Adam, The Dog That Nobody Knew

We loved him & lost him

In the town & in the villages almost all of the stray dogs are known to someone. The community dogs live a better life than the strays, being assigned to someone’s care they have a bed to sleep in, get fed & are looked out for.

But, a call came in for a dog that nobody knew & this was unusual.

Strays are sadly being moved around in Turkey at the moment. In large groups they tend to stay together or are identified by locals or through cctv but nobody had seen this little hound dog before.

He was cowering in a soggy ditch & was not happy to see the ambulance pull up. As staff approached he bared his teeth & made it very clear that their intentions were not welcome.

Dogs can be defensive when they suffering as much as road traffic accident victims are. But there was an extra level of aggression from Adam which led us to believe that he had a strong fear of humans. That coupled with his unbearable pain was a dangerous mix.

Staff carefully stretchered him in to the ambulance after putting a muzzle on him. We have several of different sizes in the clinic & in the ambulance for times such as these but as luck would have it we don’t have to use them that often.

We get criticised sometimes for using the muzzle when needed, perhaps because of the unfair muzzling of our XL’s, I don’t know. But what I do know is that staff & vets need to be protected from the bite of an angry dog no matter the reason. Make no mistake a dog has the potential to crush the bones in a hand with little effort. The bacteria in their saliva also has the potential to set up some pretty nasty infections.

Adam’s tests revealed that he had fractures in the pelvic area & a nasty infection. The infection most likely occurring before the accident.

He also had problems emptying his bladder & bowel. His spine was undamaged so it wasn’t a spinal injury causing this. Sometimes a bullet (yes, our dogs get shot a lot) can be found near the spine which causes these kind of problems but that wasn’t the case with Adam either.

Adam was made more comfortable with a urinary catheter & pain relief. I am not going to share images of his pelvic injury as it is too distressing.

As each day passed there was no neurological recovery despite the best efforts of our vets. It was clear that Adam would need one to one care when he was discharged.

It is fairly easy to find a foster in the UK capable of caring for dogs like Adam but in Turkey it is extremely difficult. Although not impossible.

However, sadly we didn’t reach that point as Adam’s infection could not be brought under control no matter how hard we tried.

He got worse until he reached the point of no return.

We give dogs every chance at life. That mantra is shared with shelter staff, community carers & vet staff. But, sometimes the only thing left for us to give them is a gentle & kind goodbye. And that is sadly what we had to do for Adam.

In life nobody knew him & nobody cared about him. Until he came under our protection. He became Adam & his life mattered to all of us.

Thank you for supporting the work we do with dogs who need us all so very much.

We are incredibly grateful to you for all your help & kindness