We have an active 3 year old English Springer Spaniel and in the 18 months he has been in our family we have only had to place him in kennels once. We found these five days quite stressful worrying about him (as we had only had him for a short time and did not know how he would react to coming into a new family and then spending time in kennels). Since then we have never left him with anyone, taking him with us on every holiday, even across the channel. Unfortunately we are foreseeing circumstances where we can not take him with us. We do not want to leave him in kennels, nor leave him in our home and have someone ‘popping’ in to see him. Does anyone know where we can find someone who will take him into their home, and treat him as an individual not just a dog in a kennel. We live in North Wales and surprisingly there is little evidence of a service like this. We would also be willing to travel around the area to take him somewhere suitable.

The problem you would have is whether you can trust this person , what to do if something happens to your dog while you are away ( ie an accident occuring , the dog becoming ill etc ) especially if you are away from your normal vet. i think a thread ran a while ago about people minding dogs in their own homes . If you do a search it may come up .
What about pet sitters where the person actually lives in your home while you are away ? At least your dog is in familiar surroundings .
Do you not have a close friend or relative that would be kind enough to stay there ? At least they would be near to your vets and the dog could go on its usual walks etc so eliminating some of the stress of your being away
Lel

Have you looked around for local pet sitters? I know here there are several companies that have someone come into your house 1, 2 or 3 times a day, and you can also hire then to stay 24 hours in your home to pet sit. It doesnt normally come cheap though, deff not as cheap as a Kennel. Maybe you san search around on the net a little for pet sitters...just an idea.

Do you not have a neighbour that is willing to take your dog in for a short time. I am very lucky where i live i have a lady that lives two doors away from me that will have my dogs up to two weeks if i ask. Maybe you could ask them, obviously only if you could trust them.
We only left our dogs with her last week and every since we got back Inca (pup) ktowards her drive and wanting to go in, so i know they are treated well. Hope you find someone.

Animal aunts will have a list:

http://www.animalaunts.co.uk

I'd ask at your vets surgery as well

I have a dog sitter who does exactly that while we are away but unfortunately we are beased in the Midlands

I will ask her if she knows of anyone in your neck of the woods

Thanks for all you advice. We have found a compromise between kennels and a sitter. It is kennel based but limited to 10 dogs at a time, run by a lovely couple who have made it very comforting knowing Max will be kept in good care.
It has definitely been a better choice than a dog sitter as although they are looking after a few dogs they will still give him lots of attention and he will be in a comfortable environment with his own sofa! - the stone floors and unsheltered kennels was something I did not want to do but I was weary about him being in someone else's home (or someone in our home), so I know this is the right choice. I will keep you posted after Max's stay to let you know whether he enjoyed it and whether we coped aswell

As promised an update on Max's stay in the kennels: He had a great time and the owners said they would welcome him back again (They couldn't believe how much he smiled when they went to him) We felt a lot better than we had done when he stayed in a bog-standard kennels knowing he was in a more comfortable environment and with a lot more attention. I would recommend to anyone to thoroughly look at all kennels in their area before choosing one because they're not all the same - some of them are very special

Rachael could you e-mail me details of your dog-sitter please? I know you live in Northampton as we do. We don't envisage using a dog-sitter on a regular basis, but just the odd emergency situation - it would be good to have arrangements in place. Thanks
Cathy.