Doggone
Pups are lost and found all the time. I get it, it’s why rescue exists. But I’ll never understand the owners who ghost their lost pets.
If you’re on any social media, you can’t help but see countless pleas for help finding lost dogs. There are heartbreaking photos, huge rewards and a tremendous amount of desperation.
That’s one side of the rescue fence. On the other side—my side—live the dogs that owners surrender and dogs that have been found. They’re in shelters or picked up by good Samaritans. And then they come to us.
Though I bring you dramatic rescue stories each week, my business is actually pretty straightforward. Putting aside the puppy mill rescues, the vast majority of our work boils down to this: Person A decides they can no longer keep their dog. They’re not a monster, so they ask us to find a new home for it. I’ve brought you lots of these sad-starting, happy-ending (for the dog) stories.
But there’s a whole other category of rescue I haven’t talked about: Person B somehow loses their dog. Someone finds the dog on the street and takes it to a shelter. If Person B is a normal owner who’s frantic about losing their pet, they scour shelters, post signs around their neighborhood, offer a reward—anything to find their dog.
But there’s another type of Person B who makes me equal parts furious and confused. They seemingly don’t try to find their lost pet at all. They just … move on, and we and the shelter are left to find the dog a new home.
Though I’ll never understand this mindset, I’ve experienced it a number of times…
Uptown Pixel
About two months ago, there was a hubbub after a Facebook group posted that a Boston terrier was found in Upper Manhattan. Since I’m pretty much the de facto New York City wing of Northeast Boston Terrier Rescue, I got pinged up the ying yang. I watched the post and the comments flow in.
Someone thought the dog belonged to an unhoused person, others said the dog lived in a nail salon and was kept in there alone overnight (yikes, and also, the fumes!). Another said they knew who the owner was and this dog was better off not going back to them.
She got posted in the New York City Boston terrier meetup group to see if anyone knew who lost her. A Brooklyn woman, Lisa, said if they couldn’t find the owner she would foster. I spoke to her and told her to apply to foster so we could take him in. Lisa and her fiancé had lost their beloved dog, Stout, not long before this. Though they weren’t looking for another dog, they were happy to jump in and help this young pup who they called Pixel.
We sent her photo to the NY Animal Care and Control in case anyone was looking for her. Further doing our due diligence, we posted her in various NYC Lost Dog groups and the original finder put up posters. If the owner was looking for this dog at all, they would’ve found her. She wasn’t in great shape, like she hadn’t been well taken care of. That made sense for an owner who’s not even looking for their lost dog, right?
Pixel seemingly had never played with toys before. She had fleas, extremely long nails (nail salon fail) and showed other signs of neglect and possible abuse. But she was now safe and having the time of her life with Lisa.
Gus takes shelter
Last week, another Boston showed up in the same NYC shelter. They called him Gus. They told us they hadn’t yet done a behavioral assessment on him, which we use to know if the dog is dog-friendly. Though I requested one, two days later it wasn’t done so I said screw it, we’ll take him and figure it out. You don’t want a sad little dog in a shelter any longer than necessary because a) they’re susceptible to kennel cough and b) SAD LITTLE DOGGY!
Lisa picked up this fellow, too, and after a night determined he wasn’t dog friendly, though very sweet and adorable. We had a dog-free foster home on standby who took him the next day. He’s doing wonderfully and will be a great dog for some lucky family.
Unlike Pixel, Gus didn’t appear to be abused or neglected. Which raises a question I’ve never been able to answer: What’s going on when someone loses a dog and doesn’t look for them? If you lost your dog wouldn’t you at least call the biggest shelter in the city?
Francois in a cone
A few years ago the police picked up a Boston terrier in Queens who was wearing a cone. This dog had Just! Been! Neutered! Surely someone was looking for him. He stayed in the shelter for the hold time and then we got him. (The NYPD officer who found him had been calling him Francois, which I imagined was because they thought his cone was haute couture.) We waited, but no one ever came forward for him.
These three dogs, Pixel, Gus and Francois, were all young, under two years. They were purebred Boston terriers. Francois had just had an expensive procedure. None had chips, collars or tags. I really struggle to understand how that happens. Why do some people move heaven and earth to find a lost dog but others … just don’t?
Lost in translation
I once had a foster dog who was chipped; we called the number and got no answer. I had him for a long time because he needed to be neutered, and every couple of days, I called again. I finally got someone and told them I had their dog, thinking they would be over the moon. I got a strange reaction. The woman asked if he could be mailed to them in New Jersey? I said no and it didn’t sound like they were missing him so we would just skip it.
I hung up and a second later a man called back. He said his wife’s English wasn’t so good, she wasn’t really understanding. It turned out the dog had been staying with a dogsitter while they were in Albania for the summer and he had gotten out. He was picked up in New Jersey, and the finder told an office mate who had Bostons. She took him home to Manhattan, contacted our rescue and I picked him up downtown. (He had explosive diarrhea from Greenwich Village to the Upper West Side; it’s been 15 years and I still wince anytime I’m on Sixth Avenue.)
The owner came into NYC that night to pick him up and brought his whole family and all of the dog’s paperwork. There was a little boy who was weeping when he saw his lost dog. It turned out the dog had gotten out while they were away, and they didn’t know until they were back. By then it was three months later, and they weren’t familiar with any of the systems. So that mystery was solved.
People are the worst
But what about the others? My shelter worker friends tell me about people who come in with a dog claiming they just found it on the street. But these workers have seen it all. They can tell the person dropping off the dog is clearly the owner, but they don’t want to take responsibility for dumping it. Again I ask: How do you do that?
I’ve written about our James, who came to us after being found on the street in Binghampton, New York. By all accounts his previous owners had moved and just left him behind. James was the best boy, so well-mannered and earnest. The thought of turning him loose without the decency to find him a new home is unimaginable to me. I find myself asking this basically daily about the world now, but seriously: What is wrong with people?
I know in this space I’m talking to dog lovers who mostly think the way I do. We’d crawl over hot coals to make sure our dogs are taken care of. Perhaps there’s a cultural aspect.
Dan and I travel a lot and there are countries, Romania and Greece to name a couple we’ve visited, where stray dogs and cats are everywhere. And while some of them get rescued, others just stay on the street and get fed by me. There’s a cat on Santorini that, three years later, is still carrying extra weight after finishing off my dinner of giant shrimp with faces.
Dog people like us see dogs as part of their family. If our dog dies, we mourn. If somehow our dog runs away, we go down every avenue to find them. But my work in dog rescue tells me not all people see their dog the same, or value the relationship the same. When that happens, I think it’s the job of rescue to match the dog with someone who would crawl on ground glass for their dog.
There’s no tidy ribbon to tie this up with, but please make sure your dogs are chipped and have tags. And if you find a dog? You don’t have to bring it to a shelter; you can take photos of it and file a found dog report with them. Petco also has a big database you can submit to. Post in lost dog groups in your area, and you can always put up posters. If no one claims the dog, contact a rescue group.
And I know dogs getting loose isn’t a rare occurrence. They can be sneaky! I’d love to hear stories about your dogs’ great escapes and reunions. We’ve all got them.
And finally, a nice P.S. today: Lisa and her fiancé adopted Pixel and they’re all living the good life together. The photos below are from Pixel’s recent photo shoot!
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Pixel has a soulful face!
I have adopted both unclaimed strays and surrendered dogs. Two of the strays were and are (one is still with me) remarkably well socialized, and obviously loved in their earlier lives. Purebred dogs, with docked tails. They had been purchased from a breeder (of sorts…tail docking is abuse). You do wonder what went wrong, when a loved dog is unclaimed. Since they were intact males, that explains their wandering ways, but why did no one pick them up?
The boy I have now was found in a farming community, an hour from the shelter where he was held. Transportation problems, immigration status, a reluctance to deal with the authorities…there are lots of reasons someone might avoid animal control. The other dog was found in a medium-sized city. Well, who knows what his story was…stuff happens. A life can be torn apart in a heartbeat, and the dog runs.
The saddest pup I adopted was a chipped puppy, four to five months old. He was clearly traumatized, and shut down. His chip, implanted by a rescue group, revealed that he’s been adopted as a just-weaned puppy. His behavior in my car spoke to having been driven somewhere and dumped (once in the car, he clamped down and refused to get out). His former owner had wanted a puppy, perhaps, but not a dog.
Rather than hate on fallible humanity, I prefer to think that all the dogs I adopt were meant to find me.
Ugh, yes...the people who return their dog to the shelter. WHAT?! mean I know people get very ill and can't for them, etc. But the people who just ... don't want them anymore? Insane.