Roxy, n/k/a Ava

Roxy was on the PTS list for so long. Weeks. She was put into a foster home and I guess the rescuers just figured she was safe there, so they disregarded her and went for all of the other dogs on the list. Every day people would cross-post her picture, but no one stepped up to take her. She was sponsored early on. People fretted about her demise. But no one made the call. Except me. I emailed and said that I had to babysit my dog-reactive old foster Lulu, then I had to find a home for Mitch, and then for Tess, and if no one spoke up for her by that time, I would take her. I told her foster I was Roxy's "fail safe." She would not be put to sleep.

And here I am breaking another one of my rules - I will not foster any dog that looks like my beautiful Remy the Rottie. I still cry for missing him.

But Roxy, now called Ava because her foster mommy in SC said she didn't answer to Roxy but likes Ava, she's a special girl.

First of all, she didn't have ANY issue with Teddy Bear the big-mouth. He barked once or twice, and she didn't even blink. And she is QUIET! Yay. Even when Teddy is a big mouth barky dog.

She was also good with Scotchy the cat. He has learned not to run from the foster dogs, but to sit and give them the evil paw wave of death if they get their big, wet, dog noses too close for his comfort. She didn't even try to sneak up and eat his catfood! Now THAT's a good dog!

She is one of the sweetest little girls! Her ears are so expressive. She perks them up and looks like a German Shep when she is curious, which is alot. Then when you call her or reach toward her, those ears go down into the "love-me" position and she gives kisses and would sit by your feet all day and night. What a lovebug!

Sadly, she is making Joel sneeze like crazy. I gave her a bath, swept up the floors, and turned on the air cleaner, and he took a Claratin, but it's still not entirely better. Her only other issue is a housebreaking failure. She has gone pee and poop in the house just in the two hours we've been home. But that's not uncommon for the first night off the 13-hour long transport - her little system is all distressed. We'll see how that one goes.

Good thing she's an amazing dog. She will make a wonderful pet for someone, hopefully before I get too close to her.

UPDATE

You know as soon as I said that, I was attached already. How do you say...FOSTER FAILURE!!! After rescuing more than 50 dogs, I have hit foster failure. Ava (also Evie) will be staying with me. She has already passed her Canine Good Citizen Test but still has serious trust issues with strangers, especially men. I can say that she is finally housebroken and feels safe peeing somewhere other than on my bed! 

More "not my dogs"

Several new dogs to add to the list of critters I have helped to rescue:

Mitch the Miracle Dog 

I am not a particularly religious person, but sometimes I feel that my actions are guided by something greater than myself - something with a divine plan which I am destined to execute. Such is the case with Mitch the Miracle Dog. I felt compelled to look at the list of dogs already put to sleep. I usually don't do that, because there is not much that can be done at that point - it's too late. Not only did I look at the list, but I clicked on Mitch's picture and read all of the wonderful things that the shelter volunteers had said about him...how wonderful he was on a leash, how well-mannered he was, how absolutely lovable he was and what wonderful family dogs walker hounds can be. What a shame I thought. So I looked to see when the page had been updated - 38 minutes. That's kind of a long time. But just to push it, I emailed the shelter director and asked "Is he really gone?" She responded, "No, he's right here" (in the euthanizing room.) So I pulled him. I broke my rules again and pulled him despite the fact that I had no where to put him. And of course I had to juggle dogs when he got to NJ. But he found a wonderful home, so it's all good for that little coon hound sweetheart of a dog! Thank your angel for watching over you - and just in the nick of time.

Wilma the flat-coated retriever was saved because she is a black dog - usually the first to be put down at a kill shelter - just too many of them. But Susan volunteered to foster her, so she made it out to NJ.

Amber the little chi boy with the crazy ear - he's a wild little one that gets all the other dogs in Nancy's house riled up.

And the hound twins, Charlotte & Chris, possibly Anglo-French hounds. They are the hand-picked rescues of Steve & Melissa, our newest fosters. Charlotte is smaller and very demure. Chris is Capt. Adventure and is energetic and boisterous like a typical boy. Both just cute as can be. So glad they are alive!

Thank you CODAR fosters for taking these babes in when my house was full!

 

My Dream Dog

Tess The Dane (mix)

I always wanted a great dane. When Remy died, I looked up the local great dane rescue and was devastated when they would not adopt out to me because we don't have a fenced yard. So when I got the opportunity to foster Tess, a 10-month-old great dane/lab mix, I begged my husband to let me do it.

What I learned is that alot of people say they always wanted a great dane, but most people have no idea what they are getting into!


People call great danes the gentle giants. Tess was a classic example of this. The caveat is that they are, in fact, giant. They don't realize that when they step on your other dog's head it is not very nice or fun for the other dog even if they were just playing. And when they stampede through the house the way playing puppies do, it sounds like a herd of horses. (Not nice for the neighbors.) She is also very skittish - way beyond the point of shy. She startles easily and isn't terribly good about meeting new people, especially men, although she does warm up pretty quickly. She is neurotic about her potty habits - like she will only go in one place. You can walk on leash for 40 minutes, but she will hold it until you get to her special place. And danes eat more food than a normal dog...like three times as much. A bag of dry food that would last Teddy a week was gone in two days.

So although it was wonderful to get so many applications for Tess, I was relieved when one of the applicants had a great dane already. THEY would know what to expect!

I had very mixed feelings the night before I took Tess to her new home. I so wanted it to be perfect. And I wanted it to be not perfect so that I had an excuse to bring her back home to be my dream dog. I cried. But when I arrived in the suburbian home outside of Philly, I found that I was right in my initial reaction - it was the most perfect home I could have ever hoped for for my dream dog. The other dane chased her for a minute or two, and then they ran around the huge, fenced yard together for hours. There was no power play for toys or attention. She was super comfortable with all of the family members as if she had known them her whole life. I didn't even cry as I left - she was looking out the sliding glass door and wagging as if to say, "Thanks so much! This is great!" I got an email saying they played all afternoon until they finally flopped down in two tired heaps in the living room. How great is that??

Help us Save Cider the Tree-Walking Coonhound!
I think Cider is the most beautiful Tennessee tree-walking coon hound ever! She's from Greenville County Animal Control in South Carolina, the place I often pull my rescues. Unfortunately, like many rescue dogs from the south, just like my last rescue Punky, Cider has heartworms. This was a big problem, because dogs with heartworms aren't allowed to come into the state of New Jersey to be with her new CODAR foster family, but it became a bigger problem because the medicine is now off the market. Thankfully, due to the hard work of my friend, rescuer Angela Gschwind, a vet was located in Easely, SC who has some of the medicine and has agreed to treat Cider! Now we have only to raise the funds. We thought we had it just about wrapped up, but one of our donors backed out, so we've come up short.Please help us bridge the gap by clicking on the chip-in. Paypal will help you send funds. So easy to help a loving dog in her time of need!

Snickers the Interim Foster

Since there was a delay in Punky's transport, I've taken Snickers as my new little interim foster from Tennessee. She was from a hoarder, one of those people who starts out meaning well but somehow ends up with way more animals than they can possibly care for in a reasonable way. Unfortunately, she went from bad to worse, and ended up at an animal control facility with a gas chamber. Fortunately, it is the facility that CODAR often pulls from, so she and seven other lucky dogs got a ticket to NJ this weekend.
I selected Snickers because although she was very timid, hiding in the back of her crate after they unloaded her from the transport, she edged her way out into Pam's yard, and within a few minutes she was leaping through the grass like a little bunny. She immediately went to check out the other rescues and Pam's dogs with her tail up and her ears alert. Some of the other pups had their hackles up and were afraid, but she was cheerful and curious as she interacted with all of the others. Also, she did not bark.
We had a pretty long day at the jewelry store, and she spent alot of time hiding behind the big chairs in the front of the store. She eventually got comfortable with me, but was very jumpy when anyone else tried to touch her.
She did enjoy sitting in Maggie's lap, so I would say she's good with kids like Maggie who is ten. There were some other children in the store in the evening, three boys, and she mostly stayed under the desk but was interested in what they were doing. Generally speaking, she was afraid of many things, especially while out on a walk. I wonder if she has spent much time outside. She also seems unfamiliar with a leash, but she adjusted quickly to walking with her harness, and she did pee outside. There have been no accidents indoors to date, but I cannot say for sure that she is housebroken. She is very fearful of cars and loud noises. At one point I thought she had tried to nip Joel, but it was just a sudden jerk of her head when he tried to pet her - no teeth and no growling. She had a similar response to Francis, and appears to have some trepidation about men, but again, not in an aggressive way, just fearful.
She had no trouble meeting Teddy Bear, who can be something of a bully when new dogs arrive at home. She seemed very comfortable walking in our yard before bedtime, and she settled right into her crate in Maggie's room without so much as a whimper. She slept right on through the night until about 4:30am when a big crack of lightning/thunder woke everyone in the house.
This morning her demeanor is much more relaxed. She and Teddy Bear have developed a nice play routine where they jump up on the sofa and she dives under or around or over him and he spins around to face her. It's a nice, gentle, but energetic game. She does not bark at all.

She really is a lap dog. She loves when Maggie holds her belly up like a baby and pets her stomach. She lets her head fall back and her eyes close and looks like she is in dog heaven. She reaches up and give little tiny kisses.
I would not hesitate to say that this little dog is going to make a great companion. She is a little shy right now, but she really warms up to people and is a very lovable little girl. She is open to all the dogs I have seen her with, and plays very nicely with a dog much bigger than herself. She is quiet and seems to require very little attention, but loves being held and snuggled. What more could you ask for?

Martin, yet another "not my dog"

Nancy is getting really ticked at me. She is one of my fellow fosters with Castle of Dreams Animal Rescue. I hooked her up with her first foster dog Loki, and I helped find a forever home for him just a few short weeks after his arrival in NJ. Her next foster was Martin, the cutest little doxie puppy ever, from a CODAR transport from Tennessee. But unbeknownst to Nancy when she went to pick him up from CODAR on Saturday morning, I was already on the phone working his adoption! By late afternoon she begrudgingly brought him over to Red Bank to meet his new owners, Christina & Charlie, who are tickled pink with this little 8-week old darling! Now he's "Jack."

Allen the Boxer - another "not my dog"

Monday was Allen's lucky day!

Several weeks ago, after Hurricane Irene, we had a fill-in guy on our trash collection route. He saw me out in the yard with Lulubelle and asked if I did dog rescue. Then he asked if I ever got boxers, and I said "just all the time!" He wanted a young male, since he lives in a house full of girls with another one on the way. Of course that meant I could only find females on the rescue list, so I set it aside and waited to see what might come up.

But this weekend there were so many dogs on the red list in Greenville. I felt so bad for the director, knowing that she would have to make that horrible choice pretty soon - which dogs were going to have to be put to sleep. So I emailed and asked if there were any particularly nice dogs that she didn't want to see euthanized. She pointed me to the photo of Allen - a MALE BOXER!! And a handsome one at that!

So I got on the phone as quick as I could and called Beth at the town clerk's office to track down the trash guy. Turns out he'd lost my card and was grateful for my call. He and his wife agreed to take Allen, sight unseen! They thought he was even better when they saw his picture. I can't wait to get him transported to New Jersey!