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After much deliberation, I made the decision to go home to California for Christmas.
The dogs and I were exhausted after a year without a break and so places were found for each dog to vacation while I was on
the west coast.
On the Sunday before Christmas I received a call from my dear friend
Brenda Myers who was spoiling and enjoying Dodger while I was away. She was upset as a friend of hers was in
distress because her elderly cat, SparkleAnn had been missing for twenty four hours and the family was beginning to panic. SparkleAnn
had never been out of the house and no one saw her get out if in fact she did. The family decided to call Brenda
and ask if there was any possibility Dodger could help even though I was in California and could not help with an on
site search.
Brenda is an experienced dog expert but she had never handled Dodger and was unfamiliar with his alerts
and his way of communicating information but the decision was made to let Dodger try to help and hope that Brenda
could understand what he was telling her.
They drove to the house and dressed Dodger in his harness. He was ready
to work. Since SparkleAnn had last been seen in the house it was decided to start inside in case she was hiding. There
was much concern as the household included eleven other cats and all were inside lounging around the house.
I assured them Dodger would ignore all the cats that did not match SparkleAnn's scent.
Dodger quickly
scanned the interior of the home ignoring all the cats inside. Within ten minutes he went to the back door and asked
to go out. The door was opened and Dodger proceeded out the door, up the side of the house, across the street and down
a few houses to a field with an abandoned car overgrown with weeds and junk. Dodger stopped at the car and looked at Brenda
who mistook his gaze as a question. She told him to "find it" and he reached under the car further and "SMACK!"
A startled and tired SparkleAnn flicked him on the nose with her claw. After apologizing to Dodger, Brenda and
Rita gathered up SparkleAnn and celebrated the elderly cats return.
In all it took Dodger only twenty
minutes to go through the eleven cat household and find SparkleAnn down the street... and all without me!
An
amazing dog helped along by my wonderful friend!
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