# Considering fostering a dog BUT...



## MayaMartina111 (Oct 13, 2015)

Hello! :wave:
My husband and I have recently moved to a new apartment in a new city. For the past two months, we have been regular volunteers at the local shelter where we met (and are quite taken with) a sweet terrier mix dog who is in serious need of an ear hematoma surgery (the thing won't reabsorb on its own). 

The vet there said she would perform the surgery if the dog goes to a clean home environment and asked if we would be willing to foster her. She is also heartworm positive and needs to undergo treatment in a place where she will remain calm. Knowing that her ear and heartworm have been the main deterrents for prospective adopters (otherwise she is the perfect dog), we are determined to help her become her best self so that she finds a forever home. 

So, since we both work full time, we have been looking at our schedules trying to see if we can make it work. We also reached out to our landlord telling them the full story and asking for their approval. Initially they said yes BUT they made a huge fuss about the laminate flooring, and how "should the dog cause any damage to the floor, the tenant must pay for new flooring FOR THE WHOLE APARTMENT."

I feel like a jerk for feeling in a position where I have to decide between the floor and the dog, but I honestly can't afford a full reflooring if the one we have gets scratched. I've never had a dog in a home with laminate flooring... I know this kind of floor is sensitive to humidity, but how delicate/sturdy is it when it comes to scratches?

The dog is 43 pounds, and again, since she has heartworm the idea is that she stay as calm as possible. 

Any words of advice would be greatly appreciated... 

And here's a picture of the girl:







She's the happiest dog!

Thanks.


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## sinisterminister (Oct 18, 2011)

Since the dog needs to be in a calm environment anyway, would it be possible for you to designate a corner of the home for the dog that can be covered by a large carpet and block off the space with X-pens/keep the dog crated whilst unattended?

I don't have experience with laminate flooring, but I couldn't imagine that a house trained (or at least, a consistently taken out) dog with properly clipped nails and toys to play with will be able to do much damage... Then again, with dogs, anything can happen.


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## kdawnk (Mar 26, 2014)

I don't imagine the laminate will be damaged by anything other than bathroom accidents. 
If that's a concern for you, you can get a tarp or thick plastic sold at hardware stores in rolls, and lay that on the floor. After that you can add a layer of newspaper, and then if you're not overly concerned of accidents place a low pile door mat or towel over top for comfort purposes. When I fostered a 5 week old puppy (obviously can't hold her bladder yet) I built a wooden frame and tacked the plastic into it for a 100% seal, then on top we added a layer of news paper for absorbency, then we had a towel for comfort.

As for your schedules and working full time, a heart worm positive dog is supposed to be on crate rest from my understanding. So as long as you can come home at noon to let her out for a midday potty break you should be fine. Add area rugs and keep the nails trimmed if you're concerned about the dog scratching the flooring. My parent's dog on the farm is trained to stay on the area rug at all times indoors.


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## Kate M (Sep 2, 2014)

We have lived in many different houses with laminate flooring and noticed damage from dogs one time: the laminate flooring that looked like dark wood and it was slightly scratched when our 80lb hyper lab mix would run and swerve on the hard floor trying to get traction. We put out stragically placed rugs after that and he would hop from rug to rug to get anywhere.

I would echo responses above: have a crate in a special area and have some sort of covering (even old towels) around it for accidents or just coming in and out of the crate. Since the HW treatments require a calm environment I doubt you will encourage rug jumping as we did.

Oh and I just thought of one more damage of laminate: when we first got our lab and thought "hey he won't do any damage alone while we are at work" and then came home to a 2'x3' section of laminate that had been ripped up by our little angel. The days before I found out about crate training were expensive!


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## Sarah101 (Jun 27, 2015)

Deleted I am leaving this forum.


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