There are many reason people leave Thailand for an extended period of time or may be forever and if you are a dog owner chances are high you’ve got one or more doggies and the question comes up what to do with your canine family members.
At this moment another question will be decided: Are you just only a dog owner or are you a dog lover?

All to often the answer is: just a dog owner.
Those people don’t care more for their dogs than for any piece of furniture. Not needed, easy to get a new one at their destination so what, leave their dogs behind them condemn their former loyal friends to a life as a street dogs. And those former family dogs are ill prepared for such a hard life.

If the answer is: dog lover, there are two ways to react

1. Looking for a new home in Thailand or
2. Taking him/her with you (if possible the best solution).

There could be good reasons for each alternative and with a bit of information it’s not to difficult to walk either way. In most cases you would be able to do it all alone and even if circumstances are a bit harder it’s still manageable with a little help from your friends (and may be Care for Dogs).

To assist you Hanna from CfD collected some information around the topic of taking your dog (or cat) with you to abroad. Just see the resulting guideline as PDF here… or via google docs here.

And as a little encouragement here some pictures of Zoe our latest International Adoption all the way to Finland (in June) preparing for the flight. Zoe is now happy in Finland and is just a loving and loyal companion to her new family – finally she has a place to call her own after years of waiting at the shelter for the right one.

Our dear Sheena is not with us any more.

She fought her battle against lymphoma with dignity and strength.

A week ago she had already a very poor blood result, but still looked amazingly well. Soraya had looked at her and said: “Can’t we just pretend that this result doesn’t exist?”

Sheena was well a few more days more but went downhill the last two days, wasn’t eating any more, getting weak, her gums completely white, her red blood cells on a record low (PCV 5) and her liver getting worse as well.

We didn’t want to extend her suffering and decided to let her go peacefully with the help of Dr. Chakkrit.

Sheena was one of our long-term shelter residents. Ally and I had picked her up from Wat Nong Baa Klang 3 years ago, the temple where the NIS-CfD school project had started. What was meant to be a temporary stay for mange treatment turned into 3 years being with us after we found out that she had lymphoma.

Amandine did research about her chemotherapy in USA and we got amazing results but in the long run the tumor came back. Sheena was loved by team and volunteers, she was a strong personality with soulful eyes.

Sheena, we will miss you.

Rest in peace.

Love from all of us.

As promised here some more details about Sammy and how he made his long way to his new family in Denmark, told by his in more than one way “human” new family members:

Finally our new family member Sammy arrived in Denmark. We had been waiting for him for 3 months and we were very excited when Karin e-mailed us that he was now on his way.

And there he was….

We picked Sammy up in Copenhagen airport on the 29th of April 2010. He looked so cute as he was sitting in the transport box, wearing a green t-shirt, so he wouldn´t feel cold during the flight. He was very happy, but also very tired. The vets examined him and assured us that he was in a very fine condition, which convinced us that we had done the right thing by bringing him to Denmark.

And how did we end up adopting a dog from Thailand?

We (2 adults and our 2 girls) were having a 2 months vacation in Thailand. We had decided to stay in Chiang Mai for 3 weeks. During our stay we wanted to donate some money to a foundation which is making a difference towards dog welfare. We have been travelling in Thailand many times and have been shocked to see how many dogs are treated. We have seen dogs with infections, broken legs, bad skin conditions, beaten dogs, starving dogs etc. etc. etc…….

How can people be that cruel to animals???

Next to a restaurant by the night bazaar we found this flyer!!! Care for Dogs!!!!

We immediately decided to visit the Care for Dogs Foundation, and called the phone number. A very kind and gracious woman answered the phone, and invited us to come to the shelter. We later got to know that it was Karin who had answered the phone.

Two days later we arrived at the shelter. So many dogs! SO MANY DOGS!!! We love dogs, and were very excited to meet all the dogs. It was so nice to see that somebody is doing a difference to dogs in need. The staff really loves dogs. The volunteers are working so hard without any salary and are giving the dogs as much love and care as possible. It was very touching to see their commitment, and after a thoughtful visit, we decided that we wanted to help in some way. How could we help? It did not take long to decide what to do. We wanted to bring a dog home with us to Denmark! In that way we could give a dog a good home, with all the love and care it deserves.

Karin gave us a tour at the shelter, and told some stories about some of the dogs. Who should we pick? It wasn´t easy until we were introduced to a small white loving dog. He had this brown spot on his eye, and we fell in love with him the moment we saw him. We took him for a walk, and that was it. He was the dog that we would bring to Denmark. No doubt about it!

We heard that Sammy had been living in a park and the management of the park wanted to get rid of all the street dogs there and there was even talk of poisoning the dogs. That’s how Sammy came to the shelter of Care for Dogs to have a save place to live and hopefully one day find his forever home.

Care for Dogs had adoptions abroad before. They knew everything about exporting a dog and did everything that was needed for exporting him to Denmark. Everything! Flight ticket, vaccinations, export permits, vet control, transport box etc.. We only had to pick him up in Copenhagen. But first we had to wait 3 long months, while he had to be in quarantine at the shelter.

In Denmark we missed him so much, and had bought him some toys, a bed and a new leash. Everything was ready long before he arrived.

Sammy has now been with us for almost a month, and he acts as he has been here since he was born. He is such a loving dog, and he loves to cuddle all the time. When we go to bed, he likes to jump into the bed to say good night to us. He is very good towards our children, and he loves his daily walks, and has gotten some new dog friends, which he is playing with in our garden.

We didn´t know if Sammy would know that he should do his business outside. But that hasn´t been a problem at all. From day one, he went to the door when he wanted to go outside.

He is a bit shy when he meets new people, but after a little while, he gets more confident, and seeks the strangers’ company.

We love our new family member very much, and are very happy that we have brought him to Denmark. We are sure that someday we will adopt another dog from Thailand.

Thank you “Care for Dogs” for doing such a wonderful job!!

Best regards

from

Maria and Jimmi Koldenborg.

Though Care for Dog’s focus is and will be helping the dogs here in Chiang Mai Thailand by our local initiatives, we’re always happy if a dog gets happy and so we take the chance even if it takes us (or better the doggie) half around the world.

**** UPDATE ****

Sammy made it! Thursday he arrived in Denmark. Here you can watch his first steps (runs) at his new family home on video.

What a happy dog!

More about his way from shelter dog to family member coming soon.

**** UPDATE ****

Are you flying from Bangkok to Copenhagen with Scandinavian Airline (SAS)?

.. and would you like to help a rescued street dog in an easy and uncomplicated way?

Care for Dogs Foundation is looking for a traveler able (and willing) to accompany Sammy to Denmark where his new owners are longing to pick him up. The dog’s travel costs will be completely covered.

If you are travelling from Bangkok to Copenhagen with Scandinavian Airline anytime after April 26th, 2010, please consider accompanying Sammy, one of our rescued dogs, to his new home.

It’s an easy procedure. We will meet you at the airport in Bangkok, check in the dog together with you and, in Copenhagen, Sammy’s new family will pick him up at the airport. Care for Dogs Foundation will prepare all administration papers and all costs will be paid for by Sammy’s new owners.

If you are interested or have any questions about the process, please contact us.

Are you interested to help a homeless dog to get to his new home abroad?

Care for Dogs Foundation, Chiang Mai / Thailand
e-Mail: karin@carefordogs.org
Telefon-Nr. 0066 (0)8 9559 83 83

Last April, we adopted Pirate from Care for Dogs. He was a stray who had been hit by a car and was rescued by some kind ladies in the Mae Jo area. They called us and I was part of the rescue team – my first rescue.

The vet informed us that aside from his hurt leg, he had a terrible heartworm infection, one that they didn’t think he would survive. At the shelter he was extremely depressed and not responsive, but the team at Care for Dogs looked after him diligently, gave him all his meds, changed his wound dressing and made sure he was at every vet appointment.

After several weeks, he amazingly recovered from the heartworm infection. Unfortunately though, his hurt front leg healed improperly and calcified in a bad position. This caused him to drag it and cause more injury to it. It was decided that the leg would have to be amputated.

Our family decided to add Pirate to our already large family of 2 male dogs and a cat. Pirate is now very comfortable and happy in his new home, although the 3 males still occasionally growl at each other.

On his three legs, he runs around the yard, jumps on the furniture and goes up and down the stairs without any problems.

After having lived on the streets, getting hit by a car and then losing a leg, he doesn’t yet completely trust his human or animal family but we’re hoping with lots of consistent love and cuddling, he will learn to love us as much as we love him.

This adoption story is a rather special one. Not only is it about 2 dogs, 2 individually special dogs but also 2 very special people.

In Mae Rim, not far from the Water Buffalo camp and Prem Tinsulanonda International School, is a Dog Training & Boarding facility called “The Happy Gambol Dog Training School” (Phone : 085 036 5732), run by Nok & Patrick.

Over the last year and a half, they have taken dogs from the shelter, training the dogs to be more sociable with a view to increasing their chances of adoption and boarding them within their 5 star premises, all for free.

One such dog was a gorgeous little Thai mix dog called Sammy. He had initially stayed at the shelter during which time Karin identified that he was a little timid and shy of humans and preferred to be on his own. When Karin introduced him to her household pack with a view to widening his outlook on social behavior, he remained isolated and lonesome. Given the opportunity of training with Patrick, after seeing the results he had achieved with other dogs, Karin jumped at the chance.

After spending some quite a while with Patrick & Nok, it was clear they had bonded and the results of Sammy’s training had paid off.

Another special dog was Chook. This big hearted little dog was rescued from a miserable village life and it must be said that if Care for Dogs had not rescued the him, that misery would not have lasted too much longer as he would surely have died an early death from malnutrition and possibly being abandoned. He was born with only 2 hind legs and being young, weak and flopping about in squaller, the family considering him a burden, Care for Dogs were very happy to be in the right place at the right time, to rescue him.

Given his disability and his obvious poor chances of adoption, Care for Dogs approached The Happy Gambol and asked if they may be able to assist with a special training course to not only encourage improvements in mobility but also his chances of adoption. A video of the 2 legged dog “Faith”, who had learned to walk like a human, recorded from the Oprah Winfrey show had given the inspiration that Chook would be able to learn the same. And indeed, since he has been trained by Patrick & Nok, Chook has made progress and is walking on his two hind legs.

A video of “Faith”, which may be of interest to you, can be viewed here…

These 2 special cases seem to have been very lucky indeed, as Patrick & Nok finally decided to adopt Sammy & Chook.

A heartfelt “Thank you” to Patrick and Nok for not only giving free training and boarding for Chook and Sammy but also for offering them a permanent family home.

To read more about other Dogs with Special Needs, follow this link …