The Nereida Montes de Oca Sanctuary (the official name of HHHH's Sanctuary) said goodbye to two old favorites in the last 5 months (actually all the old dogs are favorites):
On September 11, Pilar brought Odie to the vet to be euthanized. For some days, he was having trouble walking, wasn't interested in food, and couldn't control his bowels. The morning that Odie couldn't get up and was crying, Pilar knew it was time to say goodbye.
On January 8, Bootsy died after one day of drinking lots of water and vomiting. She had been at the HHHH Sanctuary since 2012, when she was found on a street in Tegucigalpa, where she had been hit by a car. She was just left there, but luckily someone saw her, almost dead on the side of the road, and contacted Pilar. Bootsy was young and active, and Pilar had hoped she would find a forever home....but her forever home became the Sanctuary.
Last July, as we mentioned in the previous HHHH blog post, we said goodbye to Thor, the sweetest rottweiler, who spent his life at the Sanctuary because the only interested adopters saw Thor as a guard dog....and he definitely was not.
Amidst the goodbyes, HHHH welcomed new puppies. Fellow rescuer/HHHH volunteer, Guillermo, and his son, had been helping a neglected dog, who kept getting pregnant and whose family --had so far--refused to have her spayed. In July, she had a litter of eight. Guillermo's family adopted two of the males. On August 18, at 6 weeks old, they brought the rest of the family to the HHHH Sanctuary, four females and two males.
At HHHH the puppies received parasite treatments and were vaccinated. Pilar stayed busy picking up newspapers, laying down clean ones, and changing beds daily! But it was nice to have these new puppies around.
We've also mentioned that HHHH has been working with other rescues and shelters, in particular Organización ARI. On September 23, ARI took three of the puppies to an event celebrating World Adopted Dog Day. The male was adopted, but the two females returned to the HHHH Sanctuary at the end of the day.
Eventually, with hard work, perfect families were found for the remaining 5 perfect (as all puppies are) puppies!
Here's one of the puppies whose new family brought him to the vet for his 2nd round of puppy shots:
We're very grateful to Dr M (based in New Mexico), who donated medicines to our AKI Partner Organizations, many of which went to Helping Hands for Hounds of Honduras.
Without Pilar's vet, Orlando, HHHH wouldn't be able to help so many, especially the older, handicapped dogs and cats who have spent their lives at the Sanctuary. Besides using the donated meds for Sanctuary animals, Pilar re-donated some to Orlando, who is also a big animal rescuer and helps many low income families by providing vet care at reduced cost.
This dog was dumped in Suyapa near the university. Over a five-day period, people had tried to approach him and finally a woman was able to rescue him. She brought him to Dr Orlando, but she didn't have money for vet care, so --at no cost--Orlando cleaned him up and gave him the donated antibiotics (with some for the rescuer to keep up with the treatment) and is keeping an eye on him with ongoing check-ups.
Dr Orlando found another use for those donated meds for this stray cat that he feeds (and of course has neutered him). He had lots of fleas so the kitty got a dose of Bravecto (for cats) that Dr M donated.
Helping Hands for Hounds of Honduras has been an AKI Partner Organization since the very beginning of AKI--2007. Together, we help HHHH care for the unwanted-most of them older, handicapped, injured dogs and cats who call the Sanctuary home. Over the years, HHHH has worked with so many Honduran rescuers and shelters, training and supporting a network of animal caregivers, a new generation of animal rescuers.