A trip down 2012 memory lane - part 1

In our second year of fostering, we've fostered and found amazing homes for 16 dogs this year!  In our first year we fostered 7 dogs so we really kicked it into gear in 2012.  We've had ratties of all different colors, sizes, personality and ages.  Here's a look back at these sweet pups, each of them touched our lives and we were happy to play a role in helping them.  As you can see it takes more than just a foster parent to help rescue these dogs so, I'm forever grateful to all the volunteers (in and outside of NR) who have helped so much with the goal of saving a dogs life!

 

 

Jasper

 

We actually fostered Jasper back in 2010, he was 1 of 15 puppies that New Rattitude rescued from a midwest puppy mill. At 4 months he was considered to old to be sold so he and the others needed rescue or they were going to be destroyed. To read the amazing rescue story check this out http://www.newrattitude.org/tudenews201107.htm

 

Jasper right of transport 5/10

 If anyone ever needed a reason to not purchase a puppy from pet store,  they need to look no further than Jasper.  He was anxious when he came to us at 4 months old and we figured a lot of that was due to his age and his limited life experience.  He was adopted by a wonderful lady and Jasper was never away from a human for more than 5 hours. Sadly that was too much time away for little Jasper's brain and his anxiety became worse and developed into a full blown very severe separation anxiety.  I do believe that his severe anxiety is due to inbreeding on top of bad breeding and probably environmental factors during his first months of life while living in a puppy mill.  Despite Jasper's adopter trying all that she could to help Jasper it wasn't enough and he was returned to us in the fall of 2011. 

 

Jasper in foster care 1/12

 

Jasper really struggled with being back in foster care due to our schedules. We tried medication to work on his anxiety and it did nothing to ease his anxiety.  Given we were not a good foster spot for Jasper the plan was to move him to another foster home, a nice retired couple who were already fostering with New Rattitude.  After about a week his new foster parents decided to adopt Jasper.  Jasper's parents are both rarely gone for more than a couple of hours and Jasper has blossomed in his now furever home.   Jasper is a wonderful little boy who just needs a lot of human presence and I'm forever grateful to his parents for adopting this little boy who really needed them.

 

Jasper at home 10/12

 Notice how softness in his face compared to the top two picture. The top pictures are of a stressed out anxious dog and this one shows what finding him the right home did for Jasper's mental health!

 

Pixie

 

Pixie was in the very large Los Angeles County animal control system and we had to move pretty quickly to rescue her as time was up for this young gal.  It was actually a huge ordeal - when we agreed to take her we found out that she was really sick with an upper respiratory infection and likely wasn't going to recover.  We reached out to one of our CA NR foster parents who was able to work with the shelter to move Pixie to a smaller shelter where she could be treated and held until we could find a "temp" spot for her as she was to sick to come up on transport.  Pixie was a lucky girl to have so many people advocating to save her - after being moved to the smaller shelter and getting some medication in her system, our CA foster parent "temped" Pixie for almost 2 weeks getting her better so she could get up here to us.  She was still pretty sick and ground transport wasn't an option for Pixie.  Our state coordinator reached out to an Alaska Airline flight attendant that she knew and that flight attendant flew Pixie in cabin up to Sea-Tac.  Thanks again to so many volunteers who worked tirelessly to get Pixie to Washington!

 

Below is Pixie's shelter video

 

 

 Pixie was a real treat to foster, she did great with Catty and has a great, gentle personality!  As you can see Pixie is also beyond adorable and always ready to give a kiss or snuggle.

 

Pixie in foster care

Pixie was adopted pretty quickly which isn't a shocker as she's an amazing gal.  Pixie is now Olive and she's doing wonderful and her parents love her very much.  Olive has completed basic doggie school and we've seen this cutie at many of our rat terrier meet ups.  Her best friend is her sister Hazel who is a big sweet cat.  Such a great life for a wonderful rattie!

 

Olive on TV - her mom sent in this picture of her and she was pet of the week!

 

Visiting with Olive & her parents at a rat terrier meet up

Darby

 

We found out about Darby by the CA foster parent who temped Pixie.... Darby was also in the very large Los Angeles County animal control.  The numbers at that shelter system are staggering, hundreds upon hundreds of dog and cats are euthanized due to lack of shelter space.  Darby's only way out of this shelter was rescue only - because she was blind. My husband and I decided we would rescue Darby and gave the go ahead to get her out and up to Washington.  Here's where it got complicated...  When dogs come into the shelter they scan them for a microchip, when dogs go out of the shelter they scan them again.  There was no chip detected when Darby was brought in but, when our volunteer was checking out they found a microchip.  The shelter called the person listed on the chip and left a message.  By law the shelter cannot release the animal for 10 day, giving the person that time to come and pick up their dog.  The problem was that Darby was coming unglued in the shelter.  She was screaming with all the noise and decompensating quickly.  The volunteer found some information on the person Darby was registered to was able to make contact with them.  What we found out was that they got Darby as a puppy, she was born blind which they didn't know at the time and they eventually got tired of dealing with her since they had a number of small children.  They gave Darby to someone "a while" ago and had no idea how to contact that person.  Our volunteer explained all that was going on and begged them to drive to the shelter to sign paperwork "releasing" Darby so that she could get out of the shelter and up to Washington.  Fortunately the people did this and Darby was sprung!  Darby is roughly 3-4 yrs old.

 

Darby leaving the shelter with the volunteer

Our main challenge with Darby was that she and Catty did not get along so they had to be separated at all times. Another struggle for Darby was that she was noise reactive so being fostered in the city was rough on her.  Outside of this two issue, Darby was wonderful - super sweet, full of personality and highly functional despite being blind. 

Darby is the reason I started blogging - I needed people to see all of Darby and what she was capable of.   The blog is the reason Darby (and many of our other foster dogs) have been adopted.  Using this tool I can show and talk a lot about the dog and an applicant/adopter can see the journey the dog has been on while in foster care. 

Darby in foster care

When Darby's dad applied for her we were so excited we could hardly stand it.  We had no idea at the time how amazing he was going to be for Darby.  Darby is now living the live of a country girl in Sequim - she goes all over the place with her dad and rattie brother "Butch". She's a well adjusted non reactive dog thanks to the hard work from her dad.   I honestly don't think we could have picked a better home for this full of life rattie girl.  Darby is a pistol and that's one of many reasons her dad adores her.

We went out to visit in August - in the center of the picture is Darby "keeping watch"

Here's Darby doing what she does best, rolling with life and having a blast.  She loves to sit in her spot on the ATV while they canvas their 30 acres (her dad rescues horses)!

 

Celilo

Tiny Celilo was what is a common theme for many of our foster dogs.  A young (she was 8 months old) stray pup in an overcrowded shelter who's time was running out.  After the shelter drama with Pixie and Darby I was happy that we were drama free with getting Celilo up to Washington.
 



Celilo's shelter picture

 Celilo was a pretty under socialized little gal who did a lot of fear barking.  Celilo also had a good dose of crate anxiety, she was not fully potty trained and was a baby gate climber!  Once she realized we were ok it was all loves and kisses but, there certainly was a warming up period.  We quickly realized that she needed a special kind of adopter.  Someone who would be patient and do a lot of work around socialization.  Lucky for Celilo that person came along pretty quickly!

 

 

Celilo in foster care

 When we went out for the home visit and it was about what I expected -  no touching, some growling all fear based and directed and her future mom.  This however didn't scare of Celilo's new mom and I was over the moon that this little gal found such an amazing mom. 

 

Celilo is now Pinkie, living on Vashon Island with her loving mom.  Pinkie struggled at first but, her mom just kept taking it day by day and before long Pinkie was head over heals in love with her mom and all the people who were giving her yummy treats.  I'm happy to report that Pinkie is now a poster child for an under socialized fearful dog turning into a well socialized, confident little girl.  Thanks to her mom Pinkie has learned and believes that humans can be good to her and that life is pretty amazing. These are clearly two very special gals that were meant to be together.

Pinkie loving her mom and life!