether it is fine with the cat, frightened of the vacuum cleaner, good in the car, or the kind that cries when you leave the room.
That is the information an adopter actually needs. New York now requires every rescue to disclose, in writing, everything it knows about a dog’s behavior and any bite history before the adoption. A foster home is where that knowledge comes from.
Where we fit
We are a rescue, not the county shelter.
We take dogs in when we have somewhere for them to go. Stray and lost dogs in Saratoga County are handled by each town’s animal control officer and the county shelter, and that is where to start if you have found a dog or lost one.
Lost or found a dog?
- Call first
- Saratoga County Animal Shelter
- Address
- 6010 County Farm Road
Ballston Spa, NY 12020 - Phone
- (518) 885-4113
- Also
- Your town’s animal control officer
What we do, and what we don’t
ABC Animal Rescue does not take strays, run animal control or operate a kennel. We have no paid staff and no building. What we have is a group of volunteers, a list of foster homes, and a vet bill that the whole organization exists to pay.
If you need to give up your own dog, we may be able to help when a foster home is free — and if we cannot, our rehoming guide covers the other options.
Every dog we save is paid for by donations and cared for by volunteers. ABC Animal Rescue Incorporated is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit — gifts are tax-deductible.