Life in Maine

The Ghost Dogs

If you are a human being with at least a bit of compassion, there will come times in life when the needs of someone or some thing compel you to take actions to address these needs, even though these actions may cause quite a personal burden. We've all heard or read about a person who has very little of their own who nonetheless donates his or her time or money to charity so as to help others, for instance. Such was our frame of mind when heard about a group of dogs in dire need of safe, comfortable homes.

If you've been following Life in Maine for the past year, you know that there is currently no shortage of dogs in our household. Our two Leonberger puppies, who are now collectively pushing 225 lbs., are more than a handful. So, taking on two more dogs in the midst of all this chaos definitely crosses the border into insanity.

Yet that's just what we did. But before you go calling the men in the white coats, let me explain. Although after you read this story, I'm sure you'll be even more convinced to call the men in the white coats.

Among the websites I maintain is one for the Maine Wolf Coalition. In September, they asked me to update the site with a story about alleged "wolf dogs" that weren't really wolf dogs, but were in desperate need of homes. To paraphrase the article, it seems that a man who lived on 90 acres in central Maine had, for a long time, advertised that he raised "wolf dogs" and would often offer puppies for sale. This summer, the man was found murdered in his driveway.

A tragedy in itself, it was made even more so by the fact that with the man gone, his eight dogs were left to fend for themselves. The mail carrier, who was familiar with the dogs from delivering the man's mail, took it upon herself to feed the dogs for the first few days after the man was killed. She, in turn, sought the help of some friends. The Maine Wolf Coalition got involved because they have connections in dealing with wolf hybrids, which was the alleged lineage of these dogs.

The dogs, having been allowed to roam free their entire lives and not well socialized to humans, would take to the woods when their "rescuers" approached. Soon, as is bound to happen whenever rumors start flying, the word around town was that the dogs were "ferocious" and had been seen stalking and killing moose and attacking children.

The five woman who were actively involved in feeding the dogs knew better. The dogs were far from ferocious - quite the opposite, they were merely quite shy. And if there were any "wolf" in them, it certainly wasn't showing up in their appearance - for the most part, they appeared to be a cross between a golden retriever and a collie. Nonetheless, the women were not able to get any local authorities to help capture that dogs and get them to a shelter. Instead, they were given an ultimatum - if the dogs weren't captured by a certain date, they would be shot.

And so began the arduous task of capturing the dogs. Most had to be tranquilized, either by placing the drug in their food, or by the use of a tranquilizer gun. It wasn't easy, and the "deadline" only added to the pressure. The last two dogs were captured just one day before the "shooting" deadline.

All the dogs were taken to a local no-kill shelter. There, they discovered that two of the dogs were pregnant. A few weeks later, the eight dogs needing homes turned into eight dogs and seven puppies needing homes.

After I first posted the story, I anxiously awaited updates. A few weeks later, an update indicated that most of the puppies, and two of the adults, had found new homes. Then, a couple weeks after that, an "urgent" update came across.

It seems that two of the males, Shep and Dusty, were rapidly retreating into animals that might not be adoptable. They were thought to be brothers and were both incredibly shy when brought in. During their stay at the no-kill shelter, they were housed with one of the pregnant dogs who thought it was her job to attack the two, especially Shep, whenever they tried to get to the food bowl. As a result, the pair became even more withdrawn and skittish. The urgent update asked if anyone could provide the dogs with at least a temporary home that could provide socialization and get them away from the mom-beast.

And that's where we stepped in. No, it didn't make any sense for us to bring two more dogs into the house. No, we weren't sure how our other two dogs would react. But we couldn't help it - what we could provide had to at least be better than what they were experiencing now.

And so it began. We visited the dogs at the shelter. As promised, they were too shy to come near us. They were kept outside despite the fact that temperatures were getting down to the single digits at night. Their water dish was frozen. This only increased our resolve to get them to a better place.

So, about a week later, after Shep was neutered (Dusty had already been neutered), we picked up our two new foster dogs. Incredibly, on the ride home, Dusty rested his head in Denise's lap, where it stayed for the entire ride. Once home, we brought the dogs inside and then introduced our Leonbergers. Alona and Ambrose sensed that this was a delicate situation and kept a respectful distance. During the evening, Shep and Dusty got up the courage to venture out of their crate and lie together on one of the dog beds.

There was a lot of work ahead of us - most notably, neither Shep or Dusty were house trained - but we had gotten off to a good start. And, for the first time in their lives, Shep and Dusty slept inside a warm house.

The next morning, Denise took Alona and Ambrose on their walk and I thought about how to get Shep and Dusty out to go the bathroom. The first thing I needed to do was get a collar on the dogs. I managed to do this with Dusty, but Shep wouldn't let me get near him. Then I hit upon an idea. I would take Dusty out to the dog pen. Shep was sure to follow, since Dusty was his security blanket.

And the plan was working. At first Shep stayed in the house while I pulled Dusty towards the pen. Dusty had never been on a leash and was protesting by trying to run away, but I at last got him to the pen. Just then, Shep rounded the corner and headed towards us in the pen also.

And then all hell broke loose.

Denise, in the mean time, had returned from her walk. Alona and Ambrose rounded the other corner of the house just as Shep was approaching the pen. Alona and Ambrose, wanting to play, ran towards Shep. Shep, not knowing what play was, bolted towards the woods. Showing that they had not maintained a thing they learned in obedience school, Alona and Ambrose continued chasing Shep despite our pleas for them to "stay."

Denise chased the dogs. I decided to leave Dusty in the pen and help Denise. After running around for 20 minutes or so, we realized that it was a lost cause - we were never going to catch three dogs hellbent on taking off through the woods. We headed back home only to discover that Dusty had jumped the fence and was now gone as well.

Words cannot begin to relate how badly we felt. Here we were, entrusted to take care of these dogs who had been through hell, and we lost them after having them only about 14 hours. All the work that had gone into capturing them was now for naught.

Two hours later, a neighbor found Ambrose sitting in the road about a half mile from our house. Five hours later, Alona stumbled into the yard, obviously exhausted. Shep and Dusty never returned.

And so began the search. We put up posters. We called all the veterinary hospitals and animal shelters. We wrote to the local media outlets in hopes they would broadcast our plight. We drove around the neighborhood looking and calling.

And we heard nothing. Then, a week later, we got a call. Someone thought they saw a dog fitting the description walking near a road about 15 miles from us. Unfortunately, it was dark out when we got the call so we had to wait until the next morning to search. No luck.

A few days passed. Then, on a Saturday night, we had a message on our answering machine. Someone said they saw both dogs just up the road from where we lived! Unfortunately, the message was a couple hours old. They were nowhere to be seen.

A few days later, a neighbor called to say she thought she saw one at the top of her driveway. Again, we searched, but to no avail. However, the food we had been leaving out for them began disappearing over night. Assuming it wasn't being eaten by a raccoon or skunk, that, too, was an encouraging sign.

During the next week, there were no more sightings. And then it happened. Denise went out one morning for a run, and she swore she saw both dogs in the yard. It was still dark out, but she was convinced she had seen them.

I must admit that I still wasn't convinced. I would have to see them with my own eyes, I reasoned. About a week later, while out walking Alona and Ambrose at the break of dawn, my skepticism was swept away. The "ghost dogs" were standing in a neighbor's driveway as we walked past!

As luck would have it, we had planned to take a trip to the Midwest over Thanksgiving. So, our dog sighting activities would have to take a break too. We had a woman stop in and take care of our cat while we were gone, so we instructed her to put out the dog food every day as well.

When we got back, she was full of good news. The food had been eaten on almost every occasion, and she had seen the dogs a number of times.

Over the course of the next few weeks, we, too, had some exciting sightings. When Alona went into heat, I looked at that as an opportunity to "bring the boys out." And, indeed, it worked. One morning while walking her past the neighbor's driveway where I had previously seen Shep and Dusty, they again showed up and came down to meet Alona. They wouldn't go near me, but they would come up to Alona when she was stretched out to the end of her leash. Then next time I went, I tied two leashes together so that Alona could better play with Shep and Dusty. Denise took some hotdogs (Shep and Dusty's favorite food) up to them one day and managed to get Dusty to follow her most of the way back home. Several days later, I was able to get them to eat hotdogs out of my hands.

Since then, we have made incredible progress in getting them to accept us, although we have not yet attained the ultimate goal of re-capturing them. But we are now convinced it is just a matter of time. They now eat out of our hands regularly, right from our front porch. They sleep on the front porch at night. And, perhaps most importantly, they have come to think of our yard as "theirs" rather than going up and staying in the woods. They are still very skittish and won't let get near enough to them to attempt to capture them, but they are happy to see us when we come out and are even happier to see Alona and Ambrose.

It has been a long, difficult, emotional two months. And life certainly would have been a lot easier had we let someone else take on the task of socializing these two dogs. But the way things look right now, a happy ending is in sight.

Can I interest anyone in a pair of "wolf" dogs?