Why?

“You have to take care of your baby. He’s my baby. He’s a good baby,” Sievers told WYFF. (You can see the news story via this link.)

Sievers’ baby is his dog, Manse Jolly.

He told reporters he doesn’t mind sleeping outdoors, but worries about the upcoming winter.

“Cold don’t really bother me,” he said. “I don’t like to have to sit out in it without being able to move around.”

Siever’s neighbor, Christine Hiatt, has become so concerned about his well-being, she started a GoFundMe site entitled “Help Boe Rebuild His Home.”

“…he found this sweet dog as a puppy,” Hiatt wrote on the fundraising page, “starving, covered in fleas and terrified of people. He nursed him back to health and has gone without so much just to make sure his dog has what he needs. He has been trying to gather enough money to get a small camper for him to live in.”

Hiatt says she’d like to get her neighbor and his dog some shelter. “I would also like to make sure he has food on the table. I think as Americans, everyone has that right.”

Sievers, in the meantime, is looking for silver linings and keeping a positive attitude.

“[My dog] crawls up into my sleeping bag. I tell you what, he’s a little heater,” Sievers said.

The post House Fire Victim Sleeps Outside to Keep His Dog appeared first on ILoveDogsAndPuppies.

Just last weekend, Joey was abandoned on the streets with nothing more than a blanket and a plastic bowl with water. The loyal pet stayed on the very same spot he last saw his owner as if to say he is staying there waiting for whoever left him to return.

Community members knew no one was coming back to get him and that’s when they came together to save this pet. Rescuers told The Dodo that a neighbor dropped off a box Joey could use as shelter. As the weather turned rainy and cold another person draped a tarp over the box for additional protection. Others dropped off blankets and food and worked towards gaining his trust, but as expected he trusted no one and every time someone tried to approach him he would run away.

What was needed was a trained professional to rescue him but no trained professional contacted by the caring residents had answered the calls or agreed to help.

“None of us are professionals,” Julian Rovito says. “We need people to help us with potential fosters. We’re willing to help with vet bills and stuff like that. We’re all dog lovers.”

Just yesterday after four days on the streets Joey was rescued. He was safely captured and with the use of a crate he was transported to a veterinarian. Best of all, Animal Recover Mission stepped up to sponsor the dog’s medical costs.

“Joey is at the vet,” said Rovito. “He pretty much passed out when he got to the run. The doctors didn’t want to probe him too much so they gave him antibiotics, flea/tick meds. He is getting a ton of attention and even gave a female handler a tail wag today!”

The once abused and unwanted dog will no longer go hungry or cold. From now on all he will now is love and this is all thanks to the animal loving community who helped rescue him.

The post Community Saves Abandoned Dog Waiting for Owners Inside a Box appeared first on ILoveDogsAndPuppies.

When service dog Kai went missing from his home last November, owner Alexandra Melnick was distraught.  But after many months of ardent searching and Facebook posting, Kai was found hundreds of miles away, and has finally been sent home to his overjoyed family.

Melnick served a nine-month deployment in Afghanistan and came home with a traumatic brain injury and PTSD.  She got a German shepherd puppy and trained him to be a service dog.

“He helps me with things like PTSD and insomnia, she told ABC 10News in December. “He puts me to sleep. He wakes me up for nightmares.”

Kai was stolen from Melnick’s Vista backyard the day after Thanksgiving.  She set up a Facebook and GoFundMe page to get the word out and have money for a detective and a reward.  She handed out thousands of fliers and drove thousands of miles, looking for him.  Months later, she still hadn’t given up.

“I spend my days searching for him, I spend my nights dreaming about him and having nightmares still and I really hope that we get him home,” Melnick told San Diego 6 in April. “He saved my life, I owe this to him. I want to do anything in my power to get him home.”

In August Kai was found, and a week ago, a happy update was posted by Bring Kai Home:

I want to thank every single one of you for all your constant support and help. I also want to say from the bottom of my heart how sorry I am that I have left you in the dark this past week. I had suspected he may have been stolen but didn’t have any idea who it may have been. So, I had to search for him as if he was running around the wilderness. For all I knew, someone took him and got spooked by the media attention and dumped him. I have been looking for breadcrumbs for months with no luck. I have driven thousands of miles the last 9 months looking.

Last week, I found him searching through social media posts. I flew to Texas the very next day. The people who had him didn’t initially know he was missing, stolen, or that I was looking. When they found out, they didn’t want to give him up. In Texas, they have laws regarding this situation. While the Denton County dispatch, deputies, constables, ACOs and clerks were extremely patient, understanding, and worked on this more than I expected, they wanted to make sure I got him back legally and wouldn’t have any issues down the line. We feared him being moved again before the hearing. Animal Control seized him and has had him for time being. They have a beautiful facility and spoiled him for me while I’ve waited. My San Diego County detective worked hard and fast to get the needed paperwork to them.

Relaxing after a much-needed trip to the salon to be flea-bathed and have his painfully overgrown claws clipped.

This morning the judge ruled that Kai is to come back home to California with me.

There is still an investigation to be done over how he left my home and ended up in Texas. In the meantime, I feel beyond blessed to have my baby boy home. I’m focusing on his health right now. The people who had him allowed him to become flea infested to the point he was going completely bald in many places with open sores. He has some trust issues. I believe, the people who had him used heavy negative reinforcement.* He cowers if you move too quickly, has scars that resemble strikes across his body, and his nose has some damage to it.

The Gofundme account is how I was able to find him. Without all your donations, I wouldn’t have been able to spread the word so far and get help from professionals. The remaining money will be divided up between various organizations, ones that helped me find Kai and ones that help others find their missing animals.

This picture is from the shelter last week in Denton County. I will post a video that will help answer questions that you may have. Right now, I’m taking some time to be with someone who I’ve missed very much.

*What she meant is positive punishment.  Negative reinforcement is a misnomer.  What it actually means is subtracting something to reinforce a behavior (i.e. hitting snooze on the alarm – when the noise is taken away, a person will repeat the behavior of shutting the alarm off).  Positive reinforcement is adding something to reinforce a behavior (i.e. giving a dog a treat for learning a trick).

Positive punishment is the addition of something to curb a behavior (i.e. striking a dog – adding pain – to stop it from barking).  Negative punishment is the removal of something to stop a behavior (i.e. taking away a video game because a child misbehaved).

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