Vale Park employees have fun with furry friends at its daycare program

Vale Park employees have fun with furry friends at its daycare program

One of the most stressful parts of adding a furry friend to your family is figuring out what to do when you have to leave them home for the day. Wouldn’t it be nice to have it all handled by the same veterinary hospital that you completely trust? Vale Park Animal Hospital’s daycare is the perfect solution to that problem.

Vale Park’s daycare program is very similar to a children's daycare program. The dogs can be taken in for the entire day, or if needed, just a half day. This allows the owners that are nervous about leaving their dogs alone for whole days a safer option.

Interested dog owners can call Vale Park at any time to sign up for the program.

“We are booked out a week or so in advance, so I always just tell people to call in and find out what days we have available and just schedule from there. We do have a lot of people who come on the same days every week. Some dogs are here Monday through Friday, so it gets booked up pretty quickly,” said Melissa Carmichael, lodge supervisor at Vale Park Animal Hospital.

The program offers many great aspects for every kind of dog. It is a great place for socialization, since the dogs are broken out into groups of about 10.

Groups will normally be decided on age, size, and playstyle. Some dogs don’t prefer playing with toys but would rather lay outside and relax, which they are allowed to do. Other groups are able to run around and have access to a variety of toys.

For the summer months, the program provides swimming pools and splash pads for the dogs. This is great for tiring out the dogs and getting them ready to rest when they go home to their owners.

The various groups are always supervised by two employees to make sure that everyone is playing nicely together. They are able to decide what activities the dogs will participate in based on their grouping.

Vale Park makes sure the program is affordable for the dog owners. It is $25 for a full day, which is 7 a.m. to 6 p.m. They also offer an option for a half day, which is four hours or less, for only $18.

There are requirements before you are able to drop your furry friend off at daycare, however. They are required to have their rabies, canine distemper, and Kennel Cough vaccine prior to coming in. For puppies, they just have to be current on all of their vaccinations.

Carmichael believes that Vale Park’s daycare program is set apart from the other programs because all of the employees are so invested in it.

“Everyone that works back here absolutely loves what they do. We love playing with the puppies. We love interacting with them, and I know they all have a great time while they are here,” Carmichael says. “It is definitely watching all the dogs playing in the swimming pool. The day we put up the pools, all the dogs were jumping in. It’s wonderful. I love it. You can’t have a bad day working here.”

For more information on the Vale Park Animal Hospital and its daycare program, visit https://valeparkah.com/