ohmidog!

A blind and deaf pug named Snowy disappeared under curious circumstances while in foster care, and Mid Atlantic Pug Rescue (MAPR) wants to know what happened to him.

Snowy was rescued after being abandoned in a backyard by a family in Wilmington, N.C., who moved away. He was blind, probably deaf, heartworm positive, with rotten teeth and skin infections.

But a foster volunteer in nearby Leland took him in, and Snowy began regular visits to the vet, all paid for by MAPR.

Early reports from the foster mom were encouraging:

“Last night, for the first time, he layed on his back and wanted belly rubs,” she wrote last November. “He’s finally trusting and feeling safe, which makes everything I’m doing feel so worthwhile and rewarding. His temperament is wonderful. He’s very easy going and sweet. He’s only improved from the moment I met him. Just a sweetheart!”

But somewhere along the way, things took a turn for the worse.

The foster mom in February contacted Robin Young, a board member of MAPR who helped arrange the foster placement, and told her she had to move and could no longer provide foster care for Snowy.

Young made arrangements for a volunteer to pick up Snowy, living in Leland, outside Wilmington, and bring him to Waxhaw, outside of Charlotte, where she could care for him herself until a new foster was found.

But when the volunteer called the foster mom, and sent emails, she got no response.

For months MAPR tried to make contact with the foster mom, even sending a certified letter, but still no response. Eventually they called the veterinarian treating Snowy, and learned that his file was “inactive.”

At MAPR’s insistence, the vet’s office contacted the foster mom, and she finally called Young, but even then it wasn’t clear what had become of Snowy.

“At first she said, ‘I gave him back to you. I gave him to that woman,’” Young recounted. Asked what woman, she said she didn’t know. And still later she said her ex-husband took the dog to Greensboro and gave her to “some woman.”

But no MAPR members or volunteers had received the dog, Young said.

“We really don’t know where he is, or who took him,” Young said. “At this point whoever has him must have taken him because they cared about him. At least I’m hoping so. But we want to make sure they were they given all the information about he needed, like the heartworm treatment.

“We’re not demanding he come back into the rescue, we just want to know if he’s OK,” she said.

MAPR asks anyone with information about Snowy to contact them at:
OUTREACH@MIDATLANTICPUGRESCUE.ORG