Monthly Archives: August 2012

Your Friendly Dog Has Gone Missing! What Now? – Part 1 of a Series

Rollie, your  friendly dog is missing. He was in the fenced backyard sniffing around and enjoying himself while you just stepped inside for a minute to get a cup of coffee. The phone rang and you were longer than you meant to be. When you came back out he was nowhere to be seen. Then you saw it, the side gate was open. It must have blown open in the wind last night! Rollie must have used the opportunity to check out the neighborhood.

Rollie fits the profile of an opportunistic dog. You may never know what happened in those few minutes when Rollie escaped, but it doesn’t really matter. What matters most is what you do next. Quick action will help you recover Rollie safely and the following series of articles is designed to help you find a friendly dog that took an opportunity to go for an adventure.

First things first, you need to check out our 5 Things To Do If You Have Lost Your Dog and get those steps underway. Keep food, water, his bed and familiar scented articles at the spot where he went missing from for the entire duration of his adventure. Many of these dogs do return on their own. Especially if they aren’t being chased and driven out of the area.

Contact all of the correct authorities – police, shelters, animal control facilities and then get busy printing your flyers and signs.  You need to go door to door with your flyers as soon as possible. Somebody, somewhere, has seen something. You might talk to 99 people that haven’t seen anything. But you are looking for the one person that has seen something. Has somebody seen your dog in their yard or did they see a vehicle stop and pick your dog up?

Three things will generally happen to the opportunistic dog:

  1. He will get picked up by a Good Samaritan who doesn’t want to see him hit by a car. Depending on the Good Samaritan’s actions: he may be reunited; taken to a shelter, animal control facility or rescue;  rehomed or kept by the finder.
  2. He will wander far outside  the owner’s original search area and start to live on his own (survival mode); eventually ending up at a farm, business or house where somebody either recognizes and reunites him; takes him to an animal control facility, shelter or rescue; rehomes him or keeps him.
  3. He will be picked up by the police or animal control and taken to a facility. Keep in mind that he may end up far outside the jurisdiction area of the local shelter and may be in the next county or the next state in a very short time.

Okay, now that we know the possible outcomes, let’s go through them step by step to try to maximize your chances of finding Rollie.

Continue on to part 2

Our tips, ideas and articles are based on information gathered from over thousands of  successful lost dog recoveries. Any advice or suggestions made by Lost Dogs of Wisconsin/Lost Dogs Illinois is not paid-for professional advice and should be taken at owner’s discretion.

 

Did Your Lost Dog Get Picked Up By a Good Samaritan? Part 2 of a Series

Immediately put a sign in front of your house to alert neighbors and passersby that your dog is missing.

The first thing we need to do is clearly define the difference between a dog that is “picked up” and one that is stolen.  A picked up dog is one that was lost or perceived to be lost and a Good Samaritan took the dog to keep it out of harm’s way. Very few dogs are actually stolen. Stealing involves a person who commits a crime of  intent by illegally entering your house, yard or vehicle and taking your dog. There is a big difference because the motive is different.  We will cover the stolen dogs in a future article. But now let’s get back to the dog that was picked up by a well-meaning passerby.

The type of dog most likely to get picked up is the small, friendly dog lost in an urban or suburban area. They may get picked up within minutes of going missing, especially if they are seen near a busy road.

Larger, friendly dogs may get picked up but are more likely to have traveled a farther distance before they do. Many people are wary of larger dogs, or they don’t have a vehicle large enough to put them in, or they are transporting children or their own pets. It is simply easier to pick up a small dog than a large one.

First and foremost, you must understand that the Good Samaritan meant well. But now the guessing game of understanding human behavior begins.  Here is a little quiz.  Let’s see if you can tell which of these scenarios will most often end up in a happy reunion.

The finder thinks:

  1. Somebody has lost their dog and I must try to find his owner.
  2. Somebody has dumped this dog or lost him out of negligence and I must rescue him. They don’t deserve him back and I will keep him or give him to Aunt Mary who really needs a nice little dog for company.
  3. I’m in a hurry and I can’t keep this dog  so I will take it to a shelter (or vet clinic) that is in the town where I work.
  4.  I can’t keep this dog but I don’t want to take it to the local shelter because they don’t have a good reputation, so I will take it to a better shelter or rescue where the dog can be adopted to a new home.
  5. I can’t keep this dog so I will research which is the correct shelter, stray holding facility or animal control facility that services this area and take him there.
  6. I will wait and see if the owners post signs and flyers and then I might give him back. If I don’t see any signs or flyers, they mustn’t really want him so I will keep him or give him away.
  7. I will wait to see if the owners offer a reward and then I will turn him over.

If you guessed numbers 1 and 5  you are correct. Finders who proactively look for owners, and dogs taken to the animal control facility, stray holding facility or shelter that serves the area where the dog was lost are the dogs that are most likely to be reunited with their owners. Educating the public about this is a large part of what we do.

But as you can see from the other options, there is a lot of human emotion in play. We see a lot of the “wait and see” method. The lesson we have learned  is that it doesn’t matter which scenario played out. The key to getting your dog home is to generate sightings by using flyers and signs. You must “convince” the finder that you are desperately looking for your dog. If the finder has decided to keep your dog you will either make them feel guilty by the amazing search you are conducting or a neighbor will “rat them out” by noticing that they have a new dog that looks just like the one on the flyer.

Put a sign in your yard as soon as possible. If the Good Samaritan was merely driving by and doesn’t live in the area, he may drive by again, checking for signs.  Do the legwork of going door to door with your flyers. Talk to everyone you see.

Use intersection signs at strategic locations throughout the area. They are an invaluable tool to alert the neighborhood that your dog is missing.

File a lost dog report and leave a flyer with your local police station and your animal control facility. Do the same for every vet clinic, animal shelter and rescue in a 50 mile radius. (You may need to expand this) Create a paper trail showing that you are actively searching for your dog. This may be invaluable if there is a question about ownership.

Use traditional and social media and Craigslist to get the word out. Put an ad in your local newspaper and call your local radio station. Remember that not everybody has a computer.

Look at the map. Where does the road go that you suspect that your dog was picked up on? Think about the traffic patterns, the commuters and the places of employment nearby. Get flyers out to those towns and places.  You will find many other suggestions for generating sightings on our website.  Print hundreds of flyers and use them. They don’t do any good sitting in a stack on the kitchen table.

Quickly spreading the word is the number one way that a small friendly lost dog will be reunited. Get going now!

Continue onto part 3

Our tips, ideas and articles are based on information gathered from over thousands of  successful lost dog recoveries. Any advice or suggestions made by Lost Dogs of Wisconsin/Lost Dogs Illinois is not paid-for professional advice and should be taken at owner’s discretion.

The Happy Wanderer – Part 3 of a Series

 

Do you remember that old song from Girl Scout camp, the Happy Wanderer? “I love to go a-wandering, Along the mountain track, And as I go, I love to sing, My knapsack on my back.”

This is often the scenario played out by the friendly, opportunistic large dog, or a friendly small dog in an unpopulated area. They took the opportunity to go for a wander, smelling new smells, maybe chasing chipmunks and rabbits; but they never gave a moment’s notice that they forgot to bring the map.

As we discussed in Part 2, the chance that the small friendly dog got picked up quite early in his adventure is very high.

But today, we are going to talk about the larger friendly dog that was having a good time but ended up a long ways from home. (In particular, think hounds, labs, huskies, spaniels, setters, pointers, German shepherds and other working and sporting breeds). Whereas, shy lost dogs will often stay within a five mile radius of where they went missing, friendly lost dogs may travel in a linear fashion, zig zagging across the countryside.

These dogs may find their way back home IF you give them a helping hand by leaving food, their bed, and familiar scented articles out for them at the place they went missing from. Do this the entire time they are gone. Refresh the food daily with new smelly canned dog or cat food or some leftovers you are having. Dogs return by scent, not by sight or sound. So that same nose that led him away, may lead him back.

But you don’t want to rely on that, because there are far too many other scenarios that could have occurred.

  1.  He could have gotten chased by people who thought he was “just a stray” and  didn’t want him in their yard or farmyard.
  2. He may be seen but be assumed to be a wandering farm dog and nobody calls in the sightings.
  3. He could have crossed a river or a bridge and can’t figure out his way back.
  4. He could have been picked up by a Good Samaritan, animal control or the police across a state, county or jurisdiction line and have ended up in a shelter, animal control facility or stray holding facility many, many miles away.
  5. He may have found a food source or some friendly doggy companions at a farm and decided to stay awhile. In our experience, most farmers won’t proactively look for an owner, but will let them hang out as long as they aren’t causing trouble or chasing livestock.
  6. He may do this numerous times, staying somewhere for a few days, then moving on again.
  7. He will eventually end up at a farm, business, or backyard or driveway of somebody who decides to either proactively look for the owner, turn him in, or keep or rehome him.

If they decide to proactively look for an owner or take him to the correct stray holding facility for the area, great! Except that by this time, the owner may have given up or they may not be looking in the right spot. Compound that with the problem that many of these larger friendly breeds look alike (think black lab or yellow lab) and it becomes even tougher to find your dog.

What can you do?

Do everything listed on our Five Things to Do If You Have Lost Your Dog flyer, our Action Plan and then include the following:

  1. Expand your flyering area quickly. Start with a 50 mile radius and then expand to 100 miles. Enlist friends and family to help you. You may want to use an automated calling service or the USPS mailing service called “Every Door Direct Mail” to help you. Check out our Generating Sightings pdf on this website for more ideas. When you get a sighting – go in and heavily re-flyer that area.
  2. Place a yard sign in your own yard.
  3. Place ads in your local newspaper and surrounding newspapers. Many small newspapers are owned by larger companies that can target many communities with one ad. Place an ad with the local radio station also.
  4. Assign a couple of Facebook and tech savvy friends to post on as many different social media sites as possible. Make sure you include a picture and contact information! Many neighborhoods, on line newspapers, vet clinics, pet supply stores, restaurants and bars have Facebook pages. It is an easy and free way to spread the word.
  5. Use intersection signs at strategic locations to catch the eye of the highest number of motorists.
  6. Check Google satellite photos for paths he could be traveling on – railroad tracks, jogging and hiking trails, old logging roads, etc.
  7. Do not limit your thinking with geographical boundaries – “he wouldn’t have crossed that river, or that busy freeway.”  Chances are he did and he will.
  8. If you have a familiar looking dog (lab, golden retriever, etc), don’t be afraid to disclose specific details on your flyer. What color collar was he wearing? Distinguishing birthmarks, size, etc. You will need the help of the community and animal shelters to identify him.
  9. Check out every possible lead even if it seems impossibly far away. Never underestimate the distance your dog can travel. Don’t be surprised if your dog doesn’t recognize you at first or doesn’t perform specific behaviors. The stress of being on his own and/or a shelter can alter behavior.
  10. The longer your dog is missing and the more often he is chased,  the more likely it is that he will go into “survival” mode. Please refer to our series of articles on capturing a shy, elusive dog.

We can tell you numerous stories of dogs that have gone hundreds of miles and been recovered. Don’t give up! Your dog is out there relying on you to find him and bring him home.

Our tips, ideas and articles are based on information gathered from over thousands of successful lost dog recoveries. Any advice or suggestions made by Lost Dogs of Wisconsin/Lost Dogs Illinois is not paid-for professional advice and should be taken at owner’s discretion.

Persistence and Perseverance Pays Off

Two-and-a-half years ago, when Army Specialist Phyllip Kennedy came home from Afghanistan to Jacksonville, Illinois he received a very special gift from his sister. It was an adorable white and tan pitbull who he named Chewy. Chewy settled in nicely with him, his wife, Jemeica, and 18-month-old Heaven, and quickly became a member of their family.

On July 23rd of this year, the family had a summer barbeque. While no one was looking Chewy made a dash out the back door. “When she first went missing I was devastated, said Phyllip. “We immediately started walking up and down each street yelling her name for three hours.” Next, he began the search strategies that Lost Dogs Illinois recommends- flyers in the area, signs on poles and at intersections, reports to authorities, visiting and calling animal control facilities, placing familiar objects in the area and posting ads on LDI’s Facebook page and other networking sites like Craigslist.  Strangers he connected with on Facebook even printed flyers and passed them out in their neighborhoods.

Despite these exhaustive efforts, Phyllip went several days without any trace of hope. He said, “After about a week of nobody claiming to have seen her I was starting to worry that somebody had picked her up.” What happened over the next two weeks was one of the most dramatic searches we at LDI have ever seen.

It began when Phyllip received a phone call from someone who saw Chewy’s lost dog ad and said he saw her at a trailer park on the other side of town. Phyllip raced to the site and spoke with the park’s manager. He told Phyllip that residents were not allowed to have pitbulls as pets, but that he had recently seen a kid walking one. The park manager had asked the boy about the pitbull and he claimed to just be dog sitting. The park manager knew who the boy’s grandmother was, so Phyllip went to talk to her. He showed her a picture of Chewy but, Phyllip recalled, “she said that she had never seen a dog like her before.”

Phyllip went to the police station and filed a missing dog report. They all went to the grandmother’s house, but when she didn’t answer the door, the police said there was nothing else they could do. Phyllip didn’t give up. Not believing the woman’s story, he later went back to the trailer park. She admitted that after that visit from the police, her grandson became fearful and sold Chewy. She gave Phyllip the name and address of the people who bought her.

Phyllip called the police with this lead and they met him at the address the grandmother gave him. A woman who lived there gave him some more bad news: her brother-in-law sold Chewy shortly after buying him. The woman gave the police the address of the people who bought the dog and Phyllip followed them there. That’s where the wild goose chase would come to an end.

The police knocked on the door of the house. A man answered and was shown a picture of Chewy. The man said, “This looks just like this dog that I bought today.” By that point, Phyllip knew that these words didn’t necessarily mean that Chewy was there. The man disappeared inside his house while Phyllip and the police waited in the front yard. He returned to the door with Chewy. Phyllip remembered, “When I saw her I called her name and she ran and jumped off of the porch and straight to me, tail wagging and all.” With the surprising news that this man has just purchased another family’s dog, he was happy to return Chewy to her family.

After 15 days, Chewy was back with her family who say they gave her lots of love and then immediately made an appointment to get her spayed, microchipped and registered. When asked what advice he has for those whose dogs are missing he said, “Don’t give up hope! Post it all over the internet, call the police and file a missing dog report, call the local radio station, go door to door with fliers, give fliers to all of the local animal shelters. Eventually the word will spread enough and hopefully, you will get help from all over just like I did. There are still good people out there that care for your baby as much as you do that know that a dog just like one of your kids!”

Navigating the Maze of Stray Holding Facilities

Your dog has gone missing and there is a good chance that he has ended up in an animal control facility or stray holding facility. This article will help you understand how the system works and will help maximize your chances of locating your dog.

Remember though, that every state has different laws and procedures, so you will need to familiarize yourself with your local area.

Dogs are considered property in all fifty states and most states have some sort of “Stray Hold” law that is designed to give an owner a chance to reclaim their dog. This may be as short as three days or as long as seven days.

Most municipalities will assign a “stray contract” with an entity in their community to house the “strays” until the owner reclaims them.  These are the ONLY facilities that should be housing lost dogs. Rescues should not be accepting or housing lost dogs unless they hold the contract for your area. When they accept lost dogs without the contract, it adds another layer of confusion to the system, and is one more barrier to getting lost pets back home.

Many different terms may be used to describe facilities which also add to the confusion. It may be called the pound, an impound facility, a stray holding facility, an animal control facility, an animal shelter, or a humane society. It may have SPCA attached to the name, although this does not mean it is connected with the national organization, the ASPCA.   Vet clinics, boarding kennels, town offices and police stations may also house lost dogs. Stray holding facilities may be a private business, a non-profit organization or a totally government run organization. Regardless, the animal control contract is paid for with tax payer dollars that compensate the facility for impounding and housing your dog while he is lost.  You have a right to know how your tax dollars are being spent and how the system works! These services are also subject to Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) requests if you run into problems.

The stray holding facility can be an elaborate large central animal shelter with all the bells and whistles of modern technology. These facilities may also operate as a humane society and will adopt your dog out if you don’t reclaim him in time.  Or,  it may be a garage or small kennel on the back of somebody’s property. The stray contract may be held by somebody that doesn’t have a cell phone or microchip scanner; let alone a computer with internet service to help get the word out that they have your dog.

It is your responsibility to advocate for your lost dog and make yourself aware of all the different stray holding possibilities in your area. Check with your local town offices and police and sheriff’s departments for a list. You will want to expand this, as time lapses. Your dog may being held several counties away and you will only have a very short time to locate and reclaim him. Leave no stone unturned!

Dogs that come off of “Stray Hold” are either made available for adoption at the facility, transferred to another rescue or shelter for adoption, or euthanized. We cannot stress enough that time is of the essence and you may want to enlist some friends or family to help you scan the websites, make the phone calls necessary and personally visit all of the facilities in your area. Don’t limit yourself to your county. Remember, dogs walk. They can easily end up in another county, state, or jurisdiction and sad to say, there is not any internal cross-sharing of information between the facilities. Just because you file a lost dog report at one place, doesn’t mean that they share it with the others. In fact, that rarely happens, if at all. It is not uncommon for there to be dozens of stray holding facilities in one county and you will need to check them all!

This lack of information sharing has been the biggest hurdle for the lost pet problem. There isn’t a “central clearing house” for lost pets, like there is for lost children. There are many reasons for this, and it is something that the animal welfare world will need to work towards if shelter deaths in this country are going to decline.  Two years after this blog was written, Lost Dogs Illinois partnered with Helping Lost Pets, a map based centralized national database.

The most progressive facilities will post pictures on line or on their Facebook page as soon as the dog is turned in. This has become an invaluable tool for locating owners and saving lives. Some shelters even have volunteer “lost and found matchers” who will try to match up lost dog reports with dogs that are brought in. But again, this is more the exception, than the rule.

Shelters that don’t post pictures on line may adopt out your dog immediately after the Stray Hold has elapsed. You may never know that your dog was there unless you check the “adoptable” photos.  These adoption pictures should appear on their website or on Petfinder.org once the dog is up for adoption. But please be forewarned, if your dog is friendly and adoptable, it may only be on the website for a few hours or a few days. If a shelter adopts your dog out, you will not have any recourse unless you are prepared to hire a lawyer and begin a legal battle.

If your dog is old, injured or sick, or shows any kind of stress or aggression in the shelter, (even if it is only from fear), he may very likely be euthanized immediately after his stray hold is up. This can be especially true of larger dogs in the larger urban shelters.

Check out EVERY dog that you think is a possible match for your dog. Errors can be made regarding gender and age; microchips can be missed and breeds can be mis-identified.  Even when you go and check in person, don’t be surprised if your dog doesn’t know you or doesn’t exhibit specific behaviors that you would expect to see. The stress of the shelter may make your dog “shut down” and you may overlook him. Please be careful. We are aware of several “near misses” when an owner didn’t recognize their own dog.

Don’t delay, get started now because your dog is depending upon you!

Unlikely Behavior?

This normally surprises people, but it’s true:  if your dog is lost, your pet will probably run from you when he or she sees you.  Yes, you read that correctly.  If lost, your dog, even one that has always been friendly and your devoted companion, will bolt in the opposite direction from where you are.

Your dog will run from you instead of to you because your dog will be in survival mode, not because he or she doesn’t love you.  You see, after three or four days on the loose, a dog’s priorities start to change.  A dog will reorder what’s important to the following sequence:  1. Predators, including you, 2. Shelter, 3. Water, and 4. Food.  A dog, therefore, will do whatever is necessary to avoid predators while pursuing the remaining items on his or her list of priorities.

It’s your pet’s ability to shift mental gears into survival mode that increases the chances that your pet will be returned to you.  This ability is also what makes it likely that your dog will view you and anyone else looking for him or her as a predator, or a potential threat.

That is why it is critical for you and everyone else trying to find your dog to refrain from yelling or approaching your dog during your search.  It’s great when enthusiastic people rally and join together to find a lost dog.  But people, together as a group or alone, are terrifying to a lost pet…and the last thing a scared dog will be tempted to approach is a person, even if that person is the dog’s loving owner.

Spread the message to all of the people that are trying to help you that they need to change their mindset from “Catching” to “Luring”. Use your helpers’ enthusiasm and energy to flyer every house and business in the neighborhood, instead of searching for your dog. You will have a much better chance of success!