Rescue Stories...Share Yours

[StacyRz]

The thread about the new Doberman puppy one of our members just got made me want to share Diva's story...

I have had 3 in my lifetime, all females (Raja, Natasha and Diva- my rescue.)

Someone on a non dog related message board told me they were feeding their neighbor's very sick, neglected and abused Doberman. She was about a year old. The neighbors were "breeders", that owned the sire and dam, who were, I was told both MEAN dogs.

Oh and they docked their own tails. Diva's tail was the length of a Weimaraner's... Thank goodness they never tried to crop her ears!!!

Anyway, this family ended up asking the neighbors if they could have her and find a home for her. They then posted pictures of her on the board.

She was so covered in demodectic mange that her skin looked like elephant skin. She was missing hair everywhere and she was all swollen on her face and paws.

Everyone else on that message board (non dog related board) told me NOT to take her as she was SURE to turn on me and my small children since she had been beaten her whole year of life. (And well, she was a *gasp* Doberman!) ...wink...

I took her anyway. There was a kindness and honesty in her eyes I just cannot describe.

She was terrified of people and would literally run to a corner and shake all over if you so much as looked at her or coughed in her direction, to the point it looked like she was convulsing.

I've been raising and rescuing dogs for 20 years now, and have been pretty accurate at reading body language so I was confident she wasn't a biter. I kept a leash and collar on her and every time she would run to a corner or try to squeeze behind the couch, I would pull her out (gently but firmly) and talk quietly to her, petting her until she stopped shaking. At first she wasn't used to being touched. Every time I would lift my hand and bring it down to stroke her, her muscles would twitch vilolently under my hand.

MANY times I cried for her and it seemed like every time I did, she would move a bit closer to me and rest her head on my feet or in my lap. It amazed me that she could give her heart to me and my family after all she had endured.

I brought her to a wonderful vet who gave me a generous discount on her mange treatments. After several weeks of daily ivermectin treatments her coat grew back, the swelling went away and she had a gorgeous, shiny coat. By then she was also healthy enough to be safely spayed and vaccinated.

She passed away last year, and though she is gone, she will always hold a place in my heart.

 

[bevann]

Went many years ago to our local SPCA shelter to get a rabbit put down.Made the mistake of walking through the dogs.Saw a female that looked like Benji-came home and cried all weekend because I didn't need another dog.Called when they opened on Mon morning-we haven't put her down YET.told them to keep her until I got off work.Picked her up.All went well for a while and they she started to run away.Decided maybe she needed a home with kids and fenced yard.She was part poodle so I put an ad in the paper.Nice family with kids came and off she went.After several days I called and dog was moping and lethargic.Bring her back.She perked up when they pulled in my lane.She never ran away again and I had her until she died at age 14.She was best buds with my German Shepherd Sam and he carried her around like a toy.She cut her leg once and she let me sew it up while she stood there quietly. I would love to have another Tuffy.When something happens to 1 of my Corgis I plan to get a rescue-hoping for a Parti colored Standard Poodle bitch.My vet just got 1-exactly want I want A black and white Pinto.I'm just not ready yet.My Corgis are 11 and 9 1/2.Hope they have a few more years.

 

[Miniv]

I'm surprised you haven't been inundated with responses.........Anyway, we have had so many rescues it's hard to choose but I've decided to share the story of a dog, who is still a member of our family. His name is "Shed". He came with that name and I don't know why.

Eight years ago we were asked by the mother of our daughter's classmate if we would do "doggy day care" for their family dog, Shed. He was 2 years old (a yellow lab mix). She had just opened a new business selling second hand children's clothes/items and her husband worked a night shift, so slept during the day. We agreed and Shed very happily spent days with us on our farm. Our other dogs, even the cats, accepted him.

It didn't take long to see that Shed didn't like men and was extremely head and hand shy. He also had a horrible case of mange (not contagious). I asked Shed's owner about both situations and she finally told me that 1. She had taken Shed to a vet and it wasn't mange, but the vet didn't know what was causing the loss of fur.......2. She and her husband were having marital problems and she was worried that her husband was taking it out on the dog.

I encouraged her to leave Shed with us EVERY day, not just during her shop hours.

After a couple of months, she asked if we would like to keep Shed permanently because the marriage was totally falling apart. We agreed without hesitation and immediately took him to OUR vet for his skin condition. It was indeed mange and with some meds his fur began growing back quickly. He's never had a problem since. (BTW, the mange he had can be made worse by stress...no surprise.)

Shed hasn't looked back since he joined our family full time. However, it took years for him to not cower when ever he saw Larry with a shovel or rake in his hand. Because of shyness towards men (especially when carrying utensils), he chose me as his person. He and I are best buds and I'm so glad we found each other.

 

[Bluebell]

Rescue animals are wonderful! I have a little black dog that was dumped on our road 9 years ago. Tried to find her people but no one came forward. We named her Molly. We have a 2+ year old Visla/Lab cross, Sam, that we got from the humane society last fall. Also 2 Thoroughbred race horses that we got from a rescue/retirement farm in Wisconsin. "Chip" was hurt at Canterbury Downs and sustained a head injury that we were able to slowly nurse him back to health and he has full vision in his eye (or as close as the vet can tell it is full vision) and he is a wonderful trail horse. Chip was horribly thin and scheduled to be put down when his trainer got him out of there and to a rescue farm because he had a soft spot in his heart for the horse too. We have Chip's papers and some of his races on tape. Gabe was an older Thoroughbred that came from Texas. He is 17 and although spunky i get along with him great. Gabe was in good shape when we got him although he had several adopters and we are quite sure that he was run a lot as it has taken 2 years or so to get him to understand that walking and jog trotting are as much fun. You can see the permanent mark across his nose that has to have come from an over grown halter. Gabe's tattoo has faded so we can't trace his history. They are both 17+ hands.

 

[StacyRz]

Thanks for sharing the stories! I love reading them

Really brightens my day

Miniv, It sounds like Shed had the same kind of mange as Diva. It wasn't contagious and stress made it worse. The vet said she may relapse and suffer another breakout if she got stressed out, but thankfully it never came back. Like Shed, she also was much more fearful of men than women and kids, which she always prefered.

 

[Miniv]

Stacy, Your Diva sounds a lot like my Shed in several ways, but Diva was worse emotionally. Shed had "issues" and there were triggers that would set him into cowering and hiding. His mange sounds very much like Diva's. Our vet also had him on daily ivermectin, plus an antibiotic. It was amazing how quickly his coat began to grow back.

Maryann

 

[ohmt]

I believe it was June of 2010 that we rescued a fawn. I told the story on here and had a lot of wonderful responses with people trying to help. We live right next to a busy highway and one morning our very sweet mail lady, Mary, came up to our front door crying. She said there was a little fawn on the side of the road and could we PLEASE take care of him or put him out of his misery? I took the van just around the corner and there he was. Not just to the side of the road, but ON the road (sitting right on the 'bumpy' things that let you know when you've strayed just a little too far). People were driving in the other lane to avoid him, but nobody stopped. He was in shock and just laid there-didn't try to move. He had a lot of road rash and I saw that his nose was bleeding so I thought for sure he had a lot of internal injuries. His mother and twin sister were both dead on the other side of the highway. I picked him up as carefully as I could and carried him to the car. When I tried to lay him on the seat he stood up and didn't seem to be in pain, just in a bit of a daze. GREAT news! Drove him to the house and my grandmother came out and I asked with my 'puppy dog, pretty please' eyes if we could take him to the vet. We drove 40 minutes to the vet and they checked him out. No broken bones from what they could tell and they gave him a great big dose of steroids to help with any brain swelling if there was any. They treated the worst of the road rash too. What concerned them was his broken jaw which was causing his bloody nose. His little baby teeth had been pushed up and over and his jaw was in rough shape. My vet put a tube in his tummy and sewed it into his nostril so we could take him home and not have to worry about accidentally getting it into his lungs. He slept for about 2 days straight in our porch and we fed him via the nasal tube. On day two he got VERY bloated and had a hard time pooping. I was so upset, thinking he had internal damage we didn't catch and couldn't afford to fix. My grandma insisted we let him outside to run around for awhile. I was hesitant, but finally agreed. He ran and ran and ran and then found a nice little tree to nap under. That night he pooped and was just fine-grandma's are always right

He started to get a lot stronger and one day my grandma found him eating her flowers in the porch and that was the end of us tube feeding him! LOL She said if he could chew her flowers then he could eat grass and drink from a bucket. He picked up on that pretty quick. After jumping through the porch window twice, we decided to leave him outside and just bring milk out to him-there were plenty of trees and bushes for shelter and he was happiest outside. We tried to keep contact with him to a minimum because we didn't have the means to keep him and he was 'wild' at heart. He knew we were helping him, but he had spent enough time with his momma to know where he belonged. It was tough finding him in the grass sometimes, even right after mowing! He was itty bitty and blended right in. Well he grew and grew and fall came around. He kept sneaking into one of our stallion pastures and we decided to let him stay because they seemed to get along and the deer could easily outrun the stallion if push came to shove. We also put our babydoll ewe in there and they would all cuddle together and eat together. Cutest thing ever. They spent all winter together and the ewe seemed to 'raise' the fawn. He often jumped the fence and ran around the yard with our weanlings (who LOVED to chase him) and then would later put himself back to bed with the sheep and stallion. When the snow finally melted the next spring, he left us and we have not seen him since. It was exactly what we wanted and I so very much hope that he is still out there, thriving. We will miss him, but will never forget that tiny little fawn that we helped.

Here he is the day we rescued him:

And a little while later out in the yard-we kept a little patch of grass long for him to hide in:

Forgot to say-we named him "Merry" after the mail lady, Mary, who is the reason that he lived

 

[chandab]

While not my rescue, my BIL recently rescued a kitten. He was on his way to town, and where he turned from the gravel to the pavement he saw 2-3 kittens that didn't make it, probably had hid in/on a trailer and fell off at the pavement. He went a bit further down the road, and there was another kitten in a puddle in the middle of the road, he thought she was gone too, but she moved, so he stopped and scooped her up. A little calico and white kitty with lots of road rash and probably a concussion. His mom fixed her up and has been feeding and caring for her. Well, its now 4-5 weeks later, maybe a bit longer, and she's such a terror, she's booted out of the house during the day, she torments the Doxie and they have a ball playing. My MIL doesn't really care for cats, but she won't let one suffer either, and now she's inherited a little terror. Little Kitty-Co is doing fine and is so darn cute. [We already have a calico names Callie, so we call this one "Co" or Kitty-Co.]

 

[StacyRz]

That fawn story is just amazing!!!

What a beauty!

Chanda I LOVE calicos. Even naughty ones LOL

MaryAnn, Diva was also on an antibiotic to prevent a secondary infection. I was really surprised how fast the hair grew back. I had expected she's have some white hairs or scarring, but her coat grew back beautiful and glossy. I don't have any "after" pictures on this computer but here are a couple. The one of her hiding her face was the first day I had her. The kid in the picture with us is the good neighbor's son who drove 2 hours to bring her to me. I wanted to always remember him. You can see Diva didn't want to even lift her head. She was terrified. She wouldn't look at anyone. You can see the missing hair and swelling all over her face and paws/legs.

The other pictures are about a week so later. She went from not looking at me to actually smiling at the camera haha! If she wasn't on the couch next to me, she was laying by the front door with her toys. It took her about a week before she started to get the hang of toys and playing. Looking at her pictures makes me miss her sooo much.

 

[StacyRz]

Here is one on her first trip to the vet. She LOVED my kids and they loved her! The last picture is with my Saint Bernard pup (he was about 6 months old there! and our cat who was also a rescue... Diva was getting used to us still, so I kept her on a light chain when we went outside to keep her safe and from running away since our yard then wasn't all fenced)

 

[chandab]

Chanda I LOVE calicos. Even naughty ones LOL

My MIL and I rescued a dark calico kitty off the road last Dec or Jan. She was frightfully thin, as I already have too many house cats, we brought her home to our calving barn and I bought her canned cat food (well, fed everyone canned food for awhile), she seemed to thrive at the barn, but then disappearred May/June. My BIL thought he saw a dark calico at his delapitated barn about 3/4 mile from our place, but wasn't sure. And, now a few weeks ago, she showed up back at the calving barn and I think she brought two kittens with her, there are two white kittens in the barn, and everything else here is black, so they must be hers. Anyway, she's home again. Last winter's ordeal tipped her ears and her tail, but otherwise she's fine.

 

[weebiscuit]

I went to a supposed rescue shelter four years ago to pick up an 8 week old yellow lab, and instead I came home with a four month old black lab mix with one eye. We named him One Eyed Jack, or Jack for short, and of the many many dogs I've had in my life, he far outshines all of them. The week we got him home he almost died, though. Turns out this shelter was VERY bad. I spent $220 on my dog at the vet the first week I got him home. He almost died from Parvo. Long story, but there's plenty about this "shelter" on the internet if anyone is interested. Just look up Thyme and Sage Ranch in Cazenovia, WI or Jennifer Petkus, the owner, who was arrested a put on trial for abuse.

I also have another rescue I got five years ago. He is a lab and belonged to my best friend's mother. The mother lived alone with two dogs. She was a bad alcholic and on two occasions my friend found her mother comatose on the floor (they didn't live together), with the dogs either locked in the house, and crapping and peeing all over the floor, or locked outside with no food or water.

The second time she was found comatose my friend and I went to the district attorney and signed papers to have her committed to a rehab center after she was detoxed at the hospital. My friend took the other dog and I took "Bailey." When the woman got out of detox she was just furious that we'd signed papers to have her committed to rehab, but she couldn't fight the courts. After six weeks of rehab she went back home and called me and said she wanted her dog back and I told her there was no way she was getting the dog back, as if she couldn't take care of herself she couldn't take care of a dog. Bailey has seizures which are successfully controlled by meds, but the woman was not giving the dog the meds so the dog was seizing daily when in her care. I told her if she was clean and sober for six months I'd give her the dog back.

She couldn't even stay sober for one week. Finally, five months later, my friend called me from her mom's house and said she found her unconscious and only half dressed, laying on the floor. i went right over there, and we called an ambulance. They took her to the local hospital and then med-flighted her to Madison, but she died the next morning, at age 54.

When I got Bailey she weighed 92 pounds and the vet told me I had to get 25 pounds off her. She was so fat because the woman would simply open bags of dogfood and leave them on the floor and then she'd take food out of her fridge and freezer and leave it on the floor for the dogs, and they never got out to exercise.

In the first year I got 20 pounds off of Bailey and six months later she had shed the full 25 pounds. I have never once missed her daily meds, and she has NEVER had a seizure since I've had her. She runs at least four miles with me every day. (Actually, I ride the four wheeler... the dogs run, LOL), and she is an absolute sweetheart, 11 years old now.

I've had several other rescue dogs over the years, but the two I have right now are the sweetest of the lot!

 

[ErikaS.]

I was on my way home one evening when I noticed a furry ball in the middle of our town's Main Street. I stopped to see if whatever it was was still alive. "It" was a cat,curled up and unconscious. with a little blood on its mouth. She had probably been hit by a car and was dying, so I picked her up and took her home to die in the comfort of a warm house. She lived. She had sustained a head injury because for days she walked like a drunk and fell often. We named her Mandy after a gal I knew who was rather clumsy (in an endearing way).After several weeks, she no longer stumbled and before long she was a normal, affectionate cat. I decided because we had so many cats already that I needed to find her a permanent home. I gave her to my step-daughter's mother who really wanted a pet cat and she seemed to fit the bill. NOT. Mandy hid under her bed for several weeks barely coming out to eat or drink, so she came back home to us. And here she stayed. She loved me, no doubt in my mind. I always sensed she was grateful for my saving her. That poor gal had the worst luck though; Mandy used up several of her nine lives with a bad infection after her spay; she was shot with a .22 by a poacher (and fully recovered,but it wasn't pretty); she caught a nasty virus and got over that, too, with vet care, of course. Several years later, what started out as an ear infection became worse and worse and nothing seemed to stop the infection. I should have put her down, but up until she went into a coma I thought she would miraculously come out of it. She spent her last hours on the heating vent on a blanket so she wouldn't get too hot and I stroked her and talked to her.

She was a good cat.

And then there's Bob. Another time when I had my stepdaughter in the car with me and we driving home, I said "Did you see that?" I swore I saw a kitten dart into the tall grass on the side if the road. This part of the highway was deserted; the nearest residence was a few miles away. I turned the car around and we searched the roadside, saying "here kitty kitty". Fat chance we'd find a scared kitten in this tall grass, if there even was one. Sure enough, a tiny hairball ran out of the brush meowing to my daughter. Of course we took him home after we searched for other kittens or a momma cat and his possible residence. We found nothing. He was maybe six weeks and soooooo hungry. We fed him kitty milk replacer and soggy kitten food. He grew to be a big, handsome, pain in the tush(lol).

He's four now and an awesome guy.

 

[dianemcc]

You all are doing such a great job.. We have taken in so many cats. some have shown up at the barn and that is where they stay. Those cats are the best at getting rid on the mice and snakes.. We have one that was born to one of those wild cats and she is an in side cat as she took to my husband and some how she came inside. Cant tell you how that happen

but she is the best cat. Prissy will talk to you all day. She will sleep under the sheets on the bed and keep your feet warm..

keep the stories coming

Diane