TRAPPED A rags to Riches LOve Story

USED DOGS has a whole litter of red-haired, fluffy residents to introduce to you …

We got them just in time. They were very timid at first, hiding their heads and looking away. But they have made steady progress and now come running up to us when they see us coming. They are ready for homes of their own. And MOM is just super! We named her Nina ; she is not feral at all. She licked our hands from inside the trap! She prefers affection to food! When she wags her tail, (which is whenever you call her name) her tail vibrates and her ears wiggle along with it! It is SO CUTE ! ! She is a little ragged, but she is (gasp) HEARTWORM NEGATIVE!!!!

Here's the story of how this little family was rescued:

For about a year we had seen and heard about a potentially feral dog roaming the streets in our neighborhood. USED DOGS decided to step in when we heard that the large field where she made her home, was being prepped for construction. It could have been very dangerous for her to be put in a situation where construction workers would decide her fate. They could scare her, accidentally injure her or call a group that would not have given her a second chance. So USED DOGS decided it was definitely time to catch this girl. USED DOGS has experience in trapping and that was clearly the best option to get a hold of her. The situation was also becoming more urgent because recent sightings of her were telling us that she had just had a litter of puppies and it is very important to get the pups as early as possible to give them the best chance at socialization. USED DOGS was relying on intel from the neighborhood to keep track of her whereabouts. We heard about some puppies under an unoccupied house. We were hoping that these were hers, but when we went to the house there were no puppies in sight. We were reassured that the puppies were absolutely there, so after surveying the location we set the trap the next day and within twenty minutes we had a momma and a pup!

And it was indeed our girl!

Neighbor sources told us that there were definitely more babies under the house. It was going to possibly be much more difficult to get these babies, because they had seen their mom and siblings get caught by the trap and might understandably be a little wary of the trap. Any experienced trapper knows that the key to overcoming this problem is some very enticing bait! So enticing that even though the dogs are scared, they simply just cannot help themselves, but go towards the very fragrant and delicious food. Thanks to some foolproof bait and a little patience we had two more puppies in two hours!

**A word of caution- trapping should not be undertaken by just anyone. We were trained in safe trapping by some really great professional trappers during Katrina.

We are beyond thrilled to tell you that mama dog is not at all feral. Shortly after rescuing her, we got a lick on the hand and then a lick on the nose! She seemed very relieved to be rescued by us, which tells us that at one point she must have had a home.

Her puppies were much more timid, but they are coming around with the help of treats and attention. It did not take long for them to start following visitors up the kennel gate to check out what kind of goodies they had. Unfortunately, one of the male puppies is shyer than the rest, but it is understandable because he has definitely been through the most. When we found him he had several wounds on one leg. Luckily we got him just in time because his infection was on the verge of becoming extremely serious. Every day his injury is getting better and better. It is sad to think about what would have happened to him if we weren’t able to get him the medicine he needed.

We are just thrilled at how successful this whole mission has been and we could not have done it without the help of the neighborhood. The momma and her puppies have a great chance at finding homes because they are comfortable with people and we got them in time to socialize them. Although Mom is petite, these pups are probably going to be around fifty to maybe 60 pounds of fluffy love.







We decided to name them after jazz singers. Momma is Nina, the two males are Miles and Django and the little girl is Ella. We would love to find them each their perfect family match because they deserve it!