A dog is for life not just for Christmas

Yesterday, December 27th I was happily going about my business doing a little work and trying to relax after over-indulging on Christmas day when my partner called me over to her outside the front of our house.

I wrongly asumed that she wanted me to help to carry the shopping in. However as I walked towards her there was no shopping and she continued to beckon me over.

I really wasn’t ready for what she was about to show me. As I peered over the side of the road in to the boggy filthy field I heard a chorus of tiny yelps as to my amazement there was a litter of 9 puppies scrambling around in the mud, calling for their mother or anyone else to get them out of the mess that they were in.

Someone had clearly brought this litter of puppies (which I guess are 2-3 weeks old) in a sack and dumped them in this boggy field to die.  Just days after Christmas and these tiny creatures were thrown out like garbage with not a care for them.

My wife asked me what we should do. Now I should explain that we are in the Philippines, there is no pet rescue or even animal welfare here. I understand that is a luxury for rich countries so the options are limited to, let them die or save them.

I don’t have a lot of money but I am sure as hell that I’m not going to let these innocent animals die. I couldn’t live with myself if I just ignored them.

Obviously being an animal lover I said we will get them all of course, so we proceeded to wade through the mud bare foot and gather them all up. Nine puppies in total, 5 boys and 4 girls to add to the two dogs I already have here.

After a quick bath to clean them up and get rid of the fleas they were covered in we gave them water and I headed off to the local pet food supply store and bought a couple of kilos of puppy food.

I put them in our outside utility room to dry and rest as they were obviously stressed and tired and left them with a bowl of water and food.

So this is their first full day with us and I am glad to say that they all seem healthy enough apart from a few chewed tails and some friction burns (probably from when they were thrown of the motorbike or car that dumped them).

I let them out today and the two most adventurous boys came out almost instantly and started to explore our yard, followed by a couple more and then eventually the whole gang appeared. They are now sat lazing in the afternoon Sun after having eaten most of the food I bought yesterday and made friends with Barney and Mitziou my two other dogs.

So this is a pre-warning that I now have 9 new subjects to test cameras out on so expect plenty of puppy pics to come whenever they’re up-to their cheeky antics.

I don’t know how anyone can just throw animals out as if they are garbage, especially when it would have been possible to find them homes here with just a little effort.

My plan now is to get them healthy and let them enjoy life a bit as puppies should. I’m now like the pied piper as they follow me everywhere I go. Two of the boys are very adventurous and boisterous and one of the girls is quite timid and shy. She is the smallest of the litter so I will be keeping an eye on her to make sure she gets her fair share of food.

I’ll leave you with a few photos I just took of them with the Nikon D7200 and Fuji XT2 as I will be doing a vs video and article on those two cameras soon.

I hope you had a Merry Christmas and wish you all a Happy New Year.

David