21/08/2022
This is brilliant advice for what to do if you lose your dog. Please read it all the way through and then save it in case you need it..
Message from The Bodie Search Team. Missing since 3rd July 2022
Sad news, I am sorry to say, since there has been no sighting for two weeks, we have scaled things down a bit â we donât think there is much we can do for now until someone comes back to us with a further sighting. Drones have been up again (Thanks Drone SAR) and even the speedboat patrol has been out at Bewl. Nothing. Had a long chat with Barbara last night and we have decided that our wonderful team are exhausted and have literally put our own lives on hold to find him, but to no avail. We are not scrapping the team, members who normally walk both areas will stay on alert and we are just moth balling the group until something happens. Dogs Lost have also been proactive. Our ground volunteers have even dragged their families into the search to spread the load. Nothing!
We all felt in the team that this would be a good time to remind owners what happens when your dog runs off and various preventions you can put in place. No one owner is perfect and despite the best of training if a dog has a scent and runs, its focus is on that, not the person recalling their dog. If you are not confident with your recall in these circumstances, put a falconry or bear bell on your dog or if you have funds a tracker than can be tracked on your phone. I have used bells and got teased by the gun dog community â here comes Sally with her black reindeer ha ha, but in new territory I know exactly where my dogs are, especially if itâs a group walk and you are distracted chatting etc. When they are young, I let a plastic long line (its 8ft) trail behind them that can run smoothly through grass and rough ground, because the dog is aware of it and what is behind. I never touch it but leave it trailing. I recall and reward so that it becomes habit. There are lots of different âtoolsâ, for instance in the gun dog world a stop whistle command and recall are used. Always have a reason for a recall, a reward, a sit, anything otherwise your dog will come back a couple of times, see no reason to come back and ignore you. Any trainer will tell you distance is important, your dog should not be a dot on the horizon, but closer to you so you have more control.
When your dog runs â donât leave the last place you saw them, donât walk on â recall with whistle and or voice. If you have other dogs with you, keep them close and back on leads. Alert someone if you are on your own that your dog has gone, if you came by car get someone to stand by car, but you stay put. The reality is that a dog running, goes deaf, they can run miles very quickly, when they stop, they realise they have no idea where they are. They turn to come back and its easy to think that their aim is to come straight back but there are distractions on the way, good smells, another rabbit etc. So they can take their time. Stop people who are walking around and ask them â have you seen my dog? Yes, it is a good idea to put something down that smells of you in the place your dog has gone missing. BUT also put a bed and food down in your own garden, leave a few lights on so it looks like you are home. You would be amazed but our breed, especially, will find their way home â even if it takes ten days to do that! DO NOT ASSUME YOUR DOG HAS BEEN STOLEN. For instance, we know that Bodi appeared and barked at the gate of the ownersâ home at 3am ten days after he went missing so donât assume that they will stay in the area you lost them. They are in a blind panic to start with but soon they are scenting the air, the ground âŚlooking for something familiar. There will be lots of false starts but âŚ.
Do not assume you know your dog and what it would do. We have heard it said so many times, oh no my dog would not do that, oh its friendly it would go up to anyone â well that is not always the case. Bodie ran away from Nicola in his own garden, three weeks after he went missing. He was feral and now had no faith in humans as he had lost one. He had to depend on his own wits. Do not assume that dogs have a plentiful food supply, unless they kill by accident, they have no idea that rabbit and pheasant are food as they, in all likelihood, have only been fed wet and dry food. However, they are scavengers, so if someone leaves food out for the foxes, or stocks a bird table and supplies are going faster than before â take note. We wanted to set up the barbecue a lot earlier than was done because the smell would have been tempting to a dog â hungry and not feral yet â he would have come in to the smell. IMPORTANT â your dog is not just going to turn up hungry and normal, lost dogs are different to when you saw them last particularly if they are missing for some time.
Use social media to get the news out that you have lost your dog, the first 48hrs are absolutely crucial, in fact if it was mine, I would be sounding the alert within a couple of hours!! Make notes of what happened, where and when, continue every day that passes, so that any help you are receiving are all on the same page. Make sure you update any information straight away, donât leave it thinking everyone will know this soâŚ.. Misinformation can waste time! Map any sightings â dogs tend to circle round their destination to check things out. A finders fee is a personal thing. We had two gypsy sites near the location so made the decision not to offer one. Be proactive, be a pest â you want to get your dog back!!
Drones and Tracker dogs are essential, but you canât use a tracker dog if you have nothing with your dogâs scent on, so multiple dog owners need to take that fact on board. When searching always make sure you have a dog lead with you. If your dog appears and has been missing a while, drop to the ground, donât make eye contact â just talk. Even if you are pretending to make a phone call, it will take time for your dog to remember your voice. Even though they ran off â in their mind you lost them! In the UK we have Dogs Lost as well and its important to get your dog registered on there asap. Alerts are then sent out by them to post codes in the area. If you put your number on the notification make sure you have your phone with you at all times. Likewise when your dog is found edit the number to stop hoax calls. Please donât be surprised if you get some weird comments on social media platforms, disregard them, I have received some really unpleasant scary ones but my focus was on finding Bodie and these losers can go do one as far as I am concerned.
I will be putting a simple 1 -10 list of what to do if you lose your dog, mainly for UK owners but some of it might be suitable for our overseas members. I will wait for comments on here in case there is something useful I can add. I am also going to ask Breeders to put this list in their puppy packs, regardless of breed, the comment we hear the most is, oh I did not know thatâŚ.if they have read it when their dog was 8 weeks old it might stick in the memory.
Sorry its not good news â of course there are things that could have hurt him, like railway lines and the ever present Blue Algae but we know from our contacts that the likelihood of him being stolen is negligible and we hope and pray that he is still alive and will one day be found. Thank you for all your support during this search and if nothing else we hope that the information posted above will be his legacy. So its not over â itâs a wait and see folks!
