gypsy queen dog - or why i rescue

seven years ago i had never spent much time around dogs. cats, yes. been rescuing cats my whole life. dogs, i never paid much attention to before i met the gypsy queen dog.

my husband and i have an architectural salvage business. don't work it much anymore due to the rescue work, but then we were very active. june 2000, we were taking down a two story house built in 1800. the house was in a town a little over an hour away from jackson. it was backbreaking work, but full of interesting finds. we had been working on the house for about 6 months. the whole time we were doing the tear down, there was a stray momma dog and her two pups from the previous season hanging around the empty house. there were several side buildings on the property full of treasures and junk. in one of the side buildings there was a very very old feather mattress. the momma dog loved that mattress and that shed. when she went in there and got on her mattress, she looked like she just knew that this was the life. she was up on the mattress looking like a queen. her pups would be on the floor of the building in front of her throne. i would go look in on them, dropping some food or treats and she would just grin and grin at me. if i got too close they would all dart out the back of the building in an opening of some missing boards.

as the year warmed up and spring approached it was apparent that she was pregnant again. we continued to try to catch her, but it was of no avail.

then on june 4th, we were up there working on preparing to take down one of the buildings and I was pulling stuff out from under the floors. i saw a little animal in a dug out hole shivering. at first i thought it was a rat, then i thought it was a mole - because it was too hairy for a rat, then i thought it might be a puppy. i called my husband over and sure enough it was a puppy. we gathered him up. he was cold and hungry. no telling how long he had been there. it was late in the day and momma dog had not been around all day. we took him back to jackson. i fed him with a straw and water the whole way home. i would pull up some water and drop it into his mouth.

when we got home all the vets were closed and we had no idea of what to do next. we called a vet, he walked us through we we should do to try to keep him alive, and warned us that he probably wouldn't make it.

well, make it he did, and he is happy and living in my back yard now. Lucky Dawg.

however, the next week we returned to the house to work again, and the gypsy queen was dead. she had stopped delivering her pups and developed gangrene in her uterus and died just in front of her wonderful throne. we never saw the pups again and soon finished our project there.

i think of the gypsy queen everyday when i go play with my lucky dawg. i know so much more now about rescue and had the timing been different, i could have gotten the gypsy queen and her pups.

stray/unwanted/unknown dogs die everyday in mississippi. painful, scary, unnecessary deaths. i can't imagine what goes through their minds as they lie dying.

the dogs at the shelter appear to love their makeshift beds in the same manner. you can see them when they run back into their pens from recess. we have cleaned their pens, put out fresh food and water, and put fresh blankets in their most wonderful beds. beds fit for a queen or king.

posted by Elizabeth @ 5:41 PM