The Bakersfield 4

These four dogs were impounded at Bakersfield Animal Shelter KCAS in a horrible cruelty case. Their former owner was beating them with baseball bats. They had never known kindness in their entire lives. They arrived shaking and terrified. The shelter employees began working with the dogs even though the shelter is filled with hundreds and hundreds of unwanted pets with more incoming every single day. 

 

A miraculous thing happened and the dogs began to transform from their former PTSD state to a timid maybe I’ll give this a chance attitude. This is thanks to these folks in the picture who took the time to try. They, this wonderful and dedicated staff, gave these dogs something they'd never had. They gave them hope.

I spent two weeks incessantly trying to find rescue and/or boarding in California. It has changed a lot in the 25 years since I founded Reunion Rescue in San Francisco and the days that our rescue transport group Streets of Bakersfield saved over 5000 lives. Now dogs are dying daily simply because there is no place to put them even with a good rescue. I could only find one spot in all of California to board them and she, an old friend who’s also a rescue with boarding facility offered to make room for me out of friendship.

And please sign up for the new Reunion Rescue newsletter - organizing to #savelives just like the Bakersfield 4. 

When I got the word they only had 72 hours, we were all heartbroken. The work these good people at KCAS had put in was about to die, just like these four dogs whose only crime had been to try and stay alive in a house of horrors. I took a leap of faith and called around here in Austin. I found places for each of them in boarding and even though I only had $1200 in the Reunion account, I placed a rescue hold on them. They were safe, for now. These four are not going to be immediately placed for adoption. As a longtime 100% lifetime guarantee rescue, I entered this decision with huge self-awareness. I’m full here at the refuge with another recent intake who came from being abandoned for over four years in a horse barn along with all the seniors who’re still kicking it and thriving on good raw diet and holistic support.

 

When I learned how closely knit and bonded the Bakersfield 4 were, I rearranged the plans and asked my friend who’d agreed to take the most bonded sisters if she could make room and board the other two. She is a great animal person who has a true gift with dogs. She said we will make it work. She even had her own private rescue transport a.k.a. Ruben who was ready to go get the dogs. I gave every penny I had and still 1/3 short of the fee. I still needed to come up with month’s boarding, too. The important thing, though, was the dogs were going to be safe. 

 

Shelter notes:

Apollo:

*Very smart

*great on leash

*easy to handle/good at listening

*learns tricks very quickly

*much quieter than most Huskys

Chiquita:  (her write-up came from Cole, the man in the videos with her)

*She's really good with men, a bit leery with women (for obvious reasons)
*Once she gets to know you, you can "mess with her paws & look in her mouth and touch her teeth"
*she's shy at first, but warms up quickly and just wants someone to LOVE her
*she's around other dogs and they don't phase her, doesn't show any aggression.
Check out Chiquita's TikTok video

Sweet Dorothy & Indica:

*The staff feels like they are a bonded pair

*Indica gets her security & cues from Dorothy

*They both have had MANY litters, especially Dorothy

*They both are shy, until they trust you and then are extremely affectionate

*Dorothy is a bit more playful and Indica just wants to be next to her human to feel safe.

*When they first came there, they were completely shutdown, and just in the short time they've been there their sweet personalities have really come out!!!

The staff and rescue team kept the shelter open so Ruben could collect the dogs - you see Tahairah and Cole in the photo - and also to say goodbye. It was one of those bittersweet moments only people who give their lives to saving animals know. They even provided an extra-large crate so the sisters who are so closely bonded could ride together.

 

We are saying goodbye to their old names, Apollo, Indica, Dorothy and Chiquita. Their new names, inspired by the fresh sounds of hip hop music touch on the new attitude and their new beginnings. From here on, they will be Rza and Sza pronounced Rizza and Sizza for the two most closely-knit sisters. Chiquita we suspect has a sassy little under-layer that we expect will rear up real soon. Her new name reflects that sassiness. Cardi B. And the big brother, always their protector, Apollo tha' Dog.

Please share the Bakersfield 4 Facebook page and keep up with their long road to recovery. Pictures and updates will be added frequently not only to update their followers, but also to share their story and help another dog or cat out there who has lost hope and is sitting in a loud clanging overfull shelter waiting to die. You can help by donating to their boarding and care at:

https://www.reunionrescue.com.

 

Hey, ya’ll…welcome to Texas!

Do you have a problem dog?

If you are a dog lover, then sometime in your life you've run into an issue or two. While I am no trainer past sit - stay - leash and house. For some reason all of the dogs here immediately know what 'house' means. It's a good thing. A Reunion Rescue thing. Whether it's coming in from outdoors or going for some crate time and I've been known to use 'house' to get them to jump into the car for a ride. But, this is about dog aggression or behavior issues that might have you pulling your hair out.

I've been in rescue a good number of years and have seen my side of problem dogs, most especially from abuse cases and coming from high kill death row shelters. I've accumulated a number of supplements I'd like to share with you.

#1 is Robert MacDowell behavior modification tincture. It’s kinda pricey but worth every penny. Just a squirt into each dog’s food daily.
 Robert McDowell Herbal Remedies You will order the Animal Botanical Relax for dogs. They have even more for the more difficult cases and in fact the company treats dogs, cats, horses and even people. They support tons of various cancers and other illnesses of the body. 

#2 is Emergency Australian Bush Flower Essence. I get the stock option..it’s something like Rescue Remedy, but this product is much better. Get a couple of mixing bottles like the one the Emergency comes in and make your own. One bottle of the stock will last you a year or more. You put one dropperful of the stock into the empty mixing bottle, fill with purified water and a couple of drops of some kind of liquor - I use brandy - to preserve. Shake it and/or pound on palm each time you use to energize. One squirt into the water bowl daily and each time they drink, they re-energize the tincture and calm the body.

And a little CBD oil always helps. I hope these suggestions help you as much as they've helped me and the Reunion Rescue dogs over the years.

Found a pit bull..or some other dog or animal?

 Reunion Rescue has been saving lives from horrible situations and death row shelters for coming up on 25 years! So we've learned a thing or two. Do you see these animals dying in shelters every day? So do I and I'm sick and tired of it, too. It seems like the harder we work, the worse the situation becomes. 

Just yesterday, a wonderful woman all the way out in California, her own zip code in the midst of over-filled stressed shelter is reaching out, begging for help for a sweet little young chow mix in San Antonio.

We want to help. Reunion's full of all our oldies right now along with a cat sanctuary and birds....not to mention all the wildlife. And we just took on the hardest pit bull rescue in all my time saving dogs. We literally cannot leave town. When we committed to this dog, it was a prison sentence. We're under house arrest, but making strides each day. We chose this life.

Here is the link to Found Pit Bulls on Reunion Rescue website. There is so much information on the site that I often have to pay for out of my social security check. It's important to me to convey this life saving information to pet owners, other rescues, shelters and all animal lovers to use our life-saving resources and help keep animals out of shelters. Be sure to check out the Health Page with tips on how we treat everything from kennel cough to giardia, heartworm to hip dysplasia with herbs and homeopathy. Rarely do we ever have to visit a conventional vet.

On our new page Found Pit Bulls we tell you what to do when you find a dog - or cat - in distress. We just helped a woman who had a very pregnant pit bull dumped on her with these same easy tips on the page. And now we're sharing with you, so please feel free to cross-post this blog with your animal-loving friends. It's time for a change in the way we treat animals in this country.

And Toto, too...

Reunion Rescue's latest rescue dog is Toto. He came from living in a horse barn for the past several years after his owner abandoned him. He had one advocate, Diana, who believed in him. She tried for over two years to find a rescue or home for Toto with no luck. Even though we were full at Reunion Rescue with senior pets and our cat and bird sanctuaries, we just couldn't get Toto out of our head. So we began a structured transition for Toto. 

Here are a few pictures from just one week at Reunion...on the way from Houston, I'm sure Toto is unsure of the unknown. It's a big world out there and especially to a dog who's been confined outdoors with little training. 
 

        This is a big yard to get used to with lots of smells. 

I will help you learn, Toto. We will learn how to walk calmly on the leash...we will learn Kong and how to get those pesky treats stuck down at the bottom with Easy Cheese. We will learn how the crate can be a safe place and not a punishment. In the crate, you will feel safe and secure and a new kind of confidence, the good kind. We will learn recall and all kinds of other good things. You will enjoy a healthy diet of good raw food with homeopathic and herbal supplements so you will live a long and happy life. Most of all, Toto, you will learn how to be just a dog ... a dog with a great life. That's my promise to you.

Please think of Reunion Rescue and Toto by making a small contribution this Christmas season on Toto's GoFundMe fundraiser.

And choose Reunion Rescue when purchasing Amazon...

   
 
        

Petco entry for the win

Here is Leslie's entry for the Petco contest for Reunion Rescue's chance to win $10,000 for the dogs!

 Gauguin: The Art of the Dog

My dog Van Gogh had died at home and was buried under a headstone that said “Companion, Friend, Teacher.” Then there was nothing left but my grief. I knew I wanted another dog, but I was looking for a pit bull because of how maligned they are and Van Gogh had been a pit bull terrier. I emailed Cindy at Reunion Rescue about a couple of dogs on their site. Cindy listened and said she had a dog that needed a friend. She said, “Festus” had been found on a brutally cold day and taken in by someone who couldn't keep him. Festus was a few months old still in “training.” He had been in two foster homes and a failed adoption. Cindy said we should both go for a walk and I should “check him out like a library book.” Reunion Rescue has a foster to adopt program and a 100% lifetime guarantee so no pet ever goes back to a shelter.

I took gangly Festus for a walk and was told he was kind of a pain – super energetic and athletic. After the walk we played fetch and he and I fell into a nice rhythm. I did NOT feel ready, but sometimes the dog knows better and “our time” was just beginning. We have the best adoption day picture EVER. The kids in the neighborhood all came over that day to meet him and they took him on a walk. Everybody loved him.

 

Throughout many other fosters, other cats, a turtle and many moves, Gauguin (renamed from a close friend to Van Gogh) has weathered the storms. Gauguin outlasted my marriage and several moves – including a cross-country move from Texas to Minnesota with Gauguin in the passenger seat. 

 

Throwback to his beginnings on that “brutally cold day” and now he has many fashionable coats to keep him warm and dry. He has run many miles and we still walk twice a day. From his frenetic youth, he has slowed to a very sweet guy who loves to lean on me. He is like a Gauguin painting, colorful, bright, mystical.

 

 

 

 

He's not your average cuddler, but he does allow me to use his hip as a pillow. I am very grateful that he was there with me to visit my difficult mother. He was there for me when I went to her funeral. He always travels back and forth from Texas with me and while he does not seem to enjoy it - he does it without complaint.

Wherever we walk he chooses human and animal friends to visit and people are so proud to be “chosen.” I get lots of strange looks and chuckles as I call him “Sir” when addressing him. It reminds me that he deserves the respect of being a separate and whole entity with his own life beyond our friendship. 

Gauguin is my best friend in the world, my soul companion like that Jimmie Dale Gilmore song, “Reunion,” “we’ll remember that we’ve never been apart.” 

 

 

Hub is the picture of good health

Hub got back to Reunion December 2020 right in the midst of Covid restraints. His longtime adopter had passed away suddenly and Hub along with Roo whom she'd recently saved in Minnesota both wound up at the vet. We got the call about the loss and scrambled to put together a transport to get both dogs safely to Texas. Reunion Rescue has a 100% lifetime guarantee and that sometimes includes a dog in Roo's situation. He wasn't an original Reunion Rescue dog, but he is now. They are bonded and Reunion Rescue is committed to giving them a happy healthy home together for their lifetimes. 

When they arrived, both dogs were timid and unsure. They'd just watched their mother die. Dogs have feelings. Dogs grieve. So the first thing I did was dose them with Ignatia 30c to help the body process the grief. Next, they went on a regimen of Australian Bush Flower Essence Emergency to help them ease into a new lifestyle.

Number 3 on the agenda, a good raw-meat diet. Hub had already been fed raw when he was here before after being rescued from dog-killing hellhole Spindletop. There, he'd been known as Angel and he was so emaciated when I got him, he was renamed Skinny Dennis after the Guy Clark song. After Barbara adopted him as a friend to Murmur, her other Reunion Rescue dog, he was renamed Hub and that's the name he carries with him today. We have some nicknames like Huck, but his God-given moniker is Hub.

Our good friend Patti lent her excellent animal communication skills when Hub wasn't eating at first. He let her know that he would go for some steak or cooked chicken, white meat. That's when I knew he was on the mend and jerking my chain. They do that, dogs. For about a week, I played along and fed him the prime menu du jour, but after that, he was going to join in with the others and dine al fresco on good raw chicken and turkey prey model with the breakdown 10% bone, 10% organ meats and 80% muscle meat.

All of this info is on the Reunion Rescue Health Page we share with other pet owners, shelters, rescues and whomever else wants to enjoy a long life with their healthy pet, cancer-free, disease-free, no kidney, hip, joint or other issues that can't be easily managed with holistic supplements. We've been doing this for almost 25 years and have the long lives to show for it.

So, it took awhile. Hub is super food-oriented. He went right over to the raw as I knew he would. Each evening, out on the deck, he and Roo enjoy a meal of large chicken quarter, either some Steve's prey model blend (turkey or chicken) and we're trying out a new product that's pretty pretty popular (in the voice of Larry David) OC Raw Dog. Added in chicken hearts or livers, gizzards not a particular fave, and since Scott and I are vegans, we have a ton of leftover veggies the dogs enjoy. From brussels sprouts to butternut squash, fresh strawberries or papaya, you name it. Lots of greens and everybody licks their plate clean.

 

We order from our local Healthy Pet at the Galleria and will be at the April 14 Wine Walk with your pooch to answer questions. Come on by. In the meantime, check out some of Hub's before pictures and see for yourself what a good healthy diet can do.

How to find a lost dog...repost

 This valuable information is a repost from Dog Inspiration.

This pet parent had given up hope after 12 days of seeking that he would ever see his dog again. But then he discovered about this fantastic suggestion and how it has assisted in the reunion of many lost canines with their owners. On Reddit, he said the following.

“I bumped upon a couple of hunters on day 12 of searching for my dog in a densely wooded region, upset and hopeless.” They claimed to have lost the odd dog on a hunt but always found them. Many canines and families have been reunited as a result of what they told me. I’ve recommended them a few times in the previous few days, so I figured this could assist if there are any lost pets on Reddit.

The dog owner(s) should bring an item of clothing that has been worn for at least a day, preferably more, so that the missing dog can pick up the fragrance.

Bring the item of clothing to the last known location of the dog and leave it there. You can also bring a crate and a familiar toy if the dog has one (unless location undesirable for crate). You might also leave a note requesting that the item(s) not be moved.

Leave a bowl of water nearby as well, as the dog is unlikely to have had access to any. Food should not be brought because it may attract other creatures that the dog may avoid.

Return the next day, or check on a regular basis if possible. Hopefully, the dog will be there to greet you.
I was skeptical that my dog could detect an article of clothing if he didn’t hear me screaming his name as loudly as possible all day for 12 days. But the next day, I came and sure enough, he was sitting there!

Please share to help more families find their missing four-legged family members. I’ve seen this work a number of times.