Congrats on your recent adoption!
With any newly adopted pet, we recommend taking things slow as you get to know each other! Decompression is KEY. Think of this time as your “dating period” – you wouldn’t introduce your new partner to all of your favorite places, friends, and family within the first couple of weeks – that would be overwhelming! Same thing for a newly adopted pet. We recommend keeping things low-key. Start by just getting to know your new pet!
Please visit our Introducing Your New Dog to Your Home page.
Within the first 3-5 days…
Please be sure your pet’s microchip is registered correctly and replace their OTAT ID tag with your own. You can purchase an ID tag at larger pet stores, or online. Feel free to mail our tag back to our Bucktown Adoption Center so we can reuse it!
Within the first 2-3 weeks…
We recommend that you take in your newly adopted pet to your vet. It is important that you get your pet established for care early on. You will want to provide their medical records. At the first vet exam, we always recommend getting your pet’s flea/tick and heartworm preventatives prescribed as well as bringing in a small fecal sample to be tested for intestinal parasites. We give the pets in our care preventative dewormer, but we do not run fecal tests unless we suspect a parasite due to diarreha. Parasites can be pesky and may require additional dewormer. This is at the cost of the adopter.
At 6 months…
We recommend every adopted dog be retested for heartworm disease after 6 months in their new home.
We heartworm test all of our dogs over 7 months of age prior to adoption, but because of the lag time in the antigens reaching testable levels in the blood, we strongly recommend that dogs adopted at 7-12 months of age should be re- tested in 6 months to ensure that they are indeed heartworm negative. Dogs arriving on transport from our rural rescue partners are most at risk, but any dog can become infected with heartworm, so keeping them on their prevention and retesting any dog adopted under a year of age is key to keeping our buddies healthy!
If your dog tests positive within 6 months of adoption and you have been giving them their heartworm prevention each month, please contact [email protected] for assistance with treatment. Want more information? Please refer to this handout.
Need extra support?
As pets decompress and get comfortable, they may show new behaviors. If you need assistance, you are always welcome to reach out to our trainer at [email protected]. We are here to assist with any post-adoption challenges you may be having.
Adopting can be an exciting, overwhelming, fun, and nerve-racking all at the same time. Breathe through it – YOU GOT THIS. And if you need any help, we are here for you!
