# Dallas got loose tonight



## dogmom (Aug 14, 2010)

My doorbell rang about 9:15 and it was my :angel: neighbor returning Dallas and I didn't even know he was gone. He ran in front of her car as she was returning home. I don't know what I would have done if he had been hit :fear:! I went to the store earlier and he must have gone through the garage when I returned and my husband was bringing in the bags. As I was putting things away I thought I heard him barking. It's been so nice here (72 today) I've just been leaving the sliding door open to the back so they can come and go as they please, so I figured I'd better bring him in before he started pestering everyone, but when I went outback he wasn't there. I knew Disney was in the bedroom with my husband so I figured Dallas must have gone with them. I was about to check on him when the bell rang. The garage opens to the front of the house so he went exploring. I don't always make them wear their collar and tags when they're inside or even outside in the fence because the gates are always closed. Thank goodness they both had on their ID today because he just doesn't know the neighborhood without us - he stands at the end of the driveway looking down the street sometime like "I'll get down there one of these days". I guess it was his day; luckily he's very friendly and the neighbor said when she got out of the car he came right up to her so she was able to read his tags. He's chipped as well so hopefully he wouldn't have been gone too long even if he hadn't been wearing his ID. I'm usually so careful when we're bringing things in from the garage because I know how they like to slip out and go visiting the dog next door but I'm usually there to keep them close. I can't believe he got past us without us even noticing :noidea:. I feel terrible - and so relieved he was returned none the worse then went he left. It can happen so quick, can't it? I WOULD HAVE FELT TERRIBLE, TERRIBLE I SAY, if he had been hurt, or worse! Has any of your pets ever gone missing and if so how long before they came home?


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## DaneMama (Jun 27, 2008)

Yikes! Glad to hear he's alright and safe back at home!

Well...um...Shiloh is an escape artist. If we don't LOCK every door and window she will open them and get out. She once opened an unlocked window, got into the back yard and broke through out wood fence to get out (we have a hot wire around the top to keep her from jumping over). I can't tell you how many times she has gotten out of the house. Luckily she seeks other people out whens she gets out so we usually get a call within about 10 minutes of her getting out. 

Except for one time....we went out for dinner and a movie. Didn't get home until about 10:30pm. Shiloh was no where to be found. We drove around the neighborhood aimlessly looking and calling for her. It was highly unusual for us NOT to get a call from someone who picked her up. We gave up after about a half hour because we both know that she would have been miles away for how long she was out (usually she gets out within a few minutes of us leaving). Jon decides to put an ad on craigslist about a missing dog with a picture. Sure enough we get a call about 20 minutes later from a young girl. She tells us that her uncle has Shiloh and he's planning on selling her. She says she doesn't want her uncle to know that she told us, so she gave us the description of the house (only 2 blocks from us!). We drove by and asked the girl sitting on the front porch if they had seen a missing dog. This girl says "there's no dogs here" so we turn around and call the girl who gave us the tip back to see if we had the right house. She said yes, we had the right house the first time. We go back, ask the girl on the front porch once again if she has seen any dogs. Again, she said "no dogs here" BUT right at that moment a younger boy (maybe 8 years old) walks to the door and says "Oh, you mean the wolf?" We just kinda push past this snarky teenage girl and follow the boy to the back. Sure as sh*t Shiloh is back there on leash, held by this guy who has a beer in his hand. He was obviously drunk. He said that he had tried calling the numbers but got a busy signal...which isn't even possible on cell phones. We asked him why he didn't call the other phone, he said he had but it never rang. Total BS. He tried to make it out like WE were the ones out of line letting our dog run the streets....yeah, right. At least it wasn't much of a fight to get her back. We were PISSED that night.....kinda scary that people like that live SO close to us. I cannot wait to get to Idaho....


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## stajbs (Jun 5, 2010)

Oh yeah, we've got sibes. We've had 4 great escapes in all our years. I swear my NY sibes are gonna kill us.... they escaped on day 2 with us while they were out in the kennels. One of them either deliberately, but I think by sheer good luck on their part flipped the lever thing up and off they went. That's when we learned to use brass snaps on those blasted levers. The same two New Yorkers ( I call them that just to be a bugger, but they were a challenge when they first came) blew past my husband when his flip flop caught in the tubing of the kennels and he tripped and went down...and off they went like lightening. I wasn't home from work, but hubby, my son, and his girlfriend and one of their friends quickly caught Blaze with the quad, but they chased Silva up the mountain...down behind a chicken farm around all the neighbors property till they finally caught her. There was a lot of griping that night about how she looked like a white tailed dear bouncing around on the mountain having a blast. Sandi escaped once when the drop she was on outside had a hardware failure.  Thorn escaped one time when we were loading up to go to an event one morning. He snuck out behind me when I was going outside with another one of the dogs. I had the other leashed, quickly tied her fast to something, don't remember what and chased him down at the next door neighbor. He liked to "mark" things so he was easily caught. 

Yes the escapes and the "what ifs" can drop your heart down into your stomach. All you can do is your best, but it still happens no matter how hard you try to prevent it. Remember you are human, but the main thing is your dog is okay.


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## dogmom (Aug 14, 2010)

Natalie, I would have been angry as well. I would never think to keep someone's pet from them just to gain a few dollars. I'm glad his niece was a thoughtful considerate person. I'm really glad you got Shiloh back because he would have been loosing a terrific home - no telling where he would have ended up. I'm excited for your move to Idaho. You're going to be so happy there. It looks amazing.


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## rannmiller (Jun 27, 2008)

Woah I'm so glad Dallas is ok! It's always scary when that happens! Luckily my yard is totally fenced so it's hard for my dogs to escape unnoticed or I would be a total wreck. How fortunate your neighbor found him and he didn't get hurt!


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## dogmom (Aug 14, 2010)

stajbs said:


> Oh yeah, we've got sibes. We've had 4 great escapes in all our years. I swear my NY sibes are gonna kill us.... they escaped on day 2 with us while they were out in the kennels. One of them either deliberately, but I think by sheer good luck on their part flipped the lever thing up and off they went. That's when we learned to use brass snaps on those blasted levers. The same two New Yorkers ( I call them that just to be a bugger, but they were a challenge when they first came) blew past my husband when his flip flop caught in the tubing of the kennels and he tripped and went down...and off they went like lightening. I wasn't home from work, but hubby, my son, and his girlfriend and one of their friends quickly caught Blaze with the quad, but they chased Silva up the mountain...down behind a chicken farm around all the neighbors property till they finally caught her. There was a lot of griping that night about how she looked like a white tailed dear bouncing around on the mountain having a blast. Sandi escaped once when the drop she was on outside had a hardware failure. Thorn escaped one time when we were loading up to go to an event one morning. He snuck out behind me when I was going outside with another one of the dogs. I had the other leashed, quickly tied her fast to something, don't remember what and chased him down at the next door neighbor. He liked to "mark" things so he was easily caught.
> 
> Yes the escapes and the "what ifs" can drop your heart down into your stomach. All you can do is your best, but it still happens no matter how hard you try to prevent it. Remember you are human, but the main thing is your dog is okay.


Thanks. It sounds like sibes are little escape artists. I couldn't help but laugh about their antics though and I'm so glad you got them back safe.


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## Devils of York (Jul 28, 2010)

I thought my boys were trained to sit and stay at the door, but the younger gave us a scare and jumped out one day to chase the UPS truck down the driveway and into the street. My boys have zero off-leash experience outside. I was just returning home and saw my little guy sailing into the street and my poor 72-year old father running behind. I jumped out of my car and called my pup to me. He listened! We put up baby gates the next day. Better safe than sorry.


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## dogmom (Aug 14, 2010)

rannmiller said:


> Woah I'm so glad Dallas is ok! It's always scary when that happens! Luckily my yard is totally fenced so it's hard for my dogs to escape unnoticed or I would be a total wreck. How fortunate your neighbor found him and he didn't get hurt!


Thanks. Unfortunately, only my backyard is fenced in and he slipped out the front. I would have been a total wreck, if I had known he was missing, LOL. I'm glad that Disney didn't go out with him because she's shy and if she was confused as well I don't know that she would let a stranger pick her up. On the other hand, if she had gone with him, surely we would have noticed that they were BOTH gone.


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## dogmom (Aug 14, 2010)

Devils of York said:


> I thought my boys were trained to sit and stay at the door, but the younger gave us a scare and jumped out one day to chase the UPS truck down the driveway and into the street. My boys have zero off-leash experience outside. I was just returning home and saw my little guy sailing into the street and my poor 72-year old father running behind. I jumped out of my car and called my pup to me. He listened! We put up baby gates the next day. Better safe than sorry.


How scary to come home and see your dog chasing the UPS truck. Mine don't have off-leash experience either, especially in our neighborhood as there's a good bit of traffic. I'll bet your dad is glad you came home when you did and the baby gates were a great idea.


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## kevin bradley (Aug 9, 2009)

oh yeah baby, Harry is a digger. He'll find a spot with just a sliver of daylight under the fence and work his "magic."

Don't beat yourself up over it... just figure out what happened and do what you can to prevent it from ocurring again(I'm sure you already did this).


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## Mia (Oct 4, 2010)

Things happen, my labs are nose to the ground (trackers!). My yellow went as far as the other two towns over from us. We had people calling everywhere. Finally the dog pound called and told us they had a yellow lab on the Friday night as they were closing. We went asap Monday morning since weekends they were closed. Well, to my surprised his collar was missing. NO clue how the heck it was missing. We asked for the collar, they said he never had one. Very very very lucky he didn't get hit or worse.

That happened about 3 years ago. Never happened again. We are very careful.


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## kevin bradley (Aug 9, 2009)

stajbs said:


> but they chased Silva up the mountain...down behind a chicken farm around all the neighbors property till they finally caught her.


some of you guys live in some exciting places. 

I chased Harry across a cornfield once


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## schtuffy (May 17, 2010)

Yea, don't beat yourself up over it! You can't have eyes everywhere. I mean, children go missing or get kidnapped all the time in the news (unfortunately...) and that doesn't mean that all the parents were negligent or bad parents. Things happen and the important thing is that Dallas made it home safe. I have an aquaintence that had the same thing happen to her. In the blink of an eye one of her dogs made his way through a fence and out of the yard. She also didn't even notice he was gone. They live close to a busy road, and unfortunately when the doorbell rang, it was animal control and they didn't have good news  

Natalie, that's just awful about Shiloh. I don't know what we would do if we found out someone just picked up Louis and tried to profit from it. My husband mentioned it once, that he was afraid people wouldn't want to return him because he is so cute and loving. I thought he was just being silly. Thank goodness he is too short and can't reach doorknobs, otherwise I'm sure he would be opening them left and right. My dad did let him slip out of the house a couple times...once he didn't even realize it. Luckily when my husband was driving over to pick us up, he noticed a white furry puppy wandering around the neighborhood that looked just like our dog...and it was!


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## dogmom (Aug 14, 2010)

schtuffy said:


> Yea, don't beat yourself up over it! You can't have eyes everywhere. I mean, children go missing or get kidnapped all the time in the news (unfortunately...) and that doesn't mean that all the parents were negligent or bad parents. Things happen and the important thing is that Dallas made it home safe. I have an aquaintence that had the same thing happen to her. In the blink of an eye one of her dogs made his way through a fence and out of the yard. She also didn't even notice he was gone. They live close to a busy road, and unfortunately when the doorbell rang, it was animal control and they didn't have good news


I know, pets and children - if they only understood we only have their best interests at heart and there's a reason we do what we do. I am extremely lucky that when my doorbell rang it wasn't bad news but rather a good neighbor returning him safely.


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## dogmom (Aug 14, 2010)

CrazyRawFedZoo said:


> Things happen, my labs are nose to the ground (trackers!). My yellow went as far as the other two towns over from us. We had people calling everywhere. Finally the dog pound called and told us they had a yellow lab on the Friday night as they were closing. We went asap Monday morning since weekends they were closed. Well, to my surprised his collar was missing. NO clue how the heck it was missing. We asked for the collar, they said he never had one. Very very very lucky he didn't get hit or worse.
> 
> That happened about 3 years ago. Never happened again. We are very careful.


Two towns over sounds like a great distance without human help. Maybe they "helped" him remove his collar? I'd hate to think someone would just keep a lost animal instead of trying to find the owners but it's possible. But whatever happened I'm glad he found his way home.


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## Mia (Oct 4, 2010)

Nah we live about ten mins to a very small town here. Not a lot of people. Out in the country. Two towns is like mini towns. It's about a 20-25 mins drive to hit the next 2 small towns. I still to this day don't know what happened to his collar. But anyhow he has a new one. I am very happy he is back home. I'd be devastated!


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## stajbs (Jun 5, 2010)

Kevin,

My biggest concern about that chicken farm is that it's an egg layer operation and it's intensive farming. Zillions of chickens for a siberian to snack on. I was so thankful she did not get into one of the huge chicken houses, run amuk and get shot. The farmer hates all the neighbors because there are issues with TONS of chicken manure and MANY flies. Can you tell the flies make me nuts?? Silva is very agile and she does look like a gazelle when she runs. Even at 12 she still leaps from the ground up onto our deck without a problem.


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