You think you have seen it all....

When you realise you havent and you probably never will.

This weekend saw the intake of probably one of the most messed up yet still beautiful in looks and soul little girl you could ever imagine.

Vixen is a 9 year old greyhound girl who is in the most terrible state. Two volunteers brought her to the kennels on Saturday and I couldnt have been prepared for what I saw. Once I had her safely home the tears just came for this beautiful girl. When her wonderful new foster family Sandra and Will came over to collect her the tears came yet again.

Vixen had been found wandering the streets of Bury, whatever has happend to this girl over the last 9 years just doesnt bear thinking about. There isnt an inch of her body that doesnt have scars old and new, lumps, bumps, tumours you name it. Her beautiful elegant nose has at some point been severly broken leaving it leaning to one side of her face, her teeth are green, puss riddled and oozing and so so sore. Her poor feet are so badly blistered that to walk on hard surfaces leaves them bleeding she is also in season. Despite all that she is still a canny little girl and we think probably an ex coursing hound considering the way she ran on her little bleeding feet across my garden to smack the resident stone squirrel knocking him flying!

After a vets visit they are confident that once she has a bit of weight on her if we can deal with the teeth, mammory tumours and get her spayed there will hopefully be life in the old dog yet! We really hope so and cant wait to see the turn around tlc can achieve.

Vixen.

On a happier note this week saw yet more hounds head off to fabulous homes.....

Orla, Kyka, Harriet & Honey & Hobo all left with their new families. We cant wait for updates on how they are all doing and wish them and their new found forever people lots of love and luck.

Savannah, Loafer and Macey are all also now reserved.

Two more of our current homeless also headed off for foster and are so far settling well...

Roscoe our big deerhound x cat friendly gentle giant boy has joined Caroline in Warrington till a new family can be found.

and

Selwyn a beautiful 4 year old greyhound boy has currently landed at Lynne and Colins in Leicestershire to build up a bit of weight and condition before we find him a new family.

Arnt they both just gorgeous?

3 months into a new year!

And.... who would believe it the first chance there has been to add a new blog entry!

The year has started worse than ever. The amount of dogs in danger the length and bredth of the country is heartbreaking.

At Gap we are doing all that we can to help as many but that has meant all work and no play and keeping on keeping on.

We have already rehomed around 40 dogs this year which is double this time last year. The numbers piling through the doors are astronomical and at the moment we have 43 dogs in our care. 36 are in foster homes and that alone is hard work to juggle keep on top of everyone and make sure dogs and humans alike are happy. We cannot keep running at this rate though as funding isnt particularly increasing more than other years and indeed last year Dogs Trust were good enough to give us 50 spaying vouchers an offer sadly this year they cant repeat. Its even more crucial now that we try and bring in more money to allow us to continue to neuter all the dogs in our care. We wont rehouse animals un altered so our only other option is to cut down on numbers rehomed. Being totally self funded is such hard work.

We hope though to level it out and although we need to get numbers down we are hoping we can handle around 30 dogs at anyone time which is an increase from 20 at this time last year.

Everyone is the same, every rescue we speak to is so highly in demand with no sign whatsoever of it easing off.

Also on a very sad note..

The beginning of the year saw us saying goodbye to Noggin the Nog our old sponsor boy as he made his way peacefully to the bridge. Our thoughts are with Dawn his foster Mum who loved him and cared for him so well in his last remaining 10mnths.

Sleep tight Nog the Dog.