Weds 23rd March: Life is hard for born-wild dogs

Erin at the Ap Lei Chau dog park

 I'm going to start with the good news, and thankfully there is some coming in on an almost daily basis.  I'm talking about adoptions, starting with confirmation of three-legged Erin's forever home after a trial for allergic reactions, and long-term foster poodle Violet, who's going to be staying where she is.

Sisters Lucy and Lorna have homes

Both Lorna and Lucy, who have been the resident Whiskers N Paws puppies, now have homes to go to, and that's double good news because it means two more puppies can take their place.  That's like a halfway home situation, which we're very happy to have  available to us.   You can meet the puppies at Whiskers N Paws any day of the week during store opening hours, even if we aren't able to hold the Sunday puppy parties at the moment. 

Kip was also chosen, and that leaves two (Kooper and Kong) from the @typhoon_k_puppies litter of six when were all taken in as newborn rain babies by the same foster home.  What an incredible feat that was, hand-rearing six babies to be happy and healthy youngsters. You can see that we still have many puppies available for adoption, most of which are shown here (but even then not all).  

Puppies still available

Lucy can be taken down now

The next litter of newborns was dropped off today, and after a good feed and a checkup by our staff on duty they were picked up by the three sets of foster parents.  It was noted that the pups had various scabs, marks and other superficial signs of living wild, and I was reminded that very few puppies born to "hillside" mothers survive.  You could say that this is nature's (cruel) way of ensuring the survival of the fittest, and other than the weather (cold and rain) there are diseases, snakes and wild boar to contend with, and probably raptors too.  I don't know the percentage of born-wild puppies that make it to adulthood, but for those that do survive their lives are short anyway.  It's a very hard life as a dog without a home. 

Very sadly two of the "T" pups from Monday lost their fight for life today, even though they were sent to Concordia for full-time supportive care.  These newborn lives are so fragile, and the hours that were spent being cold and wet before they were found by the rescuer were enough to weaken them to the point of no return.  I feel most sorry for the foster parents, and want to thank them for doing everything they could to help. 

In fact today was a very difficult and stressful day, most of all for Cindy, our Foster Coordinator, even though we were trying to do what we could to help out.  As I mentioned yesterday, there's yet another litter of puppies who will be dropped off on Thursday, this time thankfully slightly older than newborn so with a much better chance of survival, and just as the potential foster homes were being arranged for these pups I received an email from AFCD Sheung Shui asking if we could take three adults and four puppies.  This was really an "OMG!" moment, as I shared the details with Tai Po and the "Ap Lei Chau" (still called) teams, but we will deal with it, just as we have dealt with other situations in the past.