Dog's unlikely reunion with family after five months in wilderness
Training a family pet can be hard, especially when you have an active breed that needs a certain level of stimulation. Some dogs are good to go after a few training sessions with a local trainer at a pet supply store while others may require more personalized training in home. But there are some pet parents who opt to send their dogs to a sleep away training program that requires the dogs to live at a training facility for several months.
Many times these programs are expensive and used as an option when the other training programs aren't providing the dogs with the skills they need to live safely with their family. The decision to send your fur baby off to a facility for months at a time is not an easy one but with your pets' best interest in mind, you put your faith in someone who specializes in the care your pup needs.
One family thought they were doing what was best for their Huskies by sending them to a training facility. It's unclear what prompted the family's concern after dropping their four dogs off with their trainer but after months of looking for their dogs with no luck, they contacted Anakin's Trails Stray and Pet Recovery Team.
Oakley after being trappedCourtesy of Anakin's Trails Stray and Pet Recovery Team
The dogs are from Ohio where their owner, Andrea lives and were entrusted to an unnamed animal training facility in Greenville County, South Carolina. It is suspected that the training facility dumped the dogs in in the woods without contacting the family to request them to retrieve their beloved pets. Anakin's Trails Stray and Pet Recovery Team uses drones and other techniques to help locate lost dogs and give them an idea of where to place their traps.
The first of the Huskies, Oakley, was recovered by the organization and reunited with Andrea after having spent a whopping five months surviving in the wilderness. When Oakley first spots her human she's clearly unsure of the situation. It almost appears that she's not sure if he will be in trouble or welcomed into Andrea's arms. Anakin's Trails refers to this as "lost dog syndrome," but after a few seconds of uncertainty, the pooch fully recognized her human mom and could not contain his excitement.
Oakley quickly becomes overwhelmed with relief and excitement as she jumps into the chair with Andrea. The newly reunited dog can't stop licking her human and doing full body tail wagging. The sweet Husky mix probably thought things couldn't get much better but Anakin's Trails had more up their sleeves. Just a few days after Oakley was reunited with her family, her sister Marley was captured.
Ashley Raymond, Founder and Director of Anakin's Trails tells Upworthy, "The dogs were dumped/released into the wild about 4-5 months ago," Raymond recalls. "We got involved after the owners found out about them being dumped about a month and a half later [after entering the training facility]. For about a month ,we hung flyers , set food stations with high quality bait with surveillance cameras , and strategically placed them where we got sightings. Before long, we began getting sightings."
Andrea with Oakley after being reunitedCourtesy of Anakin's Trails Stray and Pet Recovery Team
Things were looking up for the agency after the sightings but that's when the south east experienced a beast of a hurricane. Hurricane Helene was massive, hitting Florida, Georgia, South Carolina, North Carolina, Tennessee and Virginia making the rescue of these four beloved family pets a bit more difficult. The animal recovery organization didn't give up hope though.
"Then, the hurricane happened and pushed them 16 miles down the road to another town. We basically had to start from scratch in an entire town, and that’s just what we did. After about 2 weeks of that, we finally nailed down the yard where they kept coming," Raymond shares. "This time, we set our custom made kennel trap up. After they came once to it, we set it live the very next night. Around 10:30 that evening, Marley and Oakley walked in! Oakley got trapped, Marley ran off. Two nights later, Marley came back and we trapped her. We called the owner and she came down for the reunion for both on 2 different evenings."
Marley going into the trap to be reunited with familyroar-assets-auto.rbl.ms
According to Anakin's Trails, the third dog, Juno who is the sister of Marley and Oakley is still missing. Their dog mom, Nova Jo has been found but has still not been reunited with her human.
"There is a fourth dog. She was dumped with the other three, but she ran up to someone days after being dumped and was picked up," Raymond says. "SC has a 5 day stray hold unfortunately. So any dog that you find in the state of SC and no one comes forward in 5 days, it’s technically yours. So they are fighting that in court."
Nova JoCourtesy of Anakin's Trails Stray and Pet Recovery Team
The work Anakin's Trails does isn't easy and since it's a nonprofit, they rely on donations, which is how they were able to help provide Andrea a hotel room when she came to be reunited with her dog. Hopefully, all four dogs will be under one roof again and this will be a story that has a book worthy happy ending.
If you'd like to donate to Anakin's Trails Stray and Pet Recovery Team so they can continue their work, you can do so here.
This article originally appeared last year.