Ferals With A Future

Elaine Rogers — Fri, 03 May 2013 13:53:00 +0000

In the process of repairing broken human-canine connections, we encounter A LOT of terrific success stories about dogs given a new lease on life, but one that even had our own ACA whisperers jabbering in April was Susan Herbert’s tale of the black feral dogs from Fort Worth that are in rehab now and slated to become Emotional Support Animals with our new nonprofit, Hounds Helping Heroes Heal (H4). Their names are Freedom, Liberty and Justice, and you’ll see the significance of that shortly.

Take a look at the attached photo: Just a nice, dog-loving lady strolling in a store with her pack of gentle labs, right? Seems ordinary enough until you learn that these sweet-looking young dogs were FERAL just three weeks earlier. And we don’t mean just a little bit wild. We’re talking about the running-crazy-in-the-country-killing-deer-and-wildlife type of WILD. REALLY feral!

So, here’s the backstory:

About two months ago, Susan (the Lone Star Dog Whisperer) was contacted by a local landowner who said she had a problem with wild dogs on her property. A black lab had been dumped out in the country with her three pups, and, over the past year and a half, as the pups grew, the activities of the wild pack had been causing concern among local residents. Nobody could catch them, and petting them was a laughable idea. They were fearful rather than aggressive, but the owners — wanting to tame them and find homes for them — were at a loss for how to approach the problem. The closest they’d gotten to interacting with the dogs was to approach with food, leave it and back off, and watch the dogs eat it from a distance; and they knew that their futures would be grim if animal control officers were recruited to “handle the problem.”

Susan and Mark German, America’s Canine Expert, came out one afternoon in early March, lured the dogs into the resident’s garage for the food, then “worked their magic.” By day’s end, they’d taught the property owners how to walk the dogs using gentle leaders and had left them with instructions on how to implement America’s Canine Academy’s four-step program to a calm, stable dog. Two weeks, later, Susan brought Freedom home to Mansfield as a foster dog while the mom stayed with the property owners and Tammy Johnson became a foster to Liberty and Justice.

The ACA is making a documentary of the tale using video footage of the wild pack and intermittent phases of their rehabilitation and socialization.

Meanwhile, Tammy and Susan continue to work with the formerly-feral dogs Freedom, Hope and Justice in their foster environments, and take regular outings to stores like Home Depot and Calloway’s. Tammy has been working with the animal rescue community for six years and is a dog assessor for Parker Paws Rescue Group in Parker County. She is also a committee chair with Hounds Helping Heroes Heal, along with Susan.

Told you it was a cool story. ** elaine rogers / the hounds-of-dallas dog whisperer

A Picture Says It All — ALMOST

admin — Thu, 24 Jan 2013 21:03:41 +0000

A sweet first meeting and a wonderful “new beginning” for an H4 hero and his hound!

We’ve been talking A LOT about how excited we are about our new Texas nonprofit, HOUNDS HELPING HEROES HEAL (H4), but the the thrilling IDEA of placing Emotional Support Animals with American heroes suffering from PTSD and other debilitating conditions cannot compare to the REALITY & the REWARD of seeing what happens when a hero first meets his hound. It is Amazing!!

This veteran served as a medic in Afghanistan, and continues to serve our country today. Horrific, bloody images replay in his head and haunt him each night, causing tortuous insomnia and sleep deprivation. His PTSD and TBI are so severe that he has become very reclusive, even withdrawing from friends and family (including a wife and four children). He has very high anxiety, is very tense at home, and often isolates himself when he returns home from work and on the weekends. At one point, he says actually said good-bye to his family and drove to Miami with the intention of going Black Ops. As fate would have it, he encountered Denise Grant, Program Director for Lone Survivor Foundation, and he discovered other options and another path. Lone Survivor Foundation put him in touch with H4, and this photo shows the happy result of a new chapter in his life — one filled with hope, support, renewed strength and daily doses of unconditional love.

The dog in the photo is no stranger to trauma either. Her name is Bonnie and she was rescued by Susan Herbert, the Lone Star Dog Whisperer, from a kill shelter in Keller, Texas on the day she was scheduled for euthanasia. Besides testing positive for heartworms, she had been returned to the shelter twice for being aggressive with other dogs. A double whammy. Susan brought her home and started her ACA behavior modification/rehabilitation, and H4′s co-founder, Dale Hodgson, DVM, started her heartworm treatment. Soon after, this beautiful Golden Retriever/Border Collie mix was healthy and rehabilitated, and living peacefully within Susan’s pack of seven dogs. Noting her gentle and affectionate nature and an obvious preference for men (who always inspired lots of couch snuggling), Susan began teasingly referring to her as the blonde-haired, blue-eyed “hussy.” When Susan received this soldier’s ESA application, she knew Bonnie would be his perfect match, and on the day of their meeting, he confirmed the correctness of her presumption and joked that he might have to change his name to Clyde.

This touching photograph was one of many taken during the new couple’s life-changing meeting during a weekend retreat at the Lone Survivor Ranch, and we had trouble remaining dry-eyed as we documented such an obvious & instant connection between two injured souls — and the start of a beautiful, healing relationship. The soldier and his ESA bonded and relaxed together during the day, and by nightfall, Bonnie curled up, comfortable and content, in a bunk alongside her new pack leader. Next morning, the veteran insomniac inspired grins and giggles when he admitted he’d slept so soundly throughout the night that he felt he should apologize to his human companions for “oversleeping.” Let the healing begin, Bonnie & Clyde. Let the healing begin!

Americas Canine Academy

Ferals With A Future

A Picture Says It All — ALMOST