July 14, 2013

Wilma was a young Saluki/Greyhound/Terrier cross who escaped from the owners house by jumping out of a first floor sache window onto the porch and down into the garden where the gate was open and off she went on her travels.

I called the owner to offer some help in tracking Wilma with Tiga and in very hot conditions we were on our way meeting the owner at her home and with a scent item we set off from the garden. Wilma had only been missing 24 hours so the scent should be good. Tiga immediately picked up the scent and took us on a small loop and back to the house which happened to be where Wilma had been walked the day before, he then picked up the scent from where Wilma escaped from the garden and took us down a very busy A road, some way down Tiga crossed over which surprised the owners as they thought she would have stayed on the same side of the road.

We tracked into a farm and around the boundary of a barn spending time sniffing  a cosy spot where we believe she spent the night. From here we left the farm and headed across some fields towards a country house with large gardens leading onto more farmland.  Tiga led us through this garden and out the back across the fields and on into another field where we again kept to the boundary and came back on ourselves going through a gate into some dense woodland. Here we followed a gentle stream crossing over it several times leading down towards the far end of the woods, we did one last crossing of the stream and headed back up towards some thick bracken and bramble and there about 6 feet in front of Tiga’s nose was what I thought at first was a dead sheep but no it was Wilma.

We now had to catch Wilma without frightening her away and I was with ‘Clarkey’ a DogLost Co-ordinator and it was the first time she had been there at the point a dog was found and she said to  me what do we do now and I said don’t panic! We scattered some sardines down on the ground with some biscuits and I allowed Tiga to eat them. Wilma thought that looks good I want some of that and got up to come to us – game over – we were then able to walk to Wilma and give her some sardines and secure her.

The owner was unable to follow us as he had injured his ankle while searching the night before but when we called him to tell him the good news nothing was going to stop him coming to see Wilma. We decided to carry Wilma back through the woods as she was limping and we weren’t sure how badly but we were met by a number of overjoyed helpers and neighbours.

After a trip to the vet Wilma was soon back home enjoying lots of cuddles from the owners.

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