Sweet Carolina Lady
By Tanya M. Jackson

Little Carolina Lady is just that – a little lady. Found as a street dog, and obviously close to delivering a large litter of puppies, she was just minutes from euthanasia when she was rescued. An animal control employee put out a call, and Carolina Lady became my foster dog.

I hurried to the shelter to pick her up. When I approached this dog in the kennel at the Nassau Humane Society, our director warned me that she was timid and upset and might bite. I knelt down to her level and held out my arms, speaking softly to her. She slowly stood up and crept to the warmth of my arms. This sweet, intelligent dog wanted only a safe place and some help so she could birth her puppies.

Carolina is yellow/pale red and has the sweetest little pointy face, with softly curled whiskers and soft brown eyes, and most definitely those ears are Carolina Dog, also known as American Dingo. Someone neglected to have her spayed and of course the inevitable happened. On December 19, 2005, Carolina Lady gave birth to ten little puppies. Not a one of them looked like her. There must have been a traveling bulldog with a very good line in the neighborhood.

Carolina was a perfectly wonderful mother. She birthed those puppies easily and quickly, beginning at 3:15 in the afternoon. The last one appeared at 8:15 that evening. We were all properly impressed. She washed them and nursed them, and in general needed little but her warm box in my puppy house, and lots of clean blankets and good food. You never saw anything grow as fast as those puppies grew! Since there were ten of them and Carolina is a rather small dog, we supplemented her milk by feeding them puppy formula in baby bottles. Eager little mouths and kneading paws kept both my granddaughter Caryl and me busy every few hours getting those little tummies full and those babies happy.

But sadness was just around the corner. Because Carolina Lady was a street dog, and we did not know how long she had been on the street, we knew little about her. To make a long story short, she carried hookworms and coccidian and these had been passed to the puppies. The puppies began to die. In three days we lost five darling puppies. We were heartsick, and Carolina Lady was distraught. She knew they were getting sick and as this happened she carried each sick puppy from the box. Frantically we tried to find out what was wrong. Lynda and Dee made numerous trips out to my house, and we cried together as we lost them. In conference with Lynda’s vet, we finally pinpointed the problem. There is a special test that must be done to show up these problems and now we know. We won’t let this happen again. It is best to have female dogs spayed and avoid puppies altogether. There are just more puppies than there are homes. But when beautiful puppies arrive, we raise them and love them and train them to be wonderful dogs and then we find good homes for them.

So we had five puppies left…Blizzard, Comet, Jingles, Missy Toes and Valerie; beautiful healthy babies, protected now from the horrible death that comes from hookworms and coccidian. Very quickly Carolina Lady weaned them and they began to eat from a big pan, gathered around in a circle with heads and feet and sometimes, whole bodies in the middle of the food! When photos and stories of the five went up on the website, we very quickly had interested families calling us, eager to see and adopt these pups.

Meanwhile, Carolina Lady was wearing a cast and recovering from a broken foot, which happened when she tried to jump a high fence in search of me. We hope she learned a valuable lesson from this experience. She suffered from separation anxiety and was totally bonded to me. There was some work to do before she could be adopted. She was well-behaved, house trained and loved to ride in the car. She didn’t mind being fenced in, but she liked to come and go at will to and from the house. She loved people and other animals. She wanted to be by your side at all times. Her only real problem was her neediness, and the right family and lots of love would help her.

After two adoptions that did not work out, I was thinking, “I’m not going to find the perfect home. Carolina will have to stay with me.” Which would have been okay, but really she needed a family all her own. I have other pets and foster animals coming and going…..I was not sure I could manage it.

But as soon as the doors opened at a PetSmart Adoption Day in walked a family with a LIST. This list included about 30 requests that this family felt they wanted for their new dog. They wanted a girl, not too big; they wanted her to be “blonde” or red; they wanted her to have “a real tail and special ears”.  They thought she should like people, especially children, and get along with other animals and like to ride in the car. They wanted her to have a short coat, be easy to keep clean and to like to sleep in a bed with them.

Well! The special Miss Carolina Lady met just about every request on the list and she was quickly adopted by this family. Obviously this was a carefully thought out plan and I realized that Carolina was going to have a happy happy life. Sure enough, in the follow up call a week later, I talked with the Mom of the family, and she enthusiastically told me how much they love Carolina, how bonded she has become to the family, and how she shares the sleeping arrangements. She sleeps one night with one of the children and the next night with another. She goes to sports practice with the family and everyone loves her. I hope soon they will send me another photo of her.

I know she is happy and I am soooo happy for her. This is what animal foster care is all about – it is one of the most satisfying “jobs” that I have ever had. I highly recommend it! I think often of Carolina Lady, of her loyalty and love, her gentle manner and her soulful eyes. I will never forget her and all that she taught me. It makes me so incredibly happy to know that she is with a wonderful “forever family”.