Rescuing Across Country

This past weekend, Grey Face Rescue & Retirement teamed up with the folks at Happy Ending Rescue in Waco, Texas to transport 9 of their dogs the 1,000+ miles across country.

Happy Ending Rescue is a dog rescue located in Hewitt, TX. Happy Endings opened its doors in 2006 with the goal of rehoming large breed dogs, specifically Rottweilers and Pitbulls. Unfortunately, due to insufficient funds, Happy Endings Rescue will be closing their doors in March which leave many dogs homeless with the only choice to be transferred to their local shelter. Happy Endings Rescue made an emergency Facebook page seeking rescues to take a majority of their dogs and one way or another – Grey Face was contacted.

Our Intake Manager, Elise Lieser called me and surprisingly she wasn’t crying because a special senior is pulling at her heart strings. She calmly said, “I’m going to ask you something, and it’s kind of crazy.” Mind you, we’ve been open for less than a year and our ducks just don’t line up in a row quite yet so her opening statement was very  frightening. She told me all about the rescue, stated that they were closing their doors due to insufficient funds and they don’t want anyone to judge or be disrespectful, we just need to find homes for their dogs. Obviously, I had a few questions like how the heck would these dogs get here? But Elise had it covered. I told her if she can find transportation, guarantee the dogs are vaccinated, fixed and ready to go then why not!

Elise was quick to start posting multiple dogs on our Dogs Needing Foster Facebook group. At this point, we failed to communicate this cross-country rescue to the rest of our team who suddenly came out of the woodwork in a panic (rightfully so). We gave a brief overview of this very large rescue mission to the team and began moving forward. Sherry, our Foster Manager (who by the way, is a SAINT) started to put together the ever so fast moving pieces while adding new team members to our Fostering Team (did I mention Sherry was the ONLY volunteer handling our fostering at this time? Yep, she’s a saint). She was stress… to say the least but I made sure to supply the beer on our recent Wednesday meetings which have now become Beer Wednesdays!

Long story short, we found long-term and short-term fosters for all 9 dogs. The folks at Happy Ending Rescue showed up at 7:00 PM exactly with all 9 dogs in tow. Our team, the fosters and volunteers waited patiently outside the van looking at our new temporary house guests.

Stella was one of the first out the door and she was SO shy. Johnny B walked out with a member of their rescue who spent a few minutes one on one with the big boy as they had a close relationship. Oliver came out like a bat out of hell! Franklin and Mighty were lifted out of the vehicle as their porky bodies weren’t ready for the steep jump. Karlee was quickly uploaded and warmed with a blanket by her new foster mommy. Ginny was nervous but warmed up quickly with her foster parents. Casey was one of the first to come out of the van as well and she was quickly placed in her vehicle to head to her new foster home. Last but not least, Sandman the GREAT made his way out of the vehicle and with his foster parents (who have one other Grey Face Foster).

All dogs received an exam from the wonderful Dr. Bea Winkler and our Vetting Manager, Sherin. They both did a phenomenal job assessing the dogs (although some were pretty amped up).

Thank you to the amazing fosters and volunteers that made this incredible experience worthwhile. Most importantly, thank you Happy Endings Rescue for not only driving across country but for donating kennels, food, medication and more. We will never be able to thank you enough for your great doings. We wish we had more time to spend with ya’ll (my attempt to reenact their southern accent). Until next time, Texas – we will keep you updated!