Our story

A slower kind of rescue.

A man walking a small white dog along a field path at sunset

In 2014, Margaret Okafor adopted Duke, a fourteen-year-old Labrador nobody else had asked about. Duke could not walk far, so they walked slowly: to the corner, to the bench, back again with a rest at every gatepost. Neighbours stopped to chat. Some asked whether there were more dogs like Duke. There were dozens, waiting in kennels while younger dogs went home first. Margaret began fostering two at a time, then recruited the neighbours. The rescue that grew out of those walks kept the name, and the pace. Margaret, Duke and Slow Walks are fictional. The problem is not: older dogs are often the last to be chosen.

How it started

It began with a walk that took forty minutes to go round one block.

An older man with a walking stick strolling barefoot along a wet beach with a black dog

Slow Walks never sends a dog back to a kennel. If a home does not work out, the dog returns to a foster sofa and we start again. If a dog becomes too frail to move, they stay put as a forever foster, and we pay every bill until the end. We would rather help forty dogs well than four hundred in a hurry. It is slower. That is rather the point.

Every dog keeps a place with us.

Our promise

About forever fostering

Most of our dogs live with foster carers, but every rescue needs a place to land. Ours is the Snug: a converted bungalow with four sofas, underfloor heating and no stairs at all. New arrivals rest here for a week or two while our vet gets to know them and we find the right foster home. The Snug is imaginary, but everything in it is chosen the way a real older-dog sanctuary would choose it.

Welcome to the Snug.

The sanctuary

The sofa room

A golden dog asleep on a black and white cushion on a dark sofa, in a patch of sun

The sun spot

A white and ginger dog asleep in the sun on a sofa, tucked into a patterned blanket

The quiet room

A black dog with a grey chin asleep between a blue blanket and a pink one

The back gate

A beagle sitting on an autumn path, holding its own lead in its mouth

A day at the Snug

Timetable, approximately

Breakfast, with tablets hidden in cheese

Walk to the gate. Sniff everything.

Nap

Hopeful faces at lunch

Nap, in a sunbeam

Beard brushing

Sofa, telly, snoring

Meet the residents

The fourteen-year-old Labrador who started it all. Duke walked about a mile a day, very slowly, and never once seemed to mind. Every dog we have helped since walks in his paw prints.

In memory of Duke.

Founding dog, 2000 to 2016 · fictional and much loved

A cream Labrador with a white face and an open, happy mouth walking on grass

Help an old dog