This is the first part of a remarkable rescue story told by
one of my customers with a heart of gold…

Sweetie’s Story
By Lisa Clark

Saint Patrick’s Day March 17, 2004. A day I had no way of recognizing at the time as the beginning of a three-month long quest to save a dog’s life. The day a colleague mentioned that a homeless female dog looking like a black lab was staying with her puppies in an abandoned house outside of Laurel, DE., in an area known as Columbia. My colleague told me about the dog because she knew that I wouldn’t be able to hear of a dog starving, left to fend for itself and protect her puppies, without wrapping my heart around the dog’s story and propelling myself to action.

Although I had no idea how to capture the dogs or if they would even
let me get close to them, I said I would try to rescue them on the
following Saturday, which was March 20, 2004. I called a Rescue in
Seaford, De for advice, having been given this name of the rescue from
a friend. The rescue had told me about the two weeks it had taken them
to rescue the seven puppies from a back road outside of Laurel, and
that they could never find the mother whenever they returned to the
area to look for her. At that time I didn’t realize then that the
rescue had rescued the puppies I had just learned about, and that they
had been trying to help the same mother dog.

On that Saturday I drove from my home in Oak Orchard, DE across the
county to the Columbia area, but found no sign of puppies or mother
dog. When I knocked on neighbors’ doors to ask about the animals, they
told me that a rescuer had been around all week, and had retrieved the
puppies but was unable to find the mother. These neighbors, who worried
about the puppies, had been feeding them in the abandoned house, and
though the mother would leave the house when they entered, she had
never growled or made a threatening advance towards them. By now the
puppies, frightened and mangy when they were being saved, had been
treated by a local veterinarian hospital in Seaford, DE and were on
their way to good health, socialization and hopefully adoption. Further
inquiries provided the information that the mother had been living as
an abandoned, homeless dog in this area on Mt. Herman Circle in Delmar,
DE for over six years. She regularly turned over trash cans to scavenge
the garbage in order to keep up her strength and protect her puppies.
Having lost patience with her marauding, one of the neighbors was on
the verge of putting poison in the trash cans. She may have also
survived by eating dead chickens from nearby chicken farms- anything to
stay alive. I never saw the dog, but the next day I drove back over to
leave food for her by the edge of the woods….

Here’s a wonderful narrative from my new friend Avril (aka
Rosalie) who is a musician and fellow animal lover from the British
Isles.

“We started
the aviary over 10 years ago, more like 15, from two zebra finches purchased
from a local pet shop. Apart from a few “imports” to mix the gene
pool a bit, they have multiplied with enthusiasm, as you can see from the pics.
They are quite self regulating, actually, this incredibly fecund year follows a
couple of years when the population dwindled to a mere half dozen or so, but
this year is more than making up for it.

A touching little story you might like; we were given a zebra finch from a friend because he was a hooligan, and beat up the other birds in their aviary. Hmmm. But he was absolutely fine here, not only that but he befriended another little finch, who had lost a leg, and most of his feathers. He would groom him , tuck up with him at nightfall, protect him from the others, and they became absolutely devoted to each other, so much so, that they built a nest together, (2 little boys, mind, this is sounding like a soap opera .but absolutely true), and a little hen laid an egg in it, which they looked after!!!!!!!!!!!

Well, the little injured bird lived a good 18 months longer than we thought possible, thanks to the ministrations of the reformed character, and when he finally passed  away, the other one  died a couple of days later! Is your mascara running down your face yet, Merry? I got a lump in the throat just telling the story.”

Suzette, one of my customers, sent me this wonderful story about her pit bull Vito:

“I acquired “Homer the Homeless” at 5 weeks old.
Having a 14 yr old Golden Retriever, I really did NOT want a puppy. Let alone a
pit bull.

[Read more…]

As I told
you after our visit at The Veterinary convention in Ohio I wanted to let you
and all your other “fans” know how your beautiful jewelry helped
change the life of our dog and also change the way we treat our patients and
clients.

Back in 1994 I met you at the Midwest Veterinary Convention in Ohio where I had a booth promoting our
school The Healing Oasis Veterinary Hospital and WellnessCenter and we had our bull terrier
“Teddy Spaghetti” as our mascot.  I saw your booth and thought
how beautiful your work was and I wanted you to make me a pin, earrings, and a
necklace of my little “Teddy”.  I brought “Teddy” over
to meet you and placed my order and you told me it could take up to 3 mos to
get my jewelry.  I was patient but ran to the post office every day
waiting for my jewelry that, at the time, I paid what I considered a lot of
money for.  Finally the package arrived!!  I ripped the packing open
only to find jewelry that looked like a large red-eared rat!!  I was SO
disappointed that when my husband came home I couldn’t wait to show him the
hideous creature you called jewelry!  As we compared it to
“Teddy” it was the hit over the head that we needed because it looked
exactly like her!!  We , in living with her every day, never saw her her
allergies flare up and her previous owner said she had food allergies!
Not only were her ears bright red, her muzzle was bright red and she had an
odor to her that we never noticed!!  She was typical of the animals we see
in our practice and we always comment when they leave” How do they live
with that smell?!”  It was that day we started to actively treat her
food allergies which after 5 years of  holistic treatment  she was completely
under control and because of The Magic Zoo, she just turned 14years old this
year, her hearing actually improved (it was said she was deaf when we got her),
and she travels all over the country with us happy and healthy!

The Magic Zoo not only changed her life and our life but now we can counsel our
clients on allergies not only with more options but with empathy and
compassion.  We have been successfully treating these animals ever
since!  So in one sentence The Magic Zoo has saved the life of :Teddy
Spaghetti” and has changed the lives of countless animals because of
Merry’s life-like work!!

Pretty profound from a few pieces of jewelry, eh?

Thanks again for you artistic work and thank you for my newest addition of the
donkeys earrings and pendant!!!

Your biggest fan,

Michelle J. Rivera