A young female shepherd needs help.

[Hatterasser]

I have a sad tale to share and would love to hear from you all as to how we can help, if at all. The Director of the Animal Control called me recently to ask if I could help a woman with a three legged shepherd female. Briefly the story is this………

Her husband rescued this dog from a Virginia Rescue group. The dog's name is Gucci, and although black and tan coloring of a shepherd, she is smaller with a shorter muzzle than a shepherd, fur far too soft, ears floppy like a golden retriever’s, weighs about 40-45 pounds. I suspect she is not a pure bred, though she definitely has a shepherd’s intelligence.

She lost her front leg and shoulder after her original owner tossed her (as a young puppy) out the window of a moving car for peeing on the seat. Her leg was broken badly and allowed to heal as it was..never saw a vet about it. It became infected and when she was finally taken from the owner, she required severe amputation to repair the damage done.

Now to the heart of the tale. The man who adopted this dog from the rescue group, the current owner’s husband, has since passed away, leaving a totally untrained dog behind. The woman is severely disabled and finds it impossible to even walk the dog up and down the stairs or outside. Gucci has been known to become so excitable as to nearly pull her off her feet and down the stairs. Left to run outside (to an unfenced yard) to do her 'business' on her own, Gucci takes off and returns only when she feels like it. She has caused an auto accident already running in the middle of the highway and her current owner lives in fear for not only the dog’s life but the lives of unsuspecting drivers as well.

The owner has contacted the rescue group (who had the usual wording in the adoption agreement; i.e. “call us first before you give her to anyone else or put her down”) but was told they had no one available to take the dog back again. She is in enough despair that she is considering putting the dog down but would like another alternative. She even tried Craigslist but the type of responses she received were less than acceptable so she removed the ad. That’s when she called Rich at Animal Control asking for help.

I have been to see Gucci personally. She is a lovely dog, approximately 5 years old. She has a loving, friendly personality and is not troubled by poking at her as I did when I checked her teeth, ears, paws, tail, even the location of the surgerical removal of her shoulder. Frankly, she would just happily roll over for a belly rub. She is extremely intelligent. I took her out for a walk and I can see the trouble that she would be for her owner. Small and lightweight (and three-legged) as she is, she could have pulled me down the stairs were I not prepared in advance for the likelihood of her doing so. But she caught on quickly to the concept of heeling. She is full of energy though and needs more physical exercise than her owner is able to give her. I think her running off whenever she’s loose is more than likely attributable to lack of training, exercise and sheer boredom…did I mention she’s a very bright dog? *smiles* I have not seen her with any other dogs (or cats) so cannot attest to how she would behave with another animal, though I would personally fear, with all her pent-up energy, her being around my foundling kitten.

With that in mind, however, I would gladly take her myself now that Thor is gone but I am currently working three jobs and what hours I have free, I’m just too exhausted to do much more than feed Freya, the cats and sometimes myself before I fall asleep watching TV. There is no way I could offer the training she needs. But she does need another place to live other than her current home.

So what do you all think? What can be done for this sweet girl? I’m a tad concerned at the brush off the owner got from the rescue group but that doesn’t help the situation now .. and we do have a situation. Do you think there’s any point in nagging the original rescue group? Is there any rescue group that deals with disabled dogs that one of you could suggest? Like the owner, I too would hate to see this sweet sweet gal have to be put down for something as simple as lack of training in the basics (you know, the sit stay, come ones).

Any advice?????????????????