Contrary to people’s initial ideas about greyhounds they make fantastic pets! Greyhounds are:

• Very affectionate and love their cuddles and attention
• Short coated and they generally don’t shed much and don’t produce much by way of ‘doggy odour’
• Low maintenance:
  • they require very little exercise – they are not long distance athletes and so only need a 15-20 minute walk 5 times a week
  • Only need bathing 2-3 times a year (and only then if they really need it)
  • Sleep for about 20 hours a day so are great for families and busy working couples.
  • Greyhounds are very clean, often seen grooming themselves like a cat
  • Greyhounds are very quiet and rarely bark

Aims and Objectives

Greyhounds as Pets is a not for profit initiative coordinated by Greyhound Racing NSW. It aims to provide families with a pet that is ideally suited to their needs while giving those greyhounds not suited to, or ready to complete their life as an athlete.

Finding a dog is easy. Finding the right dog for your family, environment and lifestyle is a challenge that Greyhounds as Pets takes very seriously. We want you and your new friend to live 'happily ever after'. For this reason, we ask foster carers and adopters to fill in a detailed questionnaire to enable us to match you to the most suitable greyhound.

Lara Griffin (Coordinator of Greyhounds as Pets) has been temperament testing dogs for many years, has considerable experience in foster caring and re-homing dogs and is about to submit her PhD in animal behaviour. She is passionate about identifying lovely greyhounds with great temperaments and placing them into the right homes.

The objective is to improve animal welfare in the greyhound racing industry by providing dogs with a ‘career change’ if they are not suited to, or are ready to retire from, the racing industry.

More about Greyhounds as Pets: