Houdini of hounds finds a home, for now

Hey there, time traveller!
This article was published 14/02/2011 (5586 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

This is the story of the one that got away. And away. And away.

Tanner is an 18-month-old golden retriever/terrier mix. His origins are hazy. He was first spotted by animal control workers in Selkirk. He’d been living outside and refused to be caught.

Instead, he eventually turned himself in, flying through the open door of a Selkirk house and jumping on the couch.

Animal control were given the wayward pup. They adopted him out to a Winnipeg family. That arrangement lasted a few hours. Tanner zipped out an open door and disappeared.

Here’s Tracy McWhirter, who helped organize an astonishing rescue effort:

“He stayed in the Minto Street area for two weeks, living in a back lane just north of the Pal (Palomino Club). People in the neighbourhood tried to catch him, Winnipeg Animal Services tried to catch him as did several people in the ‘dog community,’ who had heard of his plight.

“Just like in Selkirk, Tanner was too nervous and too quick and would run away from anyone who tried to approach him. The people in the Minto neighbourhood built him a shelter in the back lane and put out food, wanting to keep him warm and fed.

“And then, just as he did in Selkirk, Tanner randomly chose a house one morning after Christmas, and when the homeowner opened her front door, Tanner ran inside and waited to be picked up.”

He was sent to a Steinbach-area rescue home run by Sonia Christ. She describes him as “very sweet, just an amazing dog.”

She worked with Tanner, teaching him how to be a pet. Things went well and he was adopted out a few weeks later by one of the Minto Street families.

It didn’t go well. They got Tanner home, opened the car door and he bolted. It was bitterly cold that week.

“So now he was lost, scared, confused, freezing and in danger of getting either hit by a car or having his leash catch on something, leaving him exposed to the elements,” McWhirter recalls.

This is where the dog community got involved. Someone set up a Winnipeg Lost Dog Alert page on Facebook. Tanner’s photo and story were posted. Three hundred people joined within days. Christ coordinated the search from her home.

“It was a lot of work,” she says. “People were calling in tips, telling us where he’d been seen.”

Christ came to Winnipeg and searched the areas where Tanner had been spotted. She brought along another foster dog Tanner knew. She hoped the scent would attract him. He remained elusive.

Strangers came out and joined the search. They put up posters, texted each other with sightings and posted updates on Facebook. He remained on the run, determined to avoid his would-be rescuers.

Six days after he vanished, someone saw Tanner sleeping on the front step of a house. The rescue team mobilized.

“They cornered him,” remembers Christ. “They blocked him in with cars and basically surrounded him. He was captured in a fenced yard.”

She laughs.

“Once he was caught he was like ‘OK, game over! You got me.'”

This Forrest Gump of the canine world had people from across North America and Japan following his journey. Scores of people who were involved in the search efforts went on Facebook and expressed their joy at his capture.

So what happens to the escape artist now?

“He’s going to stay with me for a little while longer,” says Christ. “It’s going to take a very special home.”

One with good locks and high fences, I assume.

“He’s a very special dog,” says his foster mom. “His survival is just amazing.”

So is the effort that a group of strangers made to bring the Houdini of hounds home.

lindor.reynolds@freepress.mb.ca