When a small white dog was impounded at The Lost Dogs Home, it would have been barely noticed by management. Just one of dozens of similar small, white dogs with matted hair, bad teeth and smelly ears. A small white dog that no one cared about and who’s death could have been no more meaningful than to add a single digit to the annual euthanasia figures of the Home, of more than 3,500 dogs a year.
But as it would turn out this little dog, dubbed Phoenix by those who worked to save him, would not only have his life spared, but would mark the beginning of a revolution at The Lost Dogs Home.
The saving of Phoenix
At best guess Phoenix was over 10 years old. That put him outside the Lost Dogs Home criteria for adoption. The belief that people didn’t want to adopt ‘old pets’, that they wouldn’t be willing to pay to have surgery to get the pets well, and that the often shy nature of elderly animals made them unsuitable for adoption, had lead to a near blanket rule to kill older pets.
But Phoenix was about to change all that.
When rescue groups around Victoria were given a photograph of Phoenix, they went to work finding him a great new home. Sharing his details over email, on pet forums and spreading his story on Facebook.
News of his plight was shared by literally thousands of people as the community rushed to save his life. The compassion that spilled over for a shy, little white dog with matted hair and bad teeth made it immediately evident that rather than people rejecting older pets, they are instead willing to open up their hearts and homes to them.
As the online community waited breathlessly for news of Phoenix; would The Lost Dogs Home management bend their rules and allow him to leave the pound? His new potential parents went to the LDH to visit him;
He has been clipped off and he will not be available to come out to them until tomorrow. He is a tiny maltese boy, very withdrawn and timid, and cuddled into my arms.
I told the staff we will take him despite ANY assessment and they have written that on his sheet. We will go back in first thing tomorrow and collect him.
No photos yet at this stage, there are security cameras throughout The Lost Dogs Home and no cameras or mobile phones are allowed to be used. He has a little bed in his pen and he hopped back into it when we left and they locked up behind them.
And then…
On January 20, Phoenix went to his new home.
Which prompts the question…
If the power of the community can find a seemingly ‘unadoptable’ animal like Phoenix a home with dozens of families willing to take them, why are The Lost Dogs Home still killing them?
If there are rescue groups standing by willing to take and rehabilitate animals who fail to be immediately adoptable, why are The Lost Dogs Home still killing them?
If special needs pets like Buckely can be saved with foster care, why are The Lost Dogs Home still killing them?
We’re seeing time and time again, when The Lost Dogs Home work with their community with a life saving focus, they save lives.
The key to stopping killing is to do something other than killing.
Make no mistake, the positive changes taking place at The Lost Dogs Home are being forced onto the management of this organisation, not being driven by them.
Maverick staff members who get sick of being told to kill and start feeding information to the media.
Information being released to rescue groups so they can take action.
The community demanding more from the organisation they helped build, requiring that they use their massive resources to do what they claim to do; act as a sanctuary for pets.
After decades of killing, the biggest contribution current management can make is step aside this new culture of life-saving sweeps over their organisation.
Saving Phoenix was just a start, there are many dogs in the Lost Dog’s Home that no-one will ever know about that are not being made available for adoption.
NEH248 is currently sitting in there awaiting his fate… an 8 year old Wolfhound X who the staff feel will not pass the assessment process but have also put a special plea out for.
One dog at a time may eventually open the flood gates and help all these dogs who never get to see the adoption pens and are literally hidden out the back from public view.
At last someone has stood up to the Lost Dogs Home management and taken them on. Congratulations! It is so long over due. Maybe now the public’s eyes will start to open about what really goes on at this so called ‘Home’
We always knew that the Lost Dogs Home would be dragged kicking and screaming into the present, and it seems that this is the case. Wake up now LDH! this is what the public demand, and very soon it will be your doners as well.
WELL DONE! I will send this to all and sundry. I hope you get top media release. My heart breaks for all of the dogs in the past. Thank god I got my little (older) dog from a rescue centre that programmes especially for older dogs (AAPS).
There are 9yr old dogs available for adoption on their site at the moment. I went there over the weekend and saw dogs for adoption with notices that they need special attentions and on going care for their skin\infections. I dont believe they are not trying to do what’s best for the dogs or if they enjoy killing for decades.
Just to be fair have anyone looked at the euthanasia ratse from other pounds or organisations like RSPCAs over the years.
To be clear:
The Lost Dogs Home is the only major shelter in Australia without an extensive foster care program. My own shelter has over 250 of these carers.
The Lost Dogs Home is the only major shelter without a volunteer program. My own shelter has over 200 volunteers.
The Lost Dogs Home is the only major shelter who refuses point blank to work with local rescue groups. My own shelter works with cats and dog rescuers to save healthy, adoptable pets.
‘Not enjoying killing’ is different to taking the action required to stop it.
‘Being just as bad as other shelters’ is different to taking the action required to be much, much better than them.
It’s great that the LDH now has older/treatable pets featuring on their website. But understand, its only from the ongoing pressure from the community that this has started to happen. The LDH aren’t improving because they want to – but because suddenly the community is demanding that they do.
In 2010, with all the tools that save lives now well known and easily and cheaply implemented, there is no excuse for an extremely wealthy shelter like the LDH to not to lead the way in developing them.
Great story and happy ending…but NO thanks to the Lost Dogs Home. The picture of the Diretor Dr Graham Smith with all of those euthanised Dogs around him, sums his emotional state up….he DOESNT have one! I have me him many times and he is a cold, unfriendly, uncompassionate person
The public need to let him know this is unacceptable, and stop any one you know from responding to their ‘begging’ letters for donations, and bequests. The Lost Dogs Home has over $6 million in the bank, and the shelter conditions are disgusting…we were there 3 weeks ago….makes your heart bleed how awful it is for the poor Dogs…