Marigold went into labor in the middle of the night.
The pregnant cat, who had been rescued by the Pope Memorial Humane Society in Dover before moving into a foster home, needed immediate attention. One of her kittens had become stuck in her birth canal, a complication that might have gone unnoticed in a shelter without overnight staff.
Instead, Marigold’s foster owner knew just what to do, according to the shelter’s executive director Caryn Fugatt.
“She called the staff that she was supposed to call, and we got her right to the emergency veterinarian. She then had an emergency c-section and gave birth to eight healthy kittens,” Fugatt testified at a Senate hearing on Tuesday. “That’s just one example of many, many, many examples that I’ve seen in my time at the shelter of how foster literally saves lives.”
Advocates from across the state filled four rows of armchairs to express near-unanimous support for Sen. Regina Birdsell’s legislation, Senate Bill 475, that would enshrine in law a new definition of a foster home, one that explicitly establishes grounds for placing pregnant and lactating animals in such homes.
For years, New Hampshire shelters and rescues placed pregnant and lactating animals in foster homes until their offspring were eligible for adoption. That standard of care, widely considered a best practice in the animal welfare industry, came under threat last year when the Department of Agriculture, Markets and Food began tightening its enforcement of the state’s animal fostering statute.
The Department’s rules stipulate that pet vendors, a licensed category that includes shelters and rescues, may place an animal in a foster home only for the purpose of medical or behavioral rehabilitation. In May of 2025, the Department informed pet vendors that pregnancy and lactation do not qualify for placement in a foster home, as they’re not considered “abnormal” conditions.
Agriculture Commissioner Shawn Jasper rejected animal welfare advocates’ request to meet with him about the fostering issue and suggested that “rather than have any meeting, your concerns should be aired at a public meeting on our rules,” according to a letter obtained by the Monitor through a public records request.
Those who appeared at the bill hearing on Tuesday tried to convey the medical and behavioral benefits of placing pregnant animals and their newborns into foster homes.
“They need enhanced disease prevention, specialized nutrition and stress reduction. Difficult births can occur unexpectedly. Neonates and ‘bottle-nates,’ as we call them, require around-the-clock feeding and monitoring […] If we were to staff overnight for those situations, it would be undue hardship financially for the shelter,” said Hannah Hurley, the director of operations for the Friends of the Manchester Animal Shelter.
The Agriculture Department sought to codify its interpretation of the statute by changing its administrative rules to exclude pregnant and lactating animals. The intent of that proposed rule change conflicts with Birdsell’s bill; if lawmakers approve the bill, it will supersede the ongoing rule-change process.
Gov. Kelly Ayotte has given Birdsell’s bill her support, according to animal rights attorney Patricia Morris, who chairs the governor’s Commission on the Humane Treatment of Animals.
Amid his protracted volley with animal welfare advocates over what to do with pregnant and lactating animals, Jasper led his testimony at the bill hearing with a form of compromise: “I am here in support of 475,” he told senators. “I am asking for some amendments.”
Jasper’s amendment would require foster facilities or residences to be registered annually with the state and inspected by a pet vendor licensed in New Hampshire. It would also codify the language that’s present in the Department’s administrative rules, reintroducing medical and behavioral rehabilitation as two of the grounds, in addition to pregnancy and lactation, for placing an animal in a foster home.
The amended language drew support from Diane Richardon, a longtime dog trainer and breeder.
Twenty years ago, when Richardson helped manage a kennel in Warner, she said the standard protocol at rescues involved placing any dog into a foster home for two weeks before they could be adopted. That period would serve as an experiment: “If a dog in a shelter acted, say, really fearful and a little bowl aggressive with its food, but some of those dogs, once they were in a home for a week or two, that the behavior disappeared, it’s because it was a stress behavior.”
Richardson fears that the bill, as written, has too much “wiggle room” and could provoke a return to a time where virtually any animal could be sent to a foster home. She encouraged lawmakers to consider Jasper’s amendment and prohibit fostering for “non-behavioral, non-medical or non-reproductive reasons.”
Charles Stanton, executive director of New Hampshire Humane Society, qualified his support for the bill, too, noting that “veterinarians are not the appropriate decision makers for all foster situations.”
His chief concern, however, was what the bill revealed New Hampshire’s piecemeal approach to regulating animal welfare. Without a master plan to guide them, state leaders are over-legislating the industry and adding to the Department of Agriculture’s already strained administrative burden.
“In the state of New York last year, there were six bills that moved forward in animal welfare. We have 40 amendments and bills and legislations this year, 28 currently pending,” Stanton said. “It’s insane.”