Sophie, sheltie

As hope almost lost, dog was found
By Susan Weich - St. Louis Post-Dispatch
April 17, 2010

Overland, Mo. — Bob and Tammy Young of Overland started a high-tech search when their sheltie Sophie ran away in December, but an old-fashioned dog tag is what reunited them nearly three months later.

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The 2-year-old dog darted out the front door in December when the Youngs and other family members were decorating for Christmas. The timid dog apparently didn’t like all the commotion, and she ran outside when the Youngs’ adult son was leaving. After he chased Sophie for four blocks, she was out of sight.

Bob Young, 48, said he was beside himself. “I love my dogs; they’re my world, and Sophie was my baby,” he said.

The Youngs posted signs, checked regularly with local animal shelters and handed out fliers, but they also posted ads on the Internet and used an online service to send out 2,500 automated phone calls to people living in the area.

They contacted the Overland Business Association, and officials sent out a mass e-mail to members, asking them to pass the information along to everyone in their computer address books. They used Facebook to alert their friends about their plight.

The Youngs bundled up and went out looking for Sophie at all hours of the night, and they worried every time it snowed, sleeted or the temperature dipped near zero. Sophie had a microchip identification implant, so at first the Youngs were confident someone would find her and a vet or animal control office would scan the chip and notify them.

“As the weeks went by, we thought she was either dead someplace or somebody had found her and decided to keep her or take her to breed her,” said Young.

Then on Feb. 28, a man called to ask if they owned a dog named Sophie. He said he was putting out his trash cans when he noticed her, collapsed in his driveway and called the number listed on her heart-shaped dog tag.

The man lived in Olivette, just three miles from the Youngs, but it was across busy Page Avenue and Olive Street and a set of active railroad tracks from their home. The caller told them to hurry because Sophie was in bad shape.

Young and his son got her and sped to an animal hospital in Bridgeton. “I knew she was alive because she was breathing shallowly, but I was scared to death that we found her only for her to die in our arms,” he said. “As time went on, we prayed; we prayed a lot.”

Sophie got basic care there and then was referred to a 24-hour animal hospital for hypothermia and malnutrition. While there she also got a transfusion with blood donated by a Great Dane.

Sophie had weighed 27 pounds when she ran away, but now her weight was just 11 pounds.

Dr. Anne Wood, a veterinarian who coordinates the emergency clinic at Midwest Veterinary Referral Center in Chesterfield, said, “Initially, I gave her a 50-50 chance of surviving, but I’ve never seen a dog as emaciated as she was survive.”

Niki Prunty, a vet technician at the clinic, said said Sophie’s prognosis now is very good she is back up to 20 pounds and she should have no lasting side effects from her time on the street.

Young is grateful for all the care Sophie got, and recently he and his wife went back to the animal hospital and donated blankets, towels and toys for the other dogs.

“There were a couple of weeks after we found her that I couldn’t even talk about her or look at her without crying,” Young said. “I would tell people in similar circumstances to never give up because there’s always hope.”

Source: http://www2.ljworld.com/news/2010/apr/17/hope-almost-lost-dog-was-found/
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Fred, bassett hound

Microchip helps reunite dog with its owners
By David Olson, the Press-Enterprise
Monday, June 11, 2007

Nearly six months after Fred the basset hound disappeared from a Moreno Valley family's former home in Arizona, the dog will come home in style: on a private jet to Palm Springs.

Fred, a basset hound that disappeared from his family's home in Paulden, Ariz., will be returned to the family in Moreno Valley.

Tammie Gomez, 30, and her children, Julia, 9, and Jonah, 7, will greet Fred at Palm Springs International Airport on Tuesday, six days after the dog wandered into the parking lot of the Northern Arizona Second Chance Center for Animals near Flagstaff, Ariz.

A veterinarian at the center is a pilot and will whisk Fred to Palm Springs. Shelter staff found the Gomez family through an identification microchip implanted in Fred's neck.

"It was just chaos in the house," Tammie Gomez said of when they discovered that Fred had been found Thursday. "Everyone was screaming and crying. It's like we won the lottery."

The Gomez family last saw Fred in December, when they left Paulden, Ariz., to haul some of their belongings to Moreno Valley. They left Fred in a fenced dog run with a golden retriever and asked a neighbor to take care of them.

When the family returned two weeks later, Fred was gone. They don't know how he got out. The golden retriever was still in the dog run, and the gate was closed.

As the weeks passed, Gomez told Julia and Jonah that Fred was probably "living the good life on someone's couch." But, privately, she believed that Fred had probably been killed by one of the wild animals that inhabit the countryside near Paulden.

Then, on Thursday, Lyn Pierce, office manager of the shelter, called Gomez to tell her that Fred had walked into the shelter parking lot. It's unclear whether someone had dropped him off there earlier, Pierce said.

"She was speechless," Pierce said. "She kept having to stop the conversation. She didn't believe we had found her dog."

When Gomez hung up the phone, she tearfully told Julia and Jonah the good news.

The center veterinarian, Dr. Paul Fink, is certain that Fred did not walk the nearly 80 miles of mountainous terrain from Paulden to Flagstaff. He was healthy when he arrived at the center, and the bottoms of his paws are not scraped-up, Fink said.

No one knows what Fred has been doing for the past six months. Gomez believes someone must have picked him up, because his collar -- which held his dog tags -- was gone.

The Gomezes had lived in Riverside before they moved to Arizona two years ago. They had the microchip installed in Fred's neck about seven years ago, after they adopted him from the Riverside County animal shelter.

Gomez said she probably wouldn't have ever seen Fred again were it not for the microchip.

"I wish I could microchip my kids," she said.

Source: http://www.pe.com/localnews/riverside/stories/PE_News_Local_D_lostdog11.3ea8afc.html

Meg, sheepdog

Stolen sheepdog Meg reunited with Morpeth owner
by Sophie Doughty, Evening Chronicle
Nov 30 2009

Meg the stolen sheepdog has been reunited with her Morpeth owner David Craigs, thanks to the Chronicle.

David Craigs feared he would never see his beloved border collie again after thieves drove off in his Land Rover as she slept on the back seat.

But she has now been returned to her delighted owners after being dumped near a farm in County Durham.

She made her way to the nearest sheep-farm, in Wingate, but it was not until the farmer who found her read about the dog’s disappearance in the Chronicle that he realised where she had come from.

And David, 52, overjoyed when he heard his dog had been found.

“I’m absolutely over the moon,” he said. “I don’t think we will ever get the Land Rover back, but I don’t mind. I was more worried about the dog. I really didn’t think we would get her back.”

David left his Land Rover Defender outside the back door of his home, in Tritlington, near Morpeth, for a matter of minutes with the keys in the ignition when the thieves struck.

They free-wheeled the vehicle out of the farm gates, at just after 4pm last Saturday, and started the engine on the main road before fleeing the scene.

But the thieves were unaware that seven-year-old Meg was lying on the back seat.

Fearing his beloved pet would be dumped on the roadside once the unintentional dog-nappers discovered she was there, David made an emotional plea in the Chronicle for her safe return.

And this was spotted on Friday by the farmer that has been looking after her for three days.

“She was found on Tuesday evening and the farmer kept her and had been asking around to see if anyone had lost their dog,” he said. “And when the article ran in the Chronicle, she rang me and we went to pick her up.

“She was a bit skinny because she had been fretting and had not been eating, but otherwise she is fine.

“She had obviously been dumped and found her way to the nearest sheep farm and she had just been rounding their sheep up for a couple of days.”

Meg is now happily settling back into life on the farm.

And David believes he would not have got his dog back if it had not been for the Chronicle.

“I would just like to thank the Chronicle. We had phone calls and messages from all over the country after the story went in.

“We feel really lucky to have her back, if she had been any further down south when they dumped her whoever found her probably wouldn’t have seen the article and we wouldn’t have got her back.”

Police are still hunting the thieves who took David’s Land Rover and are appealing for witnesses..

Source: http://www.chroniclelive.co.uk/north-east-news/todays-evening-chronicle/2009/11/30/stolen-sheepdog-meg-reunited-with-morpeth-owner-72703-25287532/

Jackie, Jack Russell

'Rovers return' - stolen dog found


A 77-year-old man last night was happily reunited with his beloved Jack Russell after the dog was stolen from his home the previous day.

The resident found the dog, called Jackie, safe and well tied to his front door handle at around 10pm last night (Thursday 7th January) after he heard the dog barking outside.

Det Con Carol Beveridge, who is leading the robbery investigation, said the resident contacted Police to say that he was ‘over the moon’ that his dog had been returned.

Det Con Beveridge said it was fantastic the dog and owner had been reunited. "Maybe press appeals for the return of the dog during the afternoon may have pricked the conscience of the culprits," she said.

The dog was stolen after two men forced their way into the resident’s home in Crown Road, Sutton, on Wednesday 6th January between 7.30-8.00pm.

The men accused the resident of damaging one of their vehicles in a collision a few weeks earlier. But the resident explained that he wasn’t the man they were looking for because he hadn’t been involved in a road accident. He said he could prove his identity and that they had got the wrong person.

Police believe it was a case of mistaken identity. The two intruders left, but took the dog with them, in the direction of Collingwood Road.

Both suspects had London accents. One suspect was described as a white man, aged between 25-30. He was wearing a black anorak. The other suspect was described as a black man, who was wearing a brown top.

The Police investigation is continuing.

Source: http://cms.met.police.uk/met/boroughs/sutton/04how_are_we_doing/news/rovers_return_stolen_dog_found