MAn “animal welfare career” began in 2008 as a foster home for anxious dogs from Romania. I am currently running a dog school as a professional dog trainer. I quickly noticed that no one took advantage of the advice before the purchase, but people only come when the child has already fallen into the well. Quite often it was because everyone simply has a dog that doesn't suit them at all.

In order to limit the damage, I helped ensure that some people got the right dog. Back then it was a little easier than it is today. There were many sensible people who really read and understood the text, so that after the first phone call it was actually clear whether they were calling for the right dog and whether it was just a matter of chemistry.

My rule was to get to know the dog first and sleep on it one night. This has proven to be successful and this is the only way every dog has their dream home. Nobody ever needed a dog school for that. I was there to advise on the finishing touches and everything was always perfect. Many grateful people and happy dogs from the first day of their new life together.

Most of them were even given great social tasks such as therapy dogs, mantrailers, rescue dogs, sniffing dogs, school dogs or just office dogs and so on. Each one was the missing piece of the puzzle in life. This doesn't require any adjustment period with vacation or letting yourself arrive. It was as if the new family member had always been there.

When I went to Romania for the first time in 2012, things got so crazy that I emigrated three months later. I lived in an animal shelter with 600 mostly free-roaming dogs at the time.

My already overly developed powers of observation became even more acute and, combined with the knowledge I had previously accumulated about dogs and their people, I sent dogs from there to Germany. I was able to describe them living freely without human influence in great detail.

None of these direct placements were as great as the many before them. They all kept the dogs and got along with it, but unfortunately the stories weren't as brilliant as before. That's why I stopped pretty quickly and handed the dogs over to other clubs and animal shelters for adoption.

Of course, each of them has its own rules. It is more important for me to choose the dogs myself on site, because since the boom with the killing stations began, I have noticed first hand that more and more people are coming to Romania to carelessly save dogs from being killed can't even estimate them. By the way, neither do I, because what can I say about a dog that sits in a small kennel and that I am only allowed to photograph from the outside?

I was stoned from all sides when I prevented some dogs from being exported. I do not care. At that point I had already developed myself a long time ago, because for over a year in 2013 I was the only person who was allowed to enter such a killing station and I also very briefly made this terrible mistake of admitting to Romanian corruption financed by the EU support.

After all, I was lucky enough to be able to collect the dogs on 90 hectares of land in Romania so that I could send them to Germany with proper descriptions. Many of them were so traumatized that they could never drive because there are not enough professional foster homes for such dogs.

And then of course there is the faction that is too aggressive to be expected of a “normal” family. The demands on a dog in German society are high. I had a larger selection of dogs to choose from than places in Germany. So why should I send the "difficult" skins first?

On average, in 2012, each Romanian animal shelter housed 400 dogs. I've never understood why some rescuers push lots of friendly dogs away to pull a frightened thing out of the corner that no one can handle afterwards. Now, a decade later, there are often upwards of 1,000 dogs in Romanian animal shelters!

I once personally freed such dogs from German cellars and would rather not know how high the number of unreported cases of direct sales really is. Increasingly there was this, from my point of view, idiotic attitude: you have to let the dog arrive first, give him time, blah blah. Hey guys, if it doesn't fit, then it doesn't fit! Neither dog training nor patience will help.

In such a case, no dog is helped by keeping it and hoping for better times. Recently I even read that you should leave the dog alone if it wants to bite you. Hello? You get a dog in your house and you have to avoid him? So some bear is lying on the couch and the family moves into the apartment until the dog gets used to everything???

All these years I watched helplessly and firmly believed in the sanity of humanity. That at some point everyone understood what you were actually doing to the detriment of the animals. But now that hope is lost. Things are getting worse on both sides. Both those who choose the dogs abroad and blindly rescue everyone and those who find it convenient to have a dog delivered to them.

By the way, this is a very lucrative business. The dog catchers financed by the state take him to a killing station, where they are also fed at no cost to the agent and he is put in the transporter ready to travel free of charge.

Preferably a puppy. He's always sweet and his character or origin doesn't matter, because you can still train him... More and more dogs abroad are suffering from a misunderstood love of animals! I don't want to imply anything bad. There are no bobtails or poodles in Romania!

Back to perfect mediation. So, after the interested parties have gotten to know their new pet and slept one night, they call the next morning and we arrange the so-called “pre-inspection”: For me, this means that I personally visit the new home with the dog (!).

1. so that the dog itself has already been there and could associate it positively and 2. so that all people involved, possibly also the neighbor's dog, the cat, etc., have already been in contact with the chosen one and 3. to see where the dog will be sleep, which stairs does he have to walk, what does the surrounding area look like and if necessary the fencing.

If everything fits, the dog can be picked up as soon as it suits everyone. You don't need to go on vacation or tie up the poor dog like a package with a safety harness and two leashes, because it's much better for everyone if the dog has to integrate into everyday life straight away without a lot of learning. Well, and then everyone is always amazed why they thought about so many completely unnecessary thoughts in advance that are communicated in the media, because in this way it works well and is completely stress-free for everyone. They already know exactly what they are getting and, above all, that everything fits.

That's why you don't sell dogs on the Internet, even if the money is tempting. We therefore urgently need intelligent supporters to finance the capture and care of the dogs. The animal shelters have to pay the transport fee directly to a specialized company and of course nothing more is possible, so we cannot cover our costs.

In this sense, we are particularly urgently dependent on your donations.

We are also looking for reputable clubs and animal shelters that will occasionally take a dog off our hands.

Please spread the word: Thank you

PS: I know all the arguments and counter-arguments very well and I have no desire to convert anyone. I know that very few people will like what it says here, but I stand by it with my name. For my dogs, the motto "better than..., only the best!" does not apply. No offense, with love Sophie Bauer