Chihuahua Found After Being Lost in Florida Swampland for 19 Days
by Helena Sung
Oct 19th 2009 @ 3:00PM

Rue today

To this day, Sheila Helton cannot talk about the time her Chihuahua, Rue, went missing without tearing up. "If we had listened to people who told us to give up, we would never have found Rue," Sheila tells Paw Nation. But find her she did, after 19 days in Florida's swampland.

When Sheila and her partner Sue set off with 12 family members on a nine day trip to Portugal in September 2007, it was supposed to be the trip of a lifetime. With a pet sitter to watch their other two dogs, the women left eight-month-old Rue in the care of Sue's father.

The tiny Chihuahua rode with Sue's father and his wife to the airport in Fort Meyers, Florida to see Sheila and Sue off. Moments later, when Sue's father pulled over at a rest stop, Rue became so frightened by a bolt of lightning that she wriggled out of her harness and ran straight for a nearby massive stretch of swampland.

Sue's father, 75, and his wife looked for Rue, but there was no sight of her. At the advice of Sue's brother, her father kept mum until the women were back in the states. It was only at the end of their voyage that he revealed Rue had disappeared. "We were crying," recalls Sheila.

When they arrived home in Fort Meyers, the women went straight to the rest stop to look for Rue, who had already been missing for 9 days. They searched the mile of wetland and swamps for almost two hours, but their little dog didn't appear.

Every day after work, Sue and Sheila returned to the rest area. On weekends, they spent from morning to dusk looking for Rue, taking their other dogs along to spread their scent. "We yelled her name for hours and hours," says Sheila. They checked local shelters, put up fliers, offered a reward, and left their phone numbers with rest stop workers in case anybody found Rue.

There were tons of false sightings. "It was exhausting," recalls Sheila. "We'd drive an hour north to work, then come home and drive an hour south to the rest stop to look for Rue. It was an emotional roller coaster." It was also affecting their dogs. "They didn't know what was going on," Sheila tells Paw Nation. "Beau, our Jack Russel terrier, would walk all around the house looking for her."

Undaunted, Sheila and Sue went to a local animal shelter and borrowed a cat trap. Each night, they set the kennel-like structure with food and articles of their clothing. Once, they caught a racoon. Another time, a huge rat. But no Rue.

"We were starting to lose hope a little bit," says Sheila. "We couldn't lose our jobs and our other dogs weren't getting any attention."

Weeks after Rue's disappearance and with no recent sightings, the women made the difficult decision that, "as hard as it would be, we needed to start moving on," says Sheila. They set the trap one last time and put grilled chicken and wet dog food inside. Sheila took off her sweatshirt and placed it next to the food. "I was bawling," says Sheila. "It was horrible driving off thinking we were leaving her there."

Rue today

Rue, soon after being found.

But the next morning at 6 a.m., Sheila received a stunning phone call. It was a construction worker from the rest stop. "Do you think you can get off work today?" he asked.

"Do you have her?" Sheila yelled. He did. Rue had been found in the trap. Sue and Sheila sped to the rest area and there, Rue leapt into Sue's arms.

"We were crying, we were so grateful to have her back," says Sheila. Rue looked thin, had a big cut over her right eye, and her left eye was crusty and oozing, so Sue and Sheila sped directly to their veterinarian.

"The mosquitoes had pretty much chewed her up, but she looked pretty doggone good for being gone that long," veterinarian Terry Gardner tells Paw Nation. "I cleaned her up and gave her a steroid injection to reduce some inflammation and sent her home."

Curious about Rue's story, Dr. Gardner decided to stop by the rest area. "There was just a massive undeveloped wooded area," he says. In the pond where Rue had apparently drank from, Dr. Gardner saw alligators. "It turned out to have a happy ending, but it could have been disastrous," he says.

Today, Rue is playful as ever and rules the roost. "She still shakes whenever it rains and stiffens up when we put the harness on her, but other than that, she's the same as before," says Sheila. "I'm happy we didn't give up, and that's the message that I want people to know -- not to give up hope."


Source: http://www.pawnation.com/2009/10/19/chihuahua-found-after-being-lost-in-florida-swampland-for-19-day/