Adoption Tales

Waiting for the adoption agency bus from Tennessee on a bitter cold night, Kristen and her family didn’t know what to expect.

Fostering a dog is one of the most rewarding ways to get that sublime dog love without having the full responsibility of life-long guardianship.

There are a lot of jobs Dennis Owens could be spending his days doing: brokering real estate… practicing massage therapy… training dogs privately. He’s qualified to do all of those things, but he chooses to work full-time at one of the largest municipal animal shelters in the United States—New York City’s Animal Care & Control—where he evaluates the dogs made available for rescue placement and adoption.

Jackie, a sleek German Shepherd mix, is a dream dog who walks calmly on a leash, eagerly obeys training commands, and is gentle with children and other dogs.

Right now, millions of dogs are abandoned, alone, and afraid. They did nothing to deserve their fate, and all they want is someone to love who will treat them with kindness.

How dedicated rescuers and adopters are saving the Puerto Rican street dog, one stray at a time.

Linda Blair is an American icon, a household name since her performance as a child possessed by the devil in "The Exorcist." But in real life, Blair is an angel to homeless dogs - and like another actress famed for her philanthropy, Doris Day, she has dedicated her life to dog rescue with a 501(c)3 non-profit foundation, Linda Blair Worldheart.
 

Early on a bone-chilling late February morning,  half of New York City’s Rutherford Park is occupied by the cast and crew filming the pilot for FX’s legal drama Damages. In this scene, Glenn Close and Zeljko Ivanek play attorneys on opposing sides of a class-action suit; Close is Patty Hewes, defender of the underdog; Ivanek is Ray Fiske, who tries to convince Patty to settle, intercepting her during an early-morning play session with her pooch.

To look at Eric Stoltz, star of stage and screen, wearing a Burberry sweater with blue jeans, simultaneously enjoying a custom-painted portrait of Poppy, his yellow lab, and the barefoot comfort of a sleek, linen-slipcovered sofa by the French lifestyle designer Catherine Memmi, the casual observer would say he’s the picture of the stylish, modern dog lover.

A tenacious legal beagle survives a harrowing ordeal then treats himself to a shelter mutt.

For the lowdown on why adopting a shelter dog beats buying a pup, ask Elisabeth Rohm.

When we first met Ted, he was sharing a kennel at the Denver pound. His roommate greeted us with a burst of excitement, yelping and pawing at the glass as if to shout, "Me! Pick me!" Ted sat next to him, perfectly silent.

Let’s say it all begins with chance. The humane society just happens to be open, and I just happen to be driving by it, at precisely the same time that I had been thinking now might be the time to come into possession of a dog.

My husband and I have two female Bull Terriers, and one (Scout) is the Alpha dog - big time! We never, ever considered having three dogs. Then, approximately a year ago, I became involved in Bull Terrier Rescue.

The house was full of depressed Hollywood types moping around and shoving food in their mouths while they watched the Red states bleed all over the map on CNN.

The first time I saw Lamby, I winced - my chest felt like it was caving in on me like it does during one of my anxiety attacks. Lamby was one of the saddest cases I had ever seen. His picture was in one of the daily email pleas I get to rescue homeless dogs from the shelter. This young Bichon Frise had been suffering in the Los Angeles shelter for a week with no skin on his lower hind legs. The picture was graphic: His feet were badly broken, crushed to pulp, bones exposed. Not only were his hind legs completely de-gloved, but the tendons were torn and what was left of the flesh was putrid and green. He was going to need expensive medical care, possibly a double amputation.

I received her picture in mid-July 2006. It was emailed to me by a true angel; a dog rescuer who had plucked my future companion from what is essentially the pound of New York City, also known as Animal Care and Control, also known as the AC&C. One hour before certain death, one hour before scheduled euthanasia the rescuer soared up East 110th Street on the tires of an old blue station wagon and gave my love another chance at life.

Michelle and Barack Obama’s young daughters, Malia Ann and Natasha, apparently have talked them into getting the family’s first dog.

Nobody wanted Ollie, a big, white mutt with a reverse-panda eye-patch and a tendency to either try to hide from sight or run madly off in all directions. He was young and full of energy that had nowhere to go. He worried about anyone touching a jagged scar on his left side and found himself labeled "untouchable." When his time was up at the city-run shelter, a call went out to find a "no-kill" facility that could hold him until the right adopter came along.