Starting a Rescue
From the The Home for Unwanted and Abandoned Guinea Pigs. This site has helped many other rescuers get started and has provided a lot of ground work education. The adoption application and contracts currently used by many rescuers were inspired from this site.

Burnout: When Rescuers Need Rescuing
This is a very good article that all rescuers should read and anyone considering rescue should read up front as well. While this is written by a herp (reptiles and amphibians) rescuer, it applies across the board to all rescuers.

Adoption Contract
This is the most important and most often used document at a rescue. Please feel free to download this document and change as necessary for your rescue. Change items in pink to your information and change the color back to blue or black. This version is based predominantly on the one found at the Home for Unwanted and Abandoned Guinea Pigs. There are a few additional details added about the guinea pigs, and a very important addition of a driver's license from a hard lesson learned. In addition, this version has been reformatted as a Word document.

Surrender Form (with a fee)
See Release Form for explanation. Change items in pink to your information and change the color back to blue or black.

Release Form (without a fee)
Change items in pink to your information and change the color back to blue or black.

It is important to keep a record of all of your incoming guinea pigs, regardless of where they came from. You need to note the date, sex, fertility, age, and condition of the animal. Many rescues have very different surrender policies. Some do not accept private surrenders, they only take in animals from shelters. Others take in sick or needy animals and try to avoid 'convenience' surrenders. Others take in any animal, hopefully only if they have adequate space and resources. We have two versions of the Surrender form -- one which asks for a $75 surrender fee and/or a neuter fee if appropriate, and one form that is does not request any fees. On private surrenders, it generally doesn't hurt to use the one with the fee. You may get a donation that you wouldn't have otherwise. Most of the time, circumstances dictate that no fee will be forthcoming. Again, these two word documents are based on the release form found at the Home for Unwanted and Abandoned Guinea Pigs.

Adoption Application
Be sure to change the email address to your own. This is a word document which is very similar in content to the Detailed application available on postings on the Cavy Classifieds. It is generally used as a screening tool. It is not a binding document and can be used via email or in person, if needed. Most rescues rely on a combination of these formal applications, phone conversions, emails, and in person meetings. This version is based predominantly on the one found at the Home for Unwanted and Abandoned Guinea Pigs, however additional information has been added to the word version. Please feel free to change this as you see fit.

Here are some guinea pig rescues with Petfinder sites for ideas:

http://www.petfinder.org/shelters/DE05.html

http://www.petfinder.org/shelters/FL131.html

http://www.petfinder.org/shelters/LA22.html

http://web2.petfinder.org/shelters/NJ250.html

http://web2.petfinder.org/shelters/NJ251.html

http://www.petfinder.org/shelters/TN82.html

You can see they all follow a similar format. It's pretty easy to get started.

Here's an example of a Petfinder site taking creative use of html: http://www.petfinder.org/shelters/CA179.html. It shows that you can do just about anything. You can also get a special name for your page. For example: CavySpirit.petfinder.org is easier to remember. Later, if you also get another site, you can still use your Petfinder site.

In addition, there are a number of places that offer free website hosting.

It's just too bad that Petfinder now has Petco as a major sponsor. As a rescue/shelter, you may get a few 'freebies' that you MIGHT need, but you will get some occasional junk from them now, too.

Do you need help with HTML? Have no clue what it is or why you need to know it? Even with Petfinder, it helps to know a few basics for formatting your page. Here is a GREAT site that is beautifully organized and extremely helpful for beginners. BOOKMARK this site! It is Annabella's HTML Help.

For some additional info on how these sites were put together, see this thread.