Animal Stories

This mother dog was caught when she was very pregnant. There are videos of her giving birth to her young. She was caught second to the minpin pictured here. Yes, he was the dad.

This minpin guy was caught first and was so nervous and sad at the same time. And when his mate - this huge Great Dane girl to the left was brought in, he perked up and was so excited. They were kept in the same cage until the second baby was born and Mom decided she had had enough of his nervousness.

Here is one of the babies at less than one mimute old. If we had any doubt who the father was it became quite obvious the Min Pin was daddy.

Here are most of the babies.

So, here is Pugsly - a couple of months after he arrived. He is on the mend, but still not able to eat normally.

He is not back to his overweight status yet, but he sure looks good and has a wonderful, happy personality. He has a long road to a complete recovery.

This dog was caught more than once by the police and Muttshackers. He is a very good escape artist and is a very friendly guy. He is also a guy who the police played a joke on one of our volunteers telling her there was a vicious dog on the loose and they needed help taking care of it. As she has gotten a tool to capture it from the truck and turned around, this dog gave her a big wet kiss on her face while the two policemen laughed hard in the distance.

This Sharpei had been stolen from his owner before Katrina hit and he couldn't find it. After Katrina, he tried again with signs. One of our volunteers was told about these signs and matched them to the dog they had rescued. When the owner walked into the vet clinic, this dog, who had been sad, listless and not eating, perked up, stood up in his cage and whined for his owner and then when he actually saw his owner, he barked and barked with happiness. When his owner saw him - tears welled in his eyes and all of us there too couldn't help but get wet eyes too.

This is now Daisy. But in this photo, this puppy had been at a shelter and was slated for euthanasia that very day. But all the animals slated for that fate were rescued and brought to Muttshack. This little girl came home with the photographer and now lived a good long life with her daughter in the Seattle, WA. area.

72 days after Katrina a neighbor called and said they heard a dog whining in their neighbor's home. The owners had come back to get some of their things and just left the dog behind on the trash heap outside. Muttshackers went and found this poor dog who was barely alive. Here is a vet that helped to get fluid and nutrients into it which was critical for its survival and later went home with him.

Here is that shepherd the next day. He ended up going home with the vet in the previous photo to continue to get the medical help it needed to heal. No, this dog will never be returned to the owners that had come back and abandoned it when it really needed them.

Many owners never had a clue about the flood that would occur. They were told they may only be kept from their homes for the maximum of 3 days. So many people left their pets tied to fences or in their kennels with food for three days. Unfortunately, these pets didn't survive and many scenes like this one were discovered.

This is the home of the woman who asked us to help her find her cats. The story is on the Katrina log page. The link is at the top of this page. No other organization would help her look for them and she couldn't move on with her life until she knew of their fate. But she had a feeling all had perished.

The last of the cats to move out of Muttshack at the end of November were the Feral cats. This truck was a climate controlled truck driven by the owner of this trucking company donating his time to help move 60+ cats to Forks, Washington.

Here is the inside of the truck all packed with two rows, one row on each side of air kennels full of cats. There is enough room between the two rows for a thin person to move up and down the aisle - sideways.

Here is one of the volunteers.

Here is the volunteer inside showing how much room there was inside.

The truck arrives in Forks, Washington in December.