We have two lovely dogs, they’re 7 and 1 (both Chiweenies) and they always do everything together. We follow the same routine every night, and we’ve lived in the same house for 7 years. But 30 hours ago, one of our dogs went missing and the other is completely fine.
They went outside to go to the bathroom, and as usual, after 5-10 minutes, they were done. One of them came back to the porch, but the older dog? Gone. We’ve posted about it everywhere, left out her toys, bed, etc. We’ve physically searched the whole area and looked through surrounding neighborhoods multiple times. No one has seen her.
They have both been trained to never leave the yard or cul-de-sac. We even checked if it could’ve been a coyote, but there’s no sign of one. The thing that’s really confusing is that the younger dog is perfectly fine. I love her, but she has no survival skills and would’ve been the easier target. She would follow the older dog everywhere, and they both bark loudly at the smallest disturbance. We don’t understand why she didn’t follow the older one, why they didn’t make any noise, and why the older dog ran off. Could a large bird have taken her? She weighs only 11lbs, so we don’t think that’s likely.
We’ve hired a drone service with thermal technology to search within a 2.5-mile radius, but if she doesn’t show up, we’re hoping someone has her at home and hasn’t taken her to a shelter yet. We live in a semi-rural suburban area, and the older dog has been here since she was a puppy—she would have had to travel a long distance to get lost. Our guess is that something distracted her and she chased it, as she’s done that before but always stopped at the yard’s edge. It seems the most likely.
I’m just really confused, upset, and worried. I don’t know what else to do, and mentally, I can’t accept that she might be gone.
I’d lean towards thinking someone took her, since she didn’t make any noise. What’s the situation like with predators around your area? Do you have coyotes, bears, or large birds around often? Is there any chance bad people live nearby? Maybe put up reward posters and see if someone calls you. Someone might have taken your dog hoping to collect a reward.
@Shai
Thanks for the reply. Where we live, we don’t have big predators like wolves or bears. Occasionally we might see a fox. We’ve heard about coyotes in the area but haven’t seen them ourselves, and there haven’t been any incidents in the neighborhood. We live in a pretty safe neighborhood, so it’s not out of the question. The only reason I’m not sure about theft is that both dogs bark non-stop when anyone walks by, and the younger dog was outside too. But I’ll definitely think more about your idea.
This method helped me a lot: Hang up HUGE (the bigger, the better) signs around your neighborhood on telephone poles, so that people can read ‘LOST DOG’ as they drive by. Also, offer a reward. This will alert everyone in your neighborhood, including mailmen, delivery people, etc., and the reward might encourage some people to call. Place them at least 1/4 mile around your home. Also talk to your neighbors. Go door-to-door and tell them. And post on NextDoor.
My cat was missing for 8 weeks, but everyone in the neighborhood knew. One day, I got a call from someone 1/4 mile away. Their 10-year-old daughter saw my cat coming out of the canyon early in the morning. I caught her the next day. Those big signs were what brought her back.
@Tanner
Thanks for the advice! We’ve done a lot already but we’ll make sure to use larger signs and increase the reward. Tonight, I’m planning to stop by the store after work to buy more. My fiancée is helping with the drone search and will keep me updated. If we don’t find her soon, we’ll create new posters with the reward included.
When I was a teenager, my mom and I found a puppy in the woods behind a grocery store.
We found her owner after we took her to a pet store, and an employee mentioned, ‘Hey, someone asked us to keep an eye out for a missing yellow Lab puppy…’ That’s how we found the owner.
It was similar to your situation: The puppy and her mom were in the backyard, and when it was time to come inside, the mom came in but the puppy didn’t. In this case, the backyard had a 6-foot privacy fence, so the puppy couldn’t have escaped on her own. She must have been taken.
Why someone dumped her behind the grocery store, we don’t know. But I’d really suspect someone took your dog.