I first saw a glimpse of her around the 4th of July. She was just standing there in the middle of the steep, narrow, mountain road that leads to my home. One side is mountain, the other side is guardrail and cliffs. It looked like someone had recently dumped her off and she was biding her time looking for a ride back to her home, wherever that was. I drove past her slowly getting a good look as she carefully sidestepped my truck to let me pass by her. The whole time she never took her eyes off of me. She seemed very friendly, wagging her tail; what a nice little dog she is. darn I thought to myself, why, why, why, do these people do that. I was boiling mad, but I knew I couldn’t take her home. My dogs would tear her apart, but I stopped at the top of the road to check her out anyhow. Soon as I called to her she took off fast into the woods.
It is not unusual for dogs to wander about these mountain roads. This is the perfect dumping ground for unwanted animals to be abandoned. It’s normal for here and nobody cares. The abandoned dogs suffer and starve, the remaining ultimately form packs, and turn wild. Nobody does anything to stop it. There are no county ordinances against it, no laws at all and no Humane Society or Animal Control. There is a State law, but county overrides it and there is no one to enforce it. There must be a million dead skeletons of dead dogs on the forest that encases our mountain roads.
She looked like a smaller version of a yellow lab, around 40 pounds or so as cute as she can be. She was in half way decent condition; at least someone had been feeding her something before they threw her away like garbage to fend for herself in an area of forest, guardrails and dangerous cliffs. I came on home looking at both my well fed, spoiled rotten dogs who have everything they need, thinking to myself how lucky they are and they don’t even know it. I couldn’t get her loving eyes off my mind but thought what awful chaos it would be if I attempted to bring another dog on the property. It just couldn’t happen with our dogs as protective as they are. The fighting would be a disaster so I didn’t consider it for another minute. I tried to put her out of my mind, but no use. I got on the phone and began calling this one and that one just to inquire if anyone might want her. Of course not. Nobody wants anymore dogs. I shouldn’t have bothered even asking.
I didn’t see her after that day. I had hoped someone had picked her up, but in the back of my mind, I knew that was wishful thinking. She was in the mountains somewhere in the forest that engulfs the twisting roads, starving by now I was certain of that. I could not forget her eyes looking at me.
By the beginning of August, as I was on my way down to town and at the first hairpin turn on the road, she surfaced. I spotted her little head peeking at the road behind a guardrail, then making it onto the road as my truck passed. I couldn’t see her too good in my rear view mirror, but it was her. I worried again that she was in very bad trouble with this heat, so when I went back home, I gathered up some plastic bowls, got a gallon jug of water, and stole my dog’s bag of dog food and headed back down the mountain road. There are three places along this particular 4 mile steep stretch where a vehicle can pull over, and only one of them is what I’d call safe that is not on a steep incline, so I pulled in there. Decided to hike back up about a quarter mile or so to the area where I saw her in the road and left water and food for her on the edge of the road behind the guardrails in three places. She’d find them eventually and then I’d be able to catch her.
Feeling guilty as sin that she’s out there, I came home and made a few more phone calls, this time to the humane society’s in neighboring towns so I would have some place to bring her. I knew what they would say as the boys and I have gone through this many times before. Do you know they even have an automated menu too now? Its hard to speak to a human, but if you are persistent, you might get lucky. But they tell you right on the machine they are not taking animals at this time and nobody returns your calls, ever. First, they don’t take dogs from other counties and they would check my license tag if I tried to sneak one in. Second, everyone is full up and will not take any more dogs anyhow. Ok so I can’t dwell on her. I have to forget she’s out there. I cannot help her get a home so I gave up. I continued to fill up the bowls several times a week, although half of them went missing, I filled up what was still there.
About a week or so later, I engaged Dan in a conversation about the brakes on his truck and he brought up the subject of the dog in the road with the puppies and said he almost hit them. Say what? Oh no! Puppies. It was the same dog according to Dan. Yes, Dan knew about her too and said he tried to catch her a couple of times but she took off and now of all things, she has given birth in the woods. Terrific. He had been spotting her for about a week after I put the food down and he told me she had at least 6 very tiny puppies. Well this was it. Something was going to be done but I had no idea what. On my next trip to town, I bought a few more cheap bowls at the dollar store and more dog food to keep in my back seat of my truck with water. As I put them out that Saturday morning, a car stopped and some ladies asked me if I was taking care of “mama.” They named her mama. They said “Oh yes there are lots of us trying to help mama.” They had also been putting food out in various places and confirmed the sighting of about 6 or more puppies. They too said they had called many places for help with no success. Great, the good people of the mountain neighborhood are involved and between all of us, we cannot manage to help this little girl and her babies get a home.
Finally, early September, I got my first good close up glimpse of mama and her pups. It was a horrible sight. By now she was thin and weather beaten and appeared to have some skin problems and some cuts on her legs. But the worst thing was that she had milk like a Holstein and there she was standing in the steepest area by the guardrail, with puppies hanging from her nursing right there in the road on a severe turn. They are going to get run over for sure or cause a wreck at the very least. I had to get her somehow so I did a stupid thing and stopped my truck where she was and hoped it wasn’t going to roll backwards and take a dive over the cliff. I jammed on my emergency brake, shoved my truck in park put on my flashers, and opened my back door so I could shove her and her babies in. She was shy but she seemed friendly and happy to see me; but just as I got close to approach her, she started backing away and the pups scattered like crazy in every direction into the forest. She got frantic and took off. Wonderful.
Back on the phone I went with every rescue on this side of Tennessee and nobody is going to help this dog and her babies so I went to the sheriff’s department for help. I thought if they knew she was on the road like this with babies hanging from her it could be a potential road hazard when someone would try to avoid hitting her, they would care. What a joke. I was reminded they have nothing to do with stray animals and was quickly banished into my truck. The next few days I decided to become a royal pain so I proceeded to keep going down there with “big ideas” of how they could start one of those dogs and prisoner programs. I brought information I found on the internet, gathered up contact numbers and addresses for them in a file, only to be dismissed as fast as they could get rid of me.
One day nearing the middle of September, the Hus came home and asked me if I knew anything about the dog on the mountain road with the pups. I was surprised he even would notice her because he leaves in the dark and comes home in the dark, but he said he has had a few quick glimpses of her over the past month. He said two of the puppies were dead on the last curve and he said it made him sick and wondered if I knew any rescues to call about her. I told him I’d been trying for weeks and how unsuccessful I’ve been.
I went back down to the sheriff for a last ditch effort mad as I could be about the dead puppies and their “I don’t care” attitude. I told him I was going to get her picture and write a story about how there is no help for this little girl in this county and have it published in the local newspaper. That backfired. The newspaper refused to print it and it only got the sheriff fuming at me. You just do not make waves like that around here. (adding: In all fairness our law is over worked, way underpaid, short handed, and no money in the budget to hire on more help).
.
So what am I supposed to do now? Hus decided we have to take mama and make her fit in here somehow, he’d build a pen, something, just to get her out of the woods and off the road, but if we do that, the puppies are on their own and will die if they cannot all be caught with her. I’d need a posse to help catch them all, then I need a place for the pups to live and again, nobody wants a puppy.
I arrived home from work one evening to hear a message on my answer phone from a rescue across the state who had intercepted my message. She couldn’t directly help me but offered to make a call to another organization she promised would intervene. Sure, go ahead, call anyone you want. At this point, call out anyone. As long as they aren’t the extremists’ and don’t bring explosives, I won’t turn down any help for mama and her puppies. Within 24 hours I got the call from a lady named Alisha and went over the whole story with her. She did networking for a nationwide organization and was going to hook me up. She said she would see who she could get close to my area and to be expecting another call soon. Another 24 hours passed and I received a call from a lady named Roxie who said she would be coming and bringing help. They already had a quite a few families screened and approved to adopt the dogs, once they were vet checked and brought up to date on all their vaccinations and the mother was spayed. I was shocked at all this sudden fast service but glad to get it. Finally, help is on the way.
On Saturday morning, October 24, my son and I met with our rescuers and led them to the area where our girl was last seen. I had my posse. It was a young husband and wife, with some college students in tow. They brought supplies for the dogs, loads of supplies. These folks were good and they were certainly on the ball. They were very matter of fact and clearly on board with this mission. There was no sign of our girl anywhere on the roads so we all pulled over and parked and began to scour the woods on foot in search for her. Dan was our guide through the now overgrown mountain trails as he knew them well and would keep us from getting lost. We were now 9 strong and everyone was pumped and enthusiastic. We hiked the mountain forest for about 4 hours climbing in and out of guardrails, jumping rock to rock, getting tangled in underbrush with no luck. We realized this was getting too dangerous as we came across copperheads left and right and kept loosing our footing. Coming up empty in that area, we left and were met on the road by a local woman who said the dog was near her home last night with two puppies and pointed us back up to the top of the mountain, so away we went up to the top. We mashed through that part of the forest for another hour or so and couldn’t get through the woods any more. It was just too thick, no trails, and we were all already bitten up by bugs, and cut up and bleeding from thorny underbrush, so we retreated and agreed this was futile. We cannot find this dog and her babies this way. Its just not working.
Our search party headed back to south Chattanooga and told me if I see them again to call and they would return asap. I went back home to collapse. Some 30 minutes later Dan comes running in the back door hollering for me to get the people to come back. He found mama and all her babies up here on the mountain, laying down in someone’s front yard. Unbelievable! How on earth are they traveling all these miles in a weakened state is beyond me. Thank goodness they made it up here and were off of that road. I called Roxie on her cell and they were already on the interstate, but she turned around and headed back. Dan and I pulled up in the yard and mama and her puppies were now underneath a car that was jacked up on concrete blocks with no back wheels. I stayed at the road to flag down our rescue people while Dan approached the dogs. Well holy H cow, sweet little mama dog suddenly got ten feet tall, hair stood up on her back, growling, barking, and threatening Dan as she protected her babies. Dan retreated backwards slowly but too late. Mama ran into the woods behind this house and all babies followed. All 6 of them. We got a very good look at her. She’s nothing but a bone rack now with huge milk. Her babies are small and have fat bellies, big floppy ears, and are as cute as you can imagine. But now they were gone again and here came our helpers. Oh man. Can this mission get any worse? Yes.
We followed the area where our girl went with all her babies trailing behind her but we got stopped by an old barbed wire fence that apparently went on forever with no way to get through it and solid woods on the other side. Good thing the owners were not home; the way we were thrashing through the back of his wooded property we were asking to get shot. We decided to go to the next farm house over and try to get into the woods that way but the barbed wired fence continued on that property too, so we tried the farm on the other side. We knew the people there and Dan explained we needed to cut through their woods. They didn’t care so we went hiking yet again through another forest, and how wonderful this was because it was dark like night in there. We couldn’t see anything or where we were stepping. This was bad. We finally sat down on some rocks to rest and concluded again this was not going to work. If we spotted her and the pups, we’d need a net or a sheet or some other way to catch them, not to mention a muzzle for mama who obviously was scared to death.
Our rescuers left again and said they wouldn’t give up if we didn’t, and promised to return again any time they were called. So as it stands right now, we have no idea really what it would take to catch mother with all her babies, considering their fear of humans and the kind of area we have to work with. She’s just staying on the move. I realize that the longer it takes to capture the pups, the harder it will be to get them socialized. If the puppies survive, they will undoubtedly continue to be wild, breeding each other and have a very short horrible life. Someone is bound to use them for target practice because hunting season will be open soon. If the hunting dogs don’t get them, their owners will or they will be road kill. They have to be saved, but how?
Now that we know mama and her babies have made it up to the top of the mountain to the farmlands, we won’t be putting food and water out for her down on the roads any longer so she will at least learn there is no reason to return to the cliffs. I thought she might make another attempt to move onto someone’s property with her family, so just in case I made up flyers to pass around and if seen up here, someone can call us and maybe we can lure her with food again. Its probably not going to happen, but that’s all that’s left.
I must say that I am very proud of my family: My Hus who offered to build this girl a pen and house and open up our home to her, and my Dan who gave up his Saturday plans canoeing on the river to help. They really came through when push came to shove.
I have nothing but contempt for people who dump their animals. This should have never have happened, but it did and will continue to happen here and there is no one that is going to be able to stop it. It just stinks. I am very angry about this but even moreso, I'm so sad that I failed so miserablely. I was hoping for a happy ending this weekend but no such luck. I got in over my head. I’m so sorry mama, we certainly tried to help you.
If there is an update, I’ll surely let you know. Keep your fingers crossed and hope for a miracle.
It is not unusual for dogs to wander about these mountain roads. This is the perfect dumping ground for unwanted animals to be abandoned. It’s normal for here and nobody cares. The abandoned dogs suffer and starve, the remaining ultimately form packs, and turn wild. Nobody does anything to stop it. There are no county ordinances against it, no laws at all and no Humane Society or Animal Control. There is a State law, but county overrides it and there is no one to enforce it. There must be a million dead skeletons of dead dogs on the forest that encases our mountain roads.
She looked like a smaller version of a yellow lab, around 40 pounds or so as cute as she can be. She was in half way decent condition; at least someone had been feeding her something before they threw her away like garbage to fend for herself in an area of forest, guardrails and dangerous cliffs. I came on home looking at both my well fed, spoiled rotten dogs who have everything they need, thinking to myself how lucky they are and they don’t even know it. I couldn’t get her loving eyes off my mind but thought what awful chaos it would be if I attempted to bring another dog on the property. It just couldn’t happen with our dogs as protective as they are. The fighting would be a disaster so I didn’t consider it for another minute. I tried to put her out of my mind, but no use. I got on the phone and began calling this one and that one just to inquire if anyone might want her. Of course not. Nobody wants anymore dogs. I shouldn’t have bothered even asking.
I didn’t see her after that day. I had hoped someone had picked her up, but in the back of my mind, I knew that was wishful thinking. She was in the mountains somewhere in the forest that engulfs the twisting roads, starving by now I was certain of that. I could not forget her eyes looking at me.
By the beginning of August, as I was on my way down to town and at the first hairpin turn on the road, she surfaced. I spotted her little head peeking at the road behind a guardrail, then making it onto the road as my truck passed. I couldn’t see her too good in my rear view mirror, but it was her. I worried again that she was in very bad trouble with this heat, so when I went back home, I gathered up some plastic bowls, got a gallon jug of water, and stole my dog’s bag of dog food and headed back down the mountain road. There are three places along this particular 4 mile steep stretch where a vehicle can pull over, and only one of them is what I’d call safe that is not on a steep incline, so I pulled in there. Decided to hike back up about a quarter mile or so to the area where I saw her in the road and left water and food for her on the edge of the road behind the guardrails in three places. She’d find them eventually and then I’d be able to catch her.
Feeling guilty as sin that she’s out there, I came home and made a few more phone calls, this time to the humane society’s in neighboring towns so I would have some place to bring her. I knew what they would say as the boys and I have gone through this many times before. Do you know they even have an automated menu too now? Its hard to speak to a human, but if you are persistent, you might get lucky. But they tell you right on the machine they are not taking animals at this time and nobody returns your calls, ever. First, they don’t take dogs from other counties and they would check my license tag if I tried to sneak one in. Second, everyone is full up and will not take any more dogs anyhow. Ok so I can’t dwell on her. I have to forget she’s out there. I cannot help her get a home so I gave up. I continued to fill up the bowls several times a week, although half of them went missing, I filled up what was still there.
About a week or so later, I engaged Dan in a conversation about the brakes on his truck and he brought up the subject of the dog in the road with the puppies and said he almost hit them. Say what? Oh no! Puppies. It was the same dog according to Dan. Yes, Dan knew about her too and said he tried to catch her a couple of times but she took off and now of all things, she has given birth in the woods. Terrific. He had been spotting her for about a week after I put the food down and he told me she had at least 6 very tiny puppies. Well this was it. Something was going to be done but I had no idea what. On my next trip to town, I bought a few more cheap bowls at the dollar store and more dog food to keep in my back seat of my truck with water. As I put them out that Saturday morning, a car stopped and some ladies asked me if I was taking care of “mama.” They named her mama. They said “Oh yes there are lots of us trying to help mama.” They had also been putting food out in various places and confirmed the sighting of about 6 or more puppies. They too said they had called many places for help with no success. Great, the good people of the mountain neighborhood are involved and between all of us, we cannot manage to help this little girl and her babies get a home.
Finally, early September, I got my first good close up glimpse of mama and her pups. It was a horrible sight. By now she was thin and weather beaten and appeared to have some skin problems and some cuts on her legs. But the worst thing was that she had milk like a Holstein and there she was standing in the steepest area by the guardrail, with puppies hanging from her nursing right there in the road on a severe turn. They are going to get run over for sure or cause a wreck at the very least. I had to get her somehow so I did a stupid thing and stopped my truck where she was and hoped it wasn’t going to roll backwards and take a dive over the cliff. I jammed on my emergency brake, shoved my truck in park put on my flashers, and opened my back door so I could shove her and her babies in. She was shy but she seemed friendly and happy to see me; but just as I got close to approach her, she started backing away and the pups scattered like crazy in every direction into the forest. She got frantic and took off. Wonderful.
Back on the phone I went with every rescue on this side of Tennessee and nobody is going to help this dog and her babies so I went to the sheriff’s department for help. I thought if they knew she was on the road like this with babies hanging from her it could be a potential road hazard when someone would try to avoid hitting her, they would care. What a joke. I was reminded they have nothing to do with stray animals and was quickly banished into my truck. The next few days I decided to become a royal pain so I proceeded to keep going down there with “big ideas” of how they could start one of those dogs and prisoner programs. I brought information I found on the internet, gathered up contact numbers and addresses for them in a file, only to be dismissed as fast as they could get rid of me.
One day nearing the middle of September, the Hus came home and asked me if I knew anything about the dog on the mountain road with the pups. I was surprised he even would notice her because he leaves in the dark and comes home in the dark, but he said he has had a few quick glimpses of her over the past month. He said two of the puppies were dead on the last curve and he said it made him sick and wondered if I knew any rescues to call about her. I told him I’d been trying for weeks and how unsuccessful I’ve been.
I went back down to the sheriff for a last ditch effort mad as I could be about the dead puppies and their “I don’t care” attitude. I told him I was going to get her picture and write a story about how there is no help for this little girl in this county and have it published in the local newspaper. That backfired. The newspaper refused to print it and it only got the sheriff fuming at me. You just do not make waves like that around here. (adding: In all fairness our law is over worked, way underpaid, short handed, and no money in the budget to hire on more help).
.
So what am I supposed to do now? Hus decided we have to take mama and make her fit in here somehow, he’d build a pen, something, just to get her out of the woods and off the road, but if we do that, the puppies are on their own and will die if they cannot all be caught with her. I’d need a posse to help catch them all, then I need a place for the pups to live and again, nobody wants a puppy.
I arrived home from work one evening to hear a message on my answer phone from a rescue across the state who had intercepted my message. She couldn’t directly help me but offered to make a call to another organization she promised would intervene. Sure, go ahead, call anyone you want. At this point, call out anyone. As long as they aren’t the extremists’ and don’t bring explosives, I won’t turn down any help for mama and her puppies. Within 24 hours I got the call from a lady named Alisha and went over the whole story with her. She did networking for a nationwide organization and was going to hook me up. She said she would see who she could get close to my area and to be expecting another call soon. Another 24 hours passed and I received a call from a lady named Roxie who said she would be coming and bringing help. They already had a quite a few families screened and approved to adopt the dogs, once they were vet checked and brought up to date on all their vaccinations and the mother was spayed. I was shocked at all this sudden fast service but glad to get it. Finally, help is on the way.
On Saturday morning, October 24, my son and I met with our rescuers and led them to the area where our girl was last seen. I had my posse. It was a young husband and wife, with some college students in tow. They brought supplies for the dogs, loads of supplies. These folks were good and they were certainly on the ball. They were very matter of fact and clearly on board with this mission. There was no sign of our girl anywhere on the roads so we all pulled over and parked and began to scour the woods on foot in search for her. Dan was our guide through the now overgrown mountain trails as he knew them well and would keep us from getting lost. We were now 9 strong and everyone was pumped and enthusiastic. We hiked the mountain forest for about 4 hours climbing in and out of guardrails, jumping rock to rock, getting tangled in underbrush with no luck. We realized this was getting too dangerous as we came across copperheads left and right and kept loosing our footing. Coming up empty in that area, we left and were met on the road by a local woman who said the dog was near her home last night with two puppies and pointed us back up to the top of the mountain, so away we went up to the top. We mashed through that part of the forest for another hour or so and couldn’t get through the woods any more. It was just too thick, no trails, and we were all already bitten up by bugs, and cut up and bleeding from thorny underbrush, so we retreated and agreed this was futile. We cannot find this dog and her babies this way. Its just not working.
Our search party headed back to south Chattanooga and told me if I see them again to call and they would return asap. I went back home to collapse. Some 30 minutes later Dan comes running in the back door hollering for me to get the people to come back. He found mama and all her babies up here on the mountain, laying down in someone’s front yard. Unbelievable! How on earth are they traveling all these miles in a weakened state is beyond me. Thank goodness they made it up here and were off of that road. I called Roxie on her cell and they were already on the interstate, but she turned around and headed back. Dan and I pulled up in the yard and mama and her puppies were now underneath a car that was jacked up on concrete blocks with no back wheels. I stayed at the road to flag down our rescue people while Dan approached the dogs. Well holy H cow, sweet little mama dog suddenly got ten feet tall, hair stood up on her back, growling, barking, and threatening Dan as she protected her babies. Dan retreated backwards slowly but too late. Mama ran into the woods behind this house and all babies followed. All 6 of them. We got a very good look at her. She’s nothing but a bone rack now with huge milk. Her babies are small and have fat bellies, big floppy ears, and are as cute as you can imagine. But now they were gone again and here came our helpers. Oh man. Can this mission get any worse? Yes.
We followed the area where our girl went with all her babies trailing behind her but we got stopped by an old barbed wire fence that apparently went on forever with no way to get through it and solid woods on the other side. Good thing the owners were not home; the way we were thrashing through the back of his wooded property we were asking to get shot. We decided to go to the next farm house over and try to get into the woods that way but the barbed wired fence continued on that property too, so we tried the farm on the other side. We knew the people there and Dan explained we needed to cut through their woods. They didn’t care so we went hiking yet again through another forest, and how wonderful this was because it was dark like night in there. We couldn’t see anything or where we were stepping. This was bad. We finally sat down on some rocks to rest and concluded again this was not going to work. If we spotted her and the pups, we’d need a net or a sheet or some other way to catch them, not to mention a muzzle for mama who obviously was scared to death.
Our rescuers left again and said they wouldn’t give up if we didn’t, and promised to return again any time they were called. So as it stands right now, we have no idea really what it would take to catch mother with all her babies, considering their fear of humans and the kind of area we have to work with. She’s just staying on the move. I realize that the longer it takes to capture the pups, the harder it will be to get them socialized. If the puppies survive, they will undoubtedly continue to be wild, breeding each other and have a very short horrible life. Someone is bound to use them for target practice because hunting season will be open soon. If the hunting dogs don’t get them, their owners will or they will be road kill. They have to be saved, but how?
Now that we know mama and her babies have made it up to the top of the mountain to the farmlands, we won’t be putting food and water out for her down on the roads any longer so she will at least learn there is no reason to return to the cliffs. I thought she might make another attempt to move onto someone’s property with her family, so just in case I made up flyers to pass around and if seen up here, someone can call us and maybe we can lure her with food again. Its probably not going to happen, but that’s all that’s left.
I must say that I am very proud of my family: My Hus who offered to build this girl a pen and house and open up our home to her, and my Dan who gave up his Saturday plans canoeing on the river to help. They really came through when push came to shove.
I have nothing but contempt for people who dump their animals. This should have never have happened, but it did and will continue to happen here and there is no one that is going to be able to stop it. It just stinks. I am very angry about this but even moreso, I'm so sad that I failed so miserablely. I was hoping for a happy ending this weekend but no such luck. I got in over my head. I’m so sorry mama, we certainly tried to help you.
If there is an update, I’ll surely let you know. Keep your fingers crossed and hope for a miracle.
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