Over the river and through the woods

Gus, who is apparently not your average 3 month old pup, slipped out of our yard last night through a tiny gap in the fence by an old gate, and was gone for 10 hours. Mind you, this gap in the fence has been there since we moved in, and 12 other foster dogs have never used it to make an escape. Bridget once pushed the gate open, but only made it into our neighbors yard before Kelly corralled her, barking for help, and Sonepheth was able to call them both back into the yard.

Not Gus... they were all in the yard playing at around 7:30pm, and he just went for it, easily sliding through the 4-5 inch hole and never looking back. We looked for him everywhere, called him, tramped through the neighbors yards, and nothing. We even put Kira and Kelly on the case, and although they seemed intrigued by our pleas to "find Gus" and each of them seemed to scent for a while on the same path, let's just say neither of them will never be search and rescue dogs.

I barely slept at all last night, only long enough to dream about finding Gus, then waking again to realize that he was still in fact missing. Then at about 5:30 am, Kira started barking, then Kelly, then Bogey, then a fourth faint woof that sounded like it was coming from outside! Sure enough, Gus had returned! I went outside and called him. He responded by running to hide under the truck. I yelled to Sonepheth for help and went to stand in front of the gap in the fence (I did so because in one of my earlier dreams where Gus had returned to the yard, he slipped out again, and I had scolded myself--in the dream-- for letting that happen). Sonepheth came out and I actually had to ask him if we were awake! We were indeed. When we brought him inside, all he wanted to do was curl up in his crate.

His big adventure seems to have made him regress a bit. He was loathe to go out on a leash this morning, even to leave the protection of his laundry room hide out at all. Our biggest goal with Gus is to get him properly socialized, and that had been progressing nicely until last night. In the few hours we were home this morning though, he did seem to be starting to warm up again. We had planned to have him neutered tomorrow, but that has been postponed for a couple of weeks, just until he becomes a little more confident with us and with the world.

The gap in the fence is no longer an issue, Sonepheth covered it with some extra chain link fencing this morning. And as for Gus, he is on leash restriction for a while, even in the yard.