Playpens
The First-Fortnight Playpen Setup I Use for Every New Foster
The playpen is not a cage, it is a nursery. How a foster carer sets one up for the first fourteen days, and the signs that say the animal is ready for more freedom.
Fiona Ellery
Rescue Foster Carer · Ballarat, VIC · 4 posts
Fiona has fostered more than forty dogs and cats for Ballarat rescue groups since 2016 — the shutdown ones, the chewers, the staffy with the bad hip and the kitten raised in a laundry. Every guide she writes starts with the same question: what does this animal need in its first fortnight? She tests playpens, calming beds and settling setups in her own loungeroom before recommending them.
Credentials & experience
- Foster carer for Ballarat rescue groups since 2016 (40+ animals)
- Hands-on playpen, calming-bed and settling setups in a real foster home
- Writes first-fortnight and decompression guides for rescue pets
Writes about
rescue dog settlingplaypenscalming bedsmulti-pet householdsfoster carePosts by Fiona
Playpens
Why My Fosters Chew Playpens, and the Setups That Survived Forty Animals
What forty fosters taught me about panel materials, anchors and the honest truth that some animals need a crate, not a pen.
Beds & Mats
Calming Beds for Dogs Who Have Never Had One: A Foster Carer's Notes
Most of my fosters had never owned a bed. Here is what the donut beds, mats and quilts actually did for them, and the buying notes that matter more than the fluff.
Beds & Mats
Beds for the Shutdown Dog: What Helped My Most Fearful Fosters Settle
The shutdown dog does not want a bed, it wants a decision made for it. The placement ladder and bed choices that finally got my feariest fosters sleeping flat.