Matching dogs to owners—10 years of 'Selectadog'

The purpose of this paper is to explain what the ‘Selectadog’ programme is, to emphasize some things it is not, to show what it is for and who benefits, to detail the forms that it is in, to give some indication as to how it works and to relate some of the experiences of using ‘Selectadog’ in the United Kingdom and elsewhere since 1975. ‘Selectadog’ is a programme designed to match up the characteristics of the more popular breeds of dog to the circumstances of potential owners, as identified by means of a questionnaire. Its purpose is to give guidance to people thinking about getting a dog and above all to make them think through the points they should be considering about fitting a new dog into their lives. At best and it is quite a good best, it can give the prospective owner a number of leads and a positive starting point. It also provides a good deal of free advice and information to allow the new owner to begin a prolonged period of responsible pet animal ownership, without putting them off unnecessarily.