Mick and Murph chose me, I guess... 2005, already had 5 dogs: Patch was found in 1989 wandering down the road. She passed us by (we were putting up fence on our newly bought property) came back, sat, watched for awhile, and when I called her, crawled into my lap and cried. We took her home that day. She was my heart dog for 16 years. Emily was a rottie/mix puppy (1996) given to us by a friend who had a pure bred Rottie dumped on her, Emily became my velcro dog. Holly was given to us by the owners of the boarding stable (1997) where we kept our horses before moving to our place. Robbie belonged to a neighbor who moved and left him (1997), at age 14, so we took him in. Abbey was found dumped along a state highway (1999).
Anyway, we thought Murph and Mick were another set of dumped dogs, they were skinny, extremely wary and Mick was limping from a hurt front foot. We couldn't get near them, so put food out across the road in the pasture. We'd have to leave before either dog would approach. After a few weeks of hit-and-miss appearances, the two decided to stick around, and when I walked the other dogs down the road, they started tagging along. Emily did not like them, so there was no thought of bringing them inside our fence.
Fast forward 3 months, the boys were now sleeping beside the front gate, chasing cars that went by, and Emily was no longer raging at them, so we brought them inside our fence because I didn't want to find them squashed on the road. Emily sat on them (literally), they said fine, and we had 7 dogs. Then, in the following three months, I lost Robbie, Emily and Patch.
Was walking Murph, Mick and Abbey down the road one evening, when a car went by, stopped, backed up and the woman told me, "Those are our dogs! We've been looking for them for months!" Turns out they owned the mother dog and lived about a mile down the road. I thought it was a little strange they didn't notice Mick or Murph chasing their car during the months they lived beside our gate or had any signs up, but the boys recognized her and her kids, so I turned them over, walked Abbey home and cried. An hour later, the woman called and asked if I wanted to keep Mick and Murph; evidently they had a history of killing neighbor's chickens, chasing livestock, climbing out of pens and escaping chains. I guess her husband didn't want them. I said yes, she brought them back and I've had them ever since. They're good boys and I'm glad that family didn't want them.
Riley was from a litter of 7 wk old puppies dumped alongside a road. The daughter of a woman at work found them, caught 3 of the 5 but couldn't catch the remaining 2, and then couldn't find them after putting the 3 caught puppies in her car. They thought they'd found homes for the 3 pups but the person who was going to take Riley and his sister backed out at the last minute. An email went around work, the daughter showed up at lunch time with the 2 puppies and we went home that day with Riley. Another woman at work took his sister. The woman no longer works at our company but I keep in touch with her, and send an email/photos every year of Riley to let her and her daughter know how he's doing.
Anyway, we thought Murph and Mick were another set of dumped dogs, they were skinny, extremely wary and Mick was limping from a hurt front foot. We couldn't get near them, so put food out across the road in the pasture. We'd have to leave before either dog would approach. After a few weeks of hit-and-miss appearances, the two decided to stick around, and when I walked the other dogs down the road, they started tagging along. Emily did not like them, so there was no thought of bringing them inside our fence.
Fast forward 3 months, the boys were now sleeping beside the front gate, chasing cars that went by, and Emily was no longer raging at them, so we brought them inside our fence because I didn't want to find them squashed on the road. Emily sat on them (literally), they said fine, and we had 7 dogs. Then, in the following three months, I lost Robbie, Emily and Patch.
Was walking Murph, Mick and Abbey down the road one evening, when a car went by, stopped, backed up and the woman told me, "Those are our dogs! We've been looking for them for months!" Turns out they owned the mother dog and lived about a mile down the road. I thought it was a little strange they didn't notice Mick or Murph chasing their car during the months they lived beside our gate or had any signs up, but the boys recognized her and her kids, so I turned them over, walked Abbey home and cried. An hour later, the woman called and asked if I wanted to keep Mick and Murph; evidently they had a history of killing neighbor's chickens, chasing livestock, climbing out of pens and escaping chains. I guess her husband didn't want them. I said yes, she brought them back and I've had them ever since. They're good boys and I'm glad that family didn't want them.
Riley was from a litter of 7 wk old puppies dumped alongside a road. The daughter of a woman at work found them, caught 3 of the 5 but couldn't catch the remaining 2, and then couldn't find them after putting the 3 caught puppies in her car. They thought they'd found homes for the 3 pups but the person who was going to take Riley and his sister backed out at the last minute. An email went around work, the daughter showed up at lunch time with the 2 puppies and we went home that day with Riley. Another woman at work took his sister. The woman no longer works at our company but I keep in touch with her, and send an email/photos every year of Riley to let her and her daughter know how he's doing.