Stray dog kennelling services in West Berkshire are in crisis.
Since April 2025 the dog warden service has dealt with 100 stray dogs across the West Berkshire and Bracknell Forest areas.
It says kennelling costs are going up, and is now planning to launch a dog fostering service to help ease the burden.
“We recognise that rehoming takes time, and success can be dependent on the age and breed of the dog as well as the rescue centres capacity to take in dogs at that time,” it said.
“This approach isn’t without its own considerations that need to be managed.
“For example, dog movement, incentivisation, officer time, dog temperament checks, repeated straying, damages or risk of injury to either dog or human.
“However, the service feels it can mitigate those risks with the steps it has put in place, such as officer learning and development, temperament checks, home checks and free food vouchers to potential fosterers and support from its contractor.”
The scheme is being finalised and will create a directory of dog foster homes the dog wardens can call on during peak times.
Of the 100 stray dogs picked up, 35 required kennelling and the dog warden services says this has been one of the busier summers, exacerbated due to not having in place a dedicated animal warden.
Some of the cost experienced by the service is being balanced by the vacancy of the animal warden.
However, it says this is not sustainable given the vacancy itself leads to higher costs, increased pressure on existing staff trying to back-fill the role and limited activity in other areas that role plays within the community.
An advert is progressing to replace the role.
The service reports that external capacity issues in arranging rescue spaces when attempting to rehome unclaimed dogs.
Moving dogs on after seven days – which the council is required to do by law – has been the biggest pressure insofar as maintaining the ability to collect and hold stray dogs.
The average time to rehome a stray dog this year has been around 14.5 days, 7.5 days over the statutory period.
Councils can humanely destroy a dog that hasn’t been claimed after seven days.
Historically, the service would only seek this option if no rehoming was possible, but this was at a time when kennelling wasn’t so scarce and rehoming a little easier.
This year, the service has arranged for one humane destruction due to the temperament being such that rehoming was not an option.
It currently has three permanent kennelling spaces across two locations, with an overflow option for another space if available.
Each space is secured on a monthly basis, costing around £1,000 per month/space.
However, neither facility allows members of the public to attend to reclaim.
Also, there is no guarantee that should a space be given up, that it then becomes available later.
Kennelling costs are predicted to be around £36,000 to £48,000 for this year.
