The Hope Litter

This was supposed to be a somehow easy rescue..... it wasn't.

Laura, our director, met Marco and his 12 pups while she was delivering dog food in the beginning of the quarantine.

One of our philosophies is: spay/neuter first, because no one knows what will happen tomorrow, and what ever does, at least the dogs are spayed/neutered.

So, two month old puppies and the momma, another female and a male where taken to the local Humane Society of Cozumel Island where they offer completely free surgeries of spay and neuter to the public.

From the 12 pups, 9 survived. Two died after the surgery, one was euthanized for severe skeletal malformation.

Puppies are, normally, easy to give out on adoption: they're cute, everybody wants a pup.
That's why we decided to do a full rescue with them, instead of just letting Marco to give them away to whoever wanted them.

Rescue included giving them treatment for their skin problems, deworming, vaccinations and screening of the potential adopters.

We knew that this process would'nt be the easiest. Marco lives a little bit further away from the limits of town, in a marginated area (one of the poorest) called Ranchitos. This area lacks public services such as proper roads, electricity and sewage. Although Marco had a

phone, it wasnt easy for him to charge it, so communication was sometimes deficient and made coordination difficult.

This was May 28th, a couple of months into the pandemic. Kan wasn't a thing yet. It was Laura in her boyfriends car, picking up 9 dirty smelly crazy pups using a box to take them to their vet consultations at the Humane Society.

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The vets determined the dogs had fungus, so we began the treatment while searching for foster homes.

To take care of 9 pups is not easy, add that they need 2 baths a week for the fungus, plus you live in a small place with your other 6 adult dogs, no electricity, in the middle of the jungle... we needed foster homes.

We bought everything they needed: food, pills, shampoo. We found fosters for two of the pups.

After a couple of visits to the vet, we noticed that the dogs where not getting better from their skin. Vets said that there was too much humidity in their household and proceeded to vaccinate them.

Next week, next consultation, even the dogs that where at foster homes weren't improving their skin. Vets did another check up and determined the same diagnosis: fungus, increased the dose of the treatment.

Next week... 5th week, 5th consultation was with another vet. The pups where in very rough shape that we decided to see another veterinarian.

This was Satur's (back then Tucán) development.

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The pups were smelly, itchy, in pain. I was in pain too. To see them like that, after all the efforts that Marco had done to give them their baths, their pills.. after all the resources spent. They did not deserve that. The veterinarians either misdiagnosed or failed to discover the mange during the weekly consultations.

We took the pups to a private vet, Dr. Raul Rosado. The moment he saw them he said: mange! He prescribed a pill for ticks and fleas that also works on mange. Also recommended changing the shampoo.

It took the dogs another month and a few weeks to recover. The pustules got dry, the itchiness stopped, their skin was loosing the swelling from the moment they took the pill.

A little fast forward to the good parts of this rescue story.

The two pups that were fostered (Kika and Michelin) were adopted by their fosters. And Michelin foster decided to adopt another sibiling: Almendra!

Anita also got adopted by a great family! So, of the 9 pups, 4 are already adopted with great families: Kika now Luna, Michelin, Almendra and Anita.

November 19th, 5 months after their spay and neuter, the 5 remaining pups have grown to be 7 month old wild pups.

Marco gave them a lot of love, but little education and socialization. We also failed in that matter: time, resources, availablity, pandemic, it all played against.

Thankfully, our friends of Dog's Paradise Dog Hotel and Day Care gave us a space for 4 pups (Satur, Venus, Pirate and Bandid), and one of our volunteers took another one (Buda) so they could be properly socialized and trained to be functioning dogs.

After a month and a week at the hotel, Satur and Venus are ready to go to loving foster homes. Pirate and Bandid are still to this day at Dog's Paradise overcoming their fears and socializing with dogs and humans.

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These 4 dogs are already adopted in Canada but are still in Cozumel. Our amazing friends of Taco Dog Rescue have found loving homes for them.

Their flight from Cancun to Vancouver was supposed to be February 17th with Aeromexico, but due to the recent canadian restrictions on travel, the dogs are stranded until further notice on April 30.

They where supposed to flight along with other rescues we have: Milo, Bulebar and Blacky.

We are trying every possibility to send the pups to Vancouver.

So, this story isn't over. Stay tuned.

Please so we can continue taking care of the Hope Litter!
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