Fur-mum to 5 dachshunds, all rescues.
Ricky believes she has been “owned” by a dachshund since 2005, although she believes her first dog as a child was also a dachshund! Her love of the breed started when she brought her standard black and tan puppy Gracie home at 10 weeks!
Gracie spent every day of her life in bed between her husband John and her till she passed on June 2, 2015, from Congestive Heart Failure.
Gracie was the love of her and her husband John’s life and all of Ricky’s family fell in love with her, including all 8 of her Grandchildren.
When Gracie was 6, we decided it would be nice to adopt a dachshund not so fortunate as our own, we had been on a waiting list for a year or so with no success so I responded to an ad on a for sale site.
Winston’s ad read:
“Due to circumstances, we must re home a 7 ½ month old Dachshund that we are looking after for our friend, her flat mate left the gate open, and the dog escaped, that was a few months ago, now she cannot take him back because she moved into a place that does not allow pets and we can’t keep him either.”
There were no pictures, so I emailed and asked for a pic, the picture that we received was not the dog that came to us. We couldn’t go and see him, the lady said she would bring him to me, she arrived and said we’ve been at the dog park, and he was limping.
Naturally it was love at first sight for us and we did not notice anything peculiar for a couple of hours, however as the excitement waned, we could see he not only limped but actually held his leg up and walked and ran on 3 legs, he was extremely skinny, and he looked malnourished.
It was Anzac Day so we could not get him to the vet until the next day…
To our shock, the vet confirmed a broken leg in 2 places and a fractured pelvis, there were no other symptoms to confirm anything other than physical abuse by a person/s, and he was dehydrated and starved. That was the beginning of a long road to rehabilitation, 2 operations and lots and lots of love.
Winston was my first-hand experience of animal cruelty; but sadly, not my last.
I vowed that I would help do all I could to rescue and re home this breed that I had grown to adore and so my passion and drive to rescue and re home dachshunds and to help owners needing to re home their precious pets was born.
We now have a total of 5 rescues in our loving home and wouldn’t have it any other way!
