A Christmas miracle arrived in early December when a disabled puppy — left for dead in a dumpster in the UK — was rescued, healed and given a new home just in time for the holidays.
The six-week-old terrier, weighing just 1.75 kilograms, was found in a pile of garbage, close to death. He was rushed to the Blue Cross’ rescue center in the town of Burford, Oxfordshire. Deaf and partially blind, it also sustained gruelling cuts to its tiny body.
In Blue Cross’ care, the puppy was given a new name, Dennis.
Blue Cross’ Admissions Coordinator, Anouska “Noosh” Ashmead-Bartlett, said on the charity’s website, “Dennis had been taken to a vet and then collected by the dog warden, who called and asked us to take him in.”
Noosh was also surprised by how small the puppy was for its age, able to fit in a cat carrier.
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“I’ve never seen a dog of his age quite so little and thin, and with so many injuries as well,” he added.
Blue Cross does not know where Dennis got his cuts, but they presume he may have either got them from touching sharp objects in the dumpster or he may have been wounded beforehand.
Regardless, when it was brought to Blue Cross, it was terrified. The team still needed to care for it with a nice bath to clean up the filth in its fur. They had to be careful.
“He was really, really worried,” Noosh said. “So, we just had to get damp towels and kind of wash him down that way as he was so worried by the water and the noise of the shower.”
Upon bathing Dennis, they discovered a large wound on his side, covered by dirt and fur. ” Antiseptic ointment was applied to his wounds, and because he was deaf and half-blind, he was quite wobbly, too scared to even walk.
“His eyes couldn’t focus on you very well, and he couldn’t really hear what you were saying or work out where he was,” Noosh recalled.
“So, he would sort of go to the corner of the room or try to nestle into you in order to feel safe.”
Yet, the team did all they could to help Dennis recover. Due to his small size, he was immediately placed in a foster home with a member of the team, who has experience taking care of blind puppies. Being fed with “specialist puppy food” and treated with medicated cream to his cuts, Dennis found a nice, warm home with a cozy bed, some toys, and a loving caretaker to watch over him.
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A speedy recovery for Christmas
The team is keeping him in their center to work on his confidence. However, Dennis was still timid and hindered by its disabilities, so the team had to try some new approaches.
“We weren’t able to do the normal things that you would do with a puppy. We had to teach him different cues,” Noosh said.
“If we came into the room, we’d sort of tap our feet on the floor so he would get the vibrations to let him know we were approaching. And when we’d go to pick him up, we’d tap him gently so that he knew what these things started to mean,” he added.
With this new learning experience, the team was able to combine what they learned from taking care of both deaf and blind puppies to help Dennis gain his spirit.
Noosh also explained that Dennis could learn to be in “familiar surroundings” such as his foster home. As such, the puppy was able to figure out where to go and avoid collisions.
“I think he did have breed on his side in that terriers do something once and they go: ‘oh, right, won’t do that again, that wasn’t very fun’,” he said.
Thanks to Blue Cross’ remarkable efforts, Dennis recovered fast and is now able to walk more steadily and more confidently. After 24 days under foster care, the puppy finally found a new family to love him.
“It’s wonderful and all we could ever have wanted for him,” Noosh added. “He’s got a whole new incredible life ahead of him, but it could have gone down a completely different trajectory.”
Blue Cross also wrote that thanks to the anonymous person who found Dennis in the dumpster, the puppy was saved and found a new home to spend “his first Christmas wrapped in warmth and happiness.”
