Warning-some photos are graphic. Thursday, this little border collie mix, has an incredible story.
Chain of Hope received a call from someone who said that there was a momma dog in a pen behind a house with very small puppies. It was a very odd situation because she said that the owner had left and abandoned this dog months ago and that this person (the caller) had been caring for her. She said she fed her and walked her, but then she said that this dog had gotten pregnant and had her litter outside in a nasty pen. She told me that they all really needed to get out of there.
Debbie and I headed over. When we pulled up, I recognized the house from years before-we had spayed and neutered a couple of dogs over here. I didn’t know if that had been the same guy or what. There was a vehicle in the drive way with current tags on it. I went up to the front door and knocked. The screen door was closed, but the wooden door was cracked open a little. I knocked and hollered, but no one came. There was a small black and white dog in the house at the door and it barked at me, but no one came. This was all very weird. We thought this house where this dog was was abandoned. It was confusing. The house next door to this one was abandoned, so we went over there and walked all around. We didn’t find a thing.
When we were in the back yard of the truly abandoned house, I decided to walk straight across to the back yard of the house we’d originally gone to and have a look around. We couldn’t see anything or hear anything, but I just wanted to look. There was a partial piece of privacy fence there and then I could see part of a dog pen. There was the saddest little black and white momma dog sitting there in total silence. She just looked at me with despair and I thought, “My God-you poor, poor baby.” There were puppies around her, I really couldn’t tell how many. She was literally just sitting there, I’m sure thinking that her life was hell and there was no way out. I hollered at Debbie that they were back there and Debbie came back. We had a small container of canned food and we slid it into the pen. There was mud mixed with feces-it was disgusting. There were 2 puppies off in the corner by themselves. The little brown one was dead and the little black one, we couldn’t tell. If it wasn’t dead yet, it was dying. We took pix and I told Debbie that I was going back to the door and beat on it and if no one answered, I was calling animal control. Surely they would remove these poor animals.
As I was headed around to the front of the house, a man was walking from the front of the house to come around the side. It surprised me to turn the corner and have him standing there. I said, “Oh, you are home.” He stood there with his arms crossed over his chest, a mean look on his face, and he said, “Can I help you?” I told him that we had received a call about the puppies and asked him if he needed help with them. He said no that they were fine. I told him that they weren’t fine, that at least one of them was dead. He stared straight at me with his arms still crossed and said loudly, “they’re fine”. I knew he wasn’t going to let us have them or help them in any way, so we left. As we were driving away, we saw him continuing to walk to the back yard. We called animal control as we drove away.
When I checked the case the next day, it came back as no violations. It turns out that they guy had taken them all inside and by the time animal control had gotten there, the momma and puppies were not out there. We watched this house and I was somewhat in communication with the person that had called me about this mess. That is how I found out he had moved them inside. I figured he’d keep them inside for a few days and then put them back out there. This was apparently a room mate to the guy that had taken off and he was uncooperative. The person that called this in kept telling me that she was going to get the puppies out of there, but then all I heard was that she had gotten one of them and the guy was giving them away to neighbors. This entire ordeal had been extremely worrisome. It was daily communication about getting the puppies, not getting the puppies, etc. Then this person called and said that one of the puppies that a neighbor had was not doing well. You think? Geez-these babies were tiny and had had a terrible start in life. She was going to pick it up. I was headed to the emergency clinic on that Saturday with another dog, so we made arrangements for me to meet these people and take the puppy with me to the emergency clinic. It was very, very sick and could barely hold it’s head up. It was too far gone and it didn’t make it. It tested positive for parvo. So sad. Its whole life had been just horrible. We grieve for all of the puppies that suffered at that house. Unfortunately, we really don’t know what happened to them all except one, which we are told is doing well. The rest-we don’t even know if they made it.
This had been a terrible case to be involved in. There were a lot of promises, but nothing really panned out. This person had told me that the guy didn’t really want the momma dog and that he might give her to her and then she would contact me. That didn’t happen either. But….Chain of Hope never forgets. Several weeks went by and I contacted this person again and asked her if she knew if the momma dog had ever gotten out of there. She said no that she was still over there. She said that they didn’t tie her up half the time and she ran the neighborhood. She would be pregnant again in no time. This person called the room mate and he said that he didn’t want the dog. She told me to go get her-that she was tied up to the front porch.
Carol and I headed over and there was the sweet little border collie mix just sitting there. She wasn’t even tied up. We put a slip lead on her and led her to the car. She was in rough shape-she was thin and very dirty. We got her back to Chain of Hope and got her settled in her new place. She was a sweetheart and very young. She must’ve gotten pregnant her first heat cycle. She was so affectionate and grateful to be out of that horrible place.
A couple of the volunteers named her Thursday (oh yes they did!). Thursday is such a great dog! She is so happy to be here, playing with other dogs. She goes right into her kennel when it’s time, she entertains us all and she loves to get her hugs that she had gone so long without. She is up for adoption and any family would be lucky to have her!
To all of you who donate, volunteer and share our work-this is why we do what we do. As you can see, we have a lot of challenges out there. It’s always with the people, not the animals. We keep going, though, because we know how many other animals like Thursday are waiting for us! Thank you all for keeping us out there!
