By Brae Canlen / May 28, 2025
Either I’m a magnet for lost dogs, or I proactively find them roaming the streets of my North Park neighborhood. I suppose both could be true.
Let’s start with Lucky, the beagle I found standing on the sidewalk, barking her little head off. Lucky had a collar with a phone number, which I called. A woman answered (Lucky’s owner) and told me she was vacationing in Northern California. A pet sitter was supposed to come by and pick up the dog.
We agreed that I would put Lucky back in the house. The back door was unlocked, she said. Who goes on vacation and leaves their back door open? Lucky’s owner does.
Next is Fiona, who lives one block over. Fiona looked like a little black porcupine with triangular ears glued on. I found Fiona twice – the second time before her owners even knew she was missing.
Penny was a beautiful Aussie Shepherd with one blue and one brown eye. Two women rang my doorbell early one evening, Penny in tow, asking if I knew the owner. Apparently, Penny had been hanging around my street corner. It became clear they wanted to unload Penny; they were cat owners.
So I took him in and posted his picture on Next Door. Within 15 minutes, I received a phone call from Penny’s “mom,” who arrived at my house in tears. She picked the dog up in a bear hug – he must have weighed at least 30 pounds – and held on to him until her husband arrived to take them home. The two of them will make good parents someday. And Penny will watch over the baby.
None of these “rescues” were particularly heroic. But I’ll close with one that did require a bit of courage on my part.
As I left the pet groomer’s one afternoon, I noticed a dog wandering around the large parking lot of her strip mall. I lured him over with some treats I carried in my pocket. He was a pit bull mix, and my dog is an eight-pound poodle. Uh-oh.
But I forged ahead. I took the leash off my dog, switched it to the other pooch, and carried my poodle under my arm. We walked back to the groomer’s, who took in the lost dog, put out a sign, and later called me to say that he was reunited with his owner. Who apparently has an ongoing problem keeping his pit bull mix confined.
I guess I must answer the obvious question now, about my own dog, Uli. Has he ever gone missing? Yes and no.
One summer night, Uli decided to hide in the closet under a blanket because he got scared by my flyswatter. (I have never touched him with a flyswatter and never would.) The whole neighborhood was out looking for him. (Uli is very popular.)
People were driving around in cars, walking up and down the block, and posting on social media. There was so much commotion outside that Uli came out of his hiding place and sat in the window to watch what was going on.
I threw away the fly swatter.
Brae Canlen is a retired journalist who lives in dog-friendly North Park.
HaHa. I like it Brae. My dogs have never gotten out of my yard, and it’s amazing to me how many do. Thanks to people like you, a lot of people are lucky you and others find their dogs for them.
You have a good heart, Brae. There is no mystery here.
Anyone who loves dogs as you – and I -do is sensitive to the sight of a lost dog. It pulls at the heartstrings to see that look on their faces and you feel compelled to reassure them if you can. That sensitivity is a blessing and a curse. I’m sure you would agree. I don’t have to tell you to keep up the good work because, luckily for dogs, you can’t help yourself.
Brae, you are doing good work. No doubt about it.
In these mountains on this county gravel road, and once on the winding 2-lane state highway down below in the valley, I seem to find the abandoned ones, the throw-away dogs. Most have been older, from 7 or 8 to a 15 yr old blind (bad cataracts) husky girl that was standing there looking extremely confused as to where she had ended up. She lived another two years and learned to walk the property by smell, and then taught the property boundaries to the next throw-away adoptee (given to me after spending 4 1/2 yrs alone in an outdoor 8×8 wire cage) who is now about 10 herself as the muzzle and chin hair have turned white (a golden X with probably Irish Setter?).
The one on the highway back in about 2006 was the only young dog I’ve ever found and brought home, and he was about 3 months as were the rest of his siblings from the big box they were in that was either tossed out of a moving truck or had slid out. He was the only one still alive because he had run to the side of the road into the treeline. I stopped to move the six puppies (lab mix, most were longhaired) as they were obviously getting crushed over and over again by vehicles. Then Fuzzbutt came out of the woods, met my boy dog nose to nose, and was instantly accepted.
Sometimes I’ve been lucky and found the owners, but I have 7 doggie graves under the west treeline in these last 21 years, and all but one died of old age.
I have a painted blue sign in the shape of a bone on the wall by the front door under the front porch roof that reads:
The Average Dog is a Better Person Than the Average Person
That pretty much sums up my feelings on this subject!
sealintheSelkirks