Pepper spent most of her year and a half of "life" on a chain outside her owner's house on a porch. In August the owner's son took her for a ride in the bed of his pickup tied to the back. She jumped out, and because she was tied up she was pulled under the wheels. He ran over her front and back left paws. I know her back paw was broken or severely damaged (I saw her immediately after the accident) and they were going to shoot her because "a three legged dog won't have a good life". I told them that wasn't the case.

I then told them if they ever wanted to find her a new home to contact me asap. Months later they phoned to tell me that Pepper was tied up in the back yard of their parents' house. She didn't have adequate shelter (and it was freezing at the time), she was tied up with a choke chain, and they had never taken her to the vet for her paws (or anything else). I asked them if she was in heat---they told me she was too young to go into heat. But we knew this wasn't true. They didn't even know how old she was, anyway. They kept changing her age every time we talked to them.

When we got her to our place it was obvious she was already in heat, and someone at their parents' house had said dogs had been hanging around her the night before (there was no fence there, of course). Also, when we took her home her neck was covered in scabs from the choke chain and the fur torn away all down her throat and neck (we've since given them a collar to bring to the other dog that is at their parents' house tied up with a choke chain---as uneducated as these people are, they are trying to learn and said they would definitely go there and put it on him.)

They kept telling us that the reason they were giving her up is because she is "just so crazy" and she "can't go in the house because she just races around" and "she jumps up" and and and....Grrrr. It took me literally five minutes to teach her not to jump up and five minutes to settle her down once she was in our house. She listens really well and just wants to please. She doesn't bother the cats at all and she is a total sweetheart.

Robyn