Size
(when grown) Large 61-100 lbs (28-45 kg)
Details
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Story
This is truly a sweet youngster that has had a rough life. She was put on a neighbor watch social media as a “free Doberman puppy.” A sharp-eyed rescue angel (God bless their constant vigilance) picked her up and took her to the vet. She had a large gash on the side of her neck that required sutures. Unsurprisingly, she's also heartworm positive. Her face and ear show signs of another dog attacking her at some early part of her life. The ear is completely slit and pegged back towards her head, and various white marks show where she likely has been bitten.
The rescue angel brought her to DRT where she is being treated for her heartworms as she awaits adoption to an actual loving home. As a reminder, heartworm treatment is both risky and expensive. When the worms die, fragments can break off and travel to the lungs, where they may block blood vessels and trigger dangerous blood clots. The clots can impair breathing and lead to sudden collapse or death.
There’s no doubt that prevention is safer than treatment, but that having been said, once a dog has heartworms, there’s no option but to give it the medicine that kills the worms. It takes several weeks for the worm fragments to be broken down by the immune system and absorbed so they are no longer a risk. (A miracle in itself, I’d say.) Once that happens, the dog can resume normal activity, safe from further danger.
In any case, in addition to the risk involved, the essential-to-life treatment is very expensive. If you would like to have a part in saving this dog’s life (and the lives of others who come in with heartworm), donations are very much needed, welcomed, and appreciated.
At this point, she seems to be rather calm and willing to please. Lots has happened in her life over the last couple of weeks, so we're letting her get comfortable while she chills.
Comments from the Rescue Angel: “She is very sweet, and prefers to just follow me around. She sleeps all night in a room by herself in a dog bed. I'm trying to get her to go into a large crate by me sitting in it and calling her with treats, but so far she won't walk into the crate.”
Observations from our volunteers:
“My first impression when I met Adeline was the obvious ‘What’s happened to this poor girl?’ Her chewed up ear, the stitches on her neck, and the obvious telltale marks from being bitten before were all evident. Then I sat down with her in the corral, and the next thing that came to mind was, ‘What a gentle soul this girl has!’ For the first ten seconds she was a bit shy, but that quickly disappeared, and she was between my legs waiting for me to caress her head and pet her sides. Whatever traumatic circumstances brought her to DRT haven’t affected her gentle nature. Every once in a while she’d go looking at whatever was happening outside the corral, but pretty quickly she came back for additional, well-deserved affection.”
While we have no way of knowing what her early life was like, it’s obvious it was not to her advantage. Her sweet spirit remains intact, however, and she clearly will make a loving, Velcro companion to the family that chooses to make her part of their lives. If yours is a match, follow the standard sequence: apply, acceptance, appointment, arrive, acquaint, away. Lives will be blessed all around, if you do.
