Tag: dog rescue

Everything In Its Season

I love the velvety purple stalks of Mexican sage. It heralds fall; its amethyst hues offset by the season’s golden leaves. A perennial in most gardens – but not in our Homeward Bound Memorial Garden. It is too wet in winter, and too hot in summer. The clay soil and baking sun are too much for this tough, but not quite tough enough, sage.

The first three seasons, I moved it to different spots in the garden hoping I would find just the right home for it to thrive. But no amount of pampering made a difference. It was magnificent in fall and gone by spring, never to sprout again.

Now, I treat it as an annual. I find a spot where it can be spectacular while enjoying and enhancing the company of others.

And when it is finished blooming, I thank it for its beauty, plant spring bulbs over it, and bid it a fond adieu.

Despite our best efforts, some things we love are not meant to be with us for long. I think that only makes them more precious.

Lindsey was our miracle puppy. Born an insulin-dependent diabetic, she should not have seen a few weeks much less nearly a year.

“She’s going to break your heart,” our Doc said. It is a kind way of saying ‘let her go.’ If Lindsey had been in pain, we would have seen the wisdom in that. But while Lindsey was a perpetual tiny girl…

she was happy and loved and fawned over until she left us as suddenly as she came to us – passing quietly away in the night.

Cavanaugh is 14.

Karma, only eight.

Both were left in shelters with terminal medical issues. For both, their time is likely measured in weeks, maybe months, but not years. Both were deserving of a much better ending. So they came to us and we were told, “just love them and spoil them.”

This is one of the most important gifts we can offer. Without any expectation that they will see the coming spring, we can be there for them when they need us most.

Karma will be going home this week. We call it hospice foster, matching special needs dogs with extraordinary angels who know that it is not the number of days that count, but the quality of our time together.

It’s hard to love them so when you know the time is short. Still, because the time is short, it is impossible not to love them even more.

“Every blade in the field, every leaf in the forest, lays down its life in its season, as beautifully as it was taken up.” ~ Henry David Thoreau

Dogs, like people, do not come with expiration dates. Love while you can. Live every day. Give what you are able knowing that you made a difference. You never know how something beautiful will be reborn.

A Girl Named Journey

How a garden is begun determines everything about how it grows. It starts with a solid foundation of good soil. It requires just the right amount of sunlight, water and nurturing until its roots are firmly planted to support its future brilliance.

Maybe I am a gluten for punishment, or maybe I just love puppies. Either way, I find myself fostering another one. Her name is Journey. And like a new garden, she requires some nurturing to find her forever home.

She arrived the same time as Irish’s litter. An 18-year-old who would soon be leaving for college brought her home as a surprise for his mother. It was an unwelcome surprise, and so, she came to us at the age of three months.

Puppies are always in high demand. One that was already old enough to be home would not be with us long. She went home with a man who fell for her obvious German Shepherd mix – one of his favorite breeds. He returned her less than 24 hours later because she threw up in his car and whined when she got home. This was our bad.

She went home again with a young couple. The husband was in love, but the wife was not really on board from the start. She was returned quickly for being too much work (in other words, a puppy).

The third match seemed like a good fit. But Journey is not your average snuggly, submissive puppy. She is an independent, sometimes headstrong girl. They described her as “defiant.” The wife thought she was not “alpha” enough to handle her. Someone said she resource-guarded. You would think she was Cujo at four months of age.

By her third return, I was on my second batch of puppies. Our president took her home and worked with her. The “defiance” – which was just bad, untrained puppy behavior – disappeared quickly with her firm, but kind corrections. Still, her puppy bites and jumps were off-putting to our other volunteers who had less experience or patience for puppy transgressions. Now five months of age, what Journey needed was what every puppy needs: both love and firmness, consistency of expectation and follow through.

Had I not been so preoccupied with the puppy litters, I would have spent time with her sooner. She was my garden helper for a week.

She responded quickly to corrections and commands. We tested her supposed resource guarding. No issues. But her play with other dogs was atrocious.


So I brought her home to foster thinking my Yogi boy could teach her some better manners.

What a puppy experiences shapes the dog they become. If they leave their mothers or litter mates too soon, they miss out on important dog-to-dog socialization. What Journey needed was an appropriate helper dog to expend her energy and teach her how to play politely with other dogs. My Yogi has issued corrections to the puppies we have fostered – but this little girl had my 70-lb. boy pinned in less than two minutes.

Biting at ears, lips, throat, and boy body parts was not going to get this girl home – and, as she grew older and bigger, would significantly limit her experiences.

There is no one training technique that works for all dogs – much less all puppies. Through trial and error, and the good advice of my fellow rescue volunteers, I shifted Journey’s play with Yogi to games of fetch/chase and tug of war. He’s too fast for her to catch, and a tug toy gave her something safe to bite on. As soon as she escalated, she earned a water squirt. If that failed, she went to timeout. Within two days, their play was dramatically different – to Yogi’s great relief!

By chance, we got a new dog in: a ten-month-old named Jack the Lab (aka Jack the Tank!) who joined Journey in the puppy yard for some play. Within seconds of her misdeeds – he had her pinned!


She delighted in the play but quickly learned that biting would earn her a smackdown.

In puppy class, a beautiful year-old Golden named Oden took a shine to her.

He lets her get away with nothing, and if she tries to be inappropriate with any of the smaller dogs, he body checks her to the ground.


These are the kind of corrections that puppies usually get from their mama dogs and litter mates. For reasons we’ll never know, Journey missed them.

While Jack and Oden issue corrections (nicely), Yogi delivers the love. And increasingly, those sharp puppy teeth are being replaced by kisses.

My goal is for Journey’s next family to be her forever family. My hope is that her life will be filled with journeys – of adventure.

In Defense of My Summer Garden…Again

Despite a LONG hot summer, the garden fared pretty well – until August, that is. The heat is partly to blame. Deadheading doesn’t help when 100+ degree temperatures shrink new buds into tater-tot size flowers. And it was certainly too hot to plant annuals as we usually do to keep the color going in the garden in between perennial blooms.

But there are eight tiny reason that the garden looks a bit ragged right now. They marched in with yet another heat wave at the end of July: eight adorable Golden Retriever, German Shepherd, and who-know-what-else mix puppies.


Irish – their mama – had been stray in the even hotter Central Valley. A good Samaritan took her in a couple of months prior intending to keep her, not realizing that she was already expecting. Three weeks into the care of eight puppies – they were ready to be done with mama and her litter.

A visit to the vet when they found her might have told them she was going to be a mom. They might have mentioned that her bent left rear leg – the result of an old break – was causing her great pain. They might have vaccinated her not knowing she was expecting. I guess things happen for a reason. The cost of her needed surgery might have led them to put her down or send her to a shelter. Vaccinations might have been deadly to the puppies. She was meant to come to us, but it was probably unsurprising – despite keeping her with the pups in our puppy-safe yard and house – that she contracted kennel cough and had to be separated from them after only four weeks.

Kennel cough can quickly become life-threatening for puppies. But with fast-action, meds and care, they came through it well and quickly.

We took over for feeding for mama – a slurpy mush of pulverized puppy kibble, cottage cheese, and baby food at first. It wasn’t long before the tiny pups were packing on the pounds.

I’m blessed to have flexibility in my schedule, so I signed on as morning Puppy Mama. You’ll remember that that role wreaked havoc with my summer garden last year when 12 Golden puppies arrived at the rescue. Morning Puppy Mama means showing up daily to clean, feed, bathe, and play with these adorable things. A straw happily drawn.

In these very hot days, they are out in their puppy-only yard in the mornings to have a chance to run and tackle before they are put in their air-conditioned shed for the afternoon. In the evening, Puppy Dad or Puppy Grandma free them so they can play in the cool night air. And when I need to take a day off, Puppy Aunt subs in.

Needless to say, it leaves little time for gardening.


But the garden will wait – and the bees and butterflies don’t seem to mind the weed mess below.


I will plant fresh fall flowers later when the scalding ends and something approaching fall begins – and all the puppies are home beginning their new, happy lives. Four down; four to go.

Mama Irish, meanwhile, has had surgery to eliminate her pain. The recovery will be lengthy, but her future is much brighter. She was a wonderful mom, taking such good care of her kids despite her own suffering. We will find her the perfect home and a happy life, as well. She certainly has earned it.

Hope is a Road: Amelia’s Story

“Amelia is loose at Lake Tahoe. Can you post for help?” Amelia is a six-year-old “English Cream” Golden Retriever and retired breeder dog. And not from a responsible breeder. We see too many of them. They have spent their whole lives living outdoors and making puppies. They arrive shut down, fearful, and unsocialized. They connect with other dogs, but not quickly or easily with most humans. It can take weeks, months, and in some cases, years for them to overcome their past experiences.

Amelia had been adopted just five days prior. Sometimes, when people fall in love with a dog, they listen only with the hearts. They underestimate what they are reading in the file, being told, and even seeing before them. They are in love. But you could see it in Amelia’s face on her adoption day.

She was going to need a lot of time and TLC before she would trust.

Given a momentary open door before being leashed – Amelia took off. On one side was heavily wooded and mountainous terrain populated by cougars, coyotes, snakes, and bears. On the other side: a very busy highway. The date: just a week before the July 4th fireworks when an already spooked dog could be scared into even further harm. The longer she was out, the greater the risk.

The word spread like wildfire. Local shelters, vets, online sites, road crews, and community members were alerted. A team of dedicated Homeward Bound volunteers was assembled. We’re family. And when one of us goes missing, we kick into high gear.

We were blessed to have local volunteers who knew the terrain and the challenges. One, Mike, had been on the hunt for Murphy, the dog that disappeared into the Tahoe National Forest in 2012. Incredibly, she turned up at a campground 20 months later. A miracle: that’s what we needed for Amelia.

They set out blankets with her smell, cooked bacon to attract her, and left tempting meaty treats in a humane dog trap. But all they attracted were other animals. Sightings would be reported early in the mornings, but as soon as she saw people, she would flee. This went on for a week of 17 hour search days while overnight temperatures dropped to the low 30’s. As the 4th of July grew closer, the nights colder, and the Tahoe roads more crowded with tourists, her situation was becoming desperate.

Amelia’s social media post reached more than 40,000 people. But here’s the thing: it only takes one. The one special person we connected to was a proven dog trapper who had returned over 50 dogs. And he lived just minutes from Homeward Bound. Brian volunteered his time, trap, and secret lure (puppy chow), and made his way to Tahoe to share his expertise just as hope was waning. It had been two days since Amelia was last sighted.

A couple days after Brian’s visit, Mike and Charley got up before dawn.They set the trap  in the area where Amelia was last spotted, filled it with the puppy chow and left to wait from a distance to avoid spooking her. As they drove down the road, Mike spied Ameila peaking out behind a pile of logs. They pulled over. She skulked by them warily looking right at them. With all the patience they could muster, they held still, waited and watched as she made her way in the direction of the trap. After what seemed like an eternity, they went to check. And there she was!

Before 7 AM on July 3rd, the word went out: Amelia is found! She was thin and dirty, but in surprisingly good shape given her ordeal.

Her rescue team surrounded her with their dogs knowing that would give her comfort, and within hours, they returned triumphantly to Homeward Bound.

Amelia was excited and comfortable in the company of her dog friends.

The usually standoffish girl seem to recognize that these – her rescuers – were good, trustworthy people.

After a bath and a meal, exhaustion set in.

Understanding that Amelia’s needs were greater than first believed, she was returned to our care. Our only question was: which of her rescuers would become her forever family? None wanted to let her out of their sight again.

Jana was part of her search team and has been a volunteer with Homeward Bound since the beginning. She had lost her beloved McKinley not long ago and had adopted Trixie – another shy girl who was rapidly gaining confidence – and regaining her health – with Jana’s loving care. Jana had planned to adopt a friend for Trixie when she returned from her previously scheduled two-week trip.

And so it was agreed. Amelia stayed with us for a bit where she could be under watchful eyes and close to our vet given her ordeal until Jana returned.

This week, Amelia and Trixie became sisters.

And we have a pretty good feeling they are going to be very good for each other.

Happy life, Amelia. It’s been a long road – but you are home.

While we are grateful to all that joined the effort, these individuals went way above and beyond: Mike Stram, Deb Safford, Denise and Charlie Lohner, Jana Hook, Gina Heise, and Brian Burke, the tracking expert.

“Hope is like a road in the country; there was never a road, but when many people walk on it, the road comes into existence.” ~ Lin Yutang

The Butterfly Effect

Among those that tower in summer, it is the smallest things that capture our attention –

and our hearts.

They work to feed, but in the process, they help to pollinate.

Without them – there would be no flowers.

They are not our only tiny visitors. Recently, we hosted five four-month-old puppies – although to look at them, you would think they were perhaps half their age.

“Breeder” rejects (I use that term in quotes because no reputable breeder would recognize this person as such) – they arrived malnourished, unsocialized, without vaccinations, and covered in feces and fleas.


Unsold, they were left to fend for themselves. I shudder to think what their fate might have been.

A few weeks later, they were thriving, happy, loved and loving pups ready to go home.

But these tiny things have a job to do – with your help.

Let their story and near plight inspire you to help pollinate education, please. Share with all you know the horrors of puppy mill breeders. Spread the word about the simple ways to identify and choose a responsible breeder. Create a butterfly effect.

For those who absolutely have their hearts set on a puppy, help us put puppy mill breeders out of business by sharing and embracing these important steps. (For the downloadable brochure, visit here.)

Chose a responsible breeder who:

  • Insists on meeting you and your family in person. This is the most important step you can take to make sure you’re getting a great puppy. Reputable breeders NEVER sell their beloved pups to strangers, pet stores, or over the internet.
  • Raises the puppies in the home, not a kennel. They will happily invite you to see where the pup has been raised. They are clean, well-kept, and have appropriate room to exercise.
  • Ask lots of questions about you, your family and how the puppy will be cared for and raised. They will also freely offer references.
  • Happily and proudly introduces you to the parents of the puppies. By meeting the parents – or, at the very least – the mom – you will get a sneak peek of the adult your puppy will become. The dog parents are healthy and well-socialized and never bred at ages too young or too old.
  • Socializes the puppies to people, places, and things.
  • Has a veterinarian individually examine and vaccinate each puppy and has verifiable proof of this.
  • Knows about the breed’s dispositions to certain genetic problems and has the dogs tested for them.
  • Provides a pedigree prior to purchase so you can search the Orthopedic Foundation for Animals (OFA) database for health certificates.
  • Has active associations with local and/or national breed clubs, breed activities, agility training, dog shows, etc. They show a real interest in the breed other than selling dogs and they abide by the breed club’s Code of Ethics.
  • A reputable breeder is able to knowledgeably answer all of your questions – and welcomes them.
  • Guarantees that they will take their pups back at any point in their lives – for any reason – demonstrating a lifelong commitment to the puppies and to you.

Take the time to find the right breeder – not just for your dog’s sake – but for the sake of the breeding dogs and future pups to come. If the breeder you find does not meet these standards, walk away. If you see something that warrants a welfare check, contact your local animal control. If everyone followed these guidelines, disreputable breeders would be out of business. The butterfly effect: Changing one thing can change everything.

When All Is New Again

“April hath put a spirit of youth in everything.” ~William Shakespeare

The garden in April is both young and old. New friends appear…

Old friends are reborn.


The season was never over. It was just waiting for us to find it again.

From cold ground covered in earth and leaves, springs forth our long-lost friends looking new and refreshed; ready to write another season –

another chapter in our garden’s journey.

“Age is opportunity no less,
Than youth itself, though in another dress.” ~ Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

Gracie is finding a second chapter, too. At 10, she was found stray and sent to a local shelter. Her owner was contacted, but never bothered to reclaim her – as if this beautiful life was done.

Not done – just waiting to be found again by a lucky someone who will recognize that under this sugar face is a young and loving heart.

“Every new beginning comes from some other beginning’s end.” – Seneca

Gracie’s new beginning starts now – in April – when all is new again.


Rescue is Only The Start

When we set out to save this Memorial Garden from returning to the earth, we had no idea where the journey would lead.

It was a mission of rescue, re-creation, and re-envisioning.

Today – it is this.



But a garden is a living, breathing thing.

It changes over time; plants grow and morph; and once-happy companions need to find new homes. Like our Dahlias – recently relocated –

because their once-full-sun setting…

has been cloaked in shade.

Or this graceful rose, wild and tangled in its old spot…

now supported and delighted in its new home.

Rescue is only the beginning for our dogs, as well.
The work only starts with pulling a dog from a shelter, taking in a stray, or assuming responsibility for a surrender.
Some of our dogs come to us already blooming; they just need to be replanted (Seru!).


Others require training and TLC to bring out their best selves (Jackson!).

While we work through that process, transformations take place. They grow, become more confident, and come into their own (Chief!)

Sadly, sometimes, these are the dogs that wait. For all of their readiness, people have a hard time letting go of the dog’s past and embracing its future (Nico…adopted today…we told you it would happen, boy!).

When a plant outgrows its space, it sends gentle signals at first.

Eventually, it will struggle – deprived of the very things that made it grow so strong and well.

I hope these special pups will not lose hope or faith as they wait for that special someone who recognizes that all they need is a new start and new place to call ‘home’ (we’re working on it, Riley!).

Our work for this garden is a gift.

So too is our volunteers’ work to grow the potential of these pups into the great dogs they can and have become (Nick and Nora!).

Rescue is only the start.
‘Home’ is the ending.

Life is Good…Today

Sweet Spring.

Spirited.

Poignant.

Boisterous.

Fleeting.

“And the secret garden bloomed and bloomed and every morning revealed new miracles.”

Sweet Lindsey…

Humphrey…

and Gunner.

Spirited.

Boisterous.

Poignant.

and fleeting? We cannot say.

“Is the spring coming?” he said. “What is it like?”…
“It is the sun shining on the rain and the rain falling on the sunshine…”
~ Frances Hodgson Burnett, The Secret Garden

May they bloom like little miracles.

“Life is good…today.”