Ben & I are volunteers with a Greyhound rescue group (TEAM Greyhound of Ohio) that take retired racing Greyhounds from tracks and place them in loving homes. I usually help out with reference checks and home visits. Yes, we do those things before placing a dog in a home. Many times these animals come from bad situations at the racing tracks so the last thing we want is to place them in a bad home environment. We do decline potential adopters that we feel aren't suitable dog owners, and there are a lot out there by the way. Anyway... today was busy for TEAM Greyhound because we are preparing to get 32 dogs from tracks in Florida so there is a lot of shifting of dogs to make room for the new group coming in. We use about 8 prisons in Ohio, Dayton Correctional being one of them, to train and care for the dogs. We use prisoners to train & socialize the dogs. This allows us to rescue many more dogs and also makes the dogs more adoptable because they are well mannered. It is a win, win situation for the dogs and the prisoners! Today Gideon & War Path were "paroled" from prison and need to go to foster homes while they wait for their "forever home" so that the new dogs from Florida can be trained in prison. I helped with this process today. Gideon stayed several hours with us while the other dog went to his foster home and then we took Gideon to his foster home! He was such a sweet dog! So laid back and friendly and BIG! He towered over Sophie, but they got along great! Claire squealed at him the whole time he was here... it was so funny! Maybe someone reading this has room in their heart for Gideon or one of the other thousands of Greyhounds that need a loving home! Even if you're not interested go to www.teamgreyhound.com and look at pictures and descriptions of the dogs available for adoption! It's just so neat to look at these beautiful creatures!
Gideon & Sophie hanging out!
Isn't he beautiful? So sweet! He found Sophie's bed very quickly and in typical Greyhound style, he slept on the bed the majority of the time he was here!
7 comments:
He does look huge next to Sophie!! Nice post Michele. I hope they all find nice homes.
I did not know that you guys were involved with that. After I told Joel about how you guys got Sophie, we decided that is what we will do when we move to a house with a bigger yard in a few years.
He is soooooo cute Michele! What a sweet dog! I love his black eye patch. Don't you just want to bring them all home and love them to pieces? I so wish all the orphaned, abandoned, and abused dogs had a lvoing family!!!!!!! There are so many of them and not enough caring families!
Michele, what a wonderful post you made. It was so insightful to us folks that don't know that much about the dog rescue programs. I wish we could take him, but it wouldn't be fair to our two goldens right now. They are "king and queen" of our house. I'm like Heather, I love the black patch over his one eye. What an experience for Claire. As she grows up and sees and learns about this program, she can get involved and help out you and Ben. What a wonderful, special gift you will be giving to Claire. My heart breaks when I see and hear about all the dogs that don't have homes.... let alone GOOD HOMES. I can't stand to hardly think about it. Thanks for sharing this story.
Barb H.
P.S. I think you guys should keep him. Every family needs two dogs! And he got along so well with Sophie and Claire, too. Remember, this is coming from a family that once had 4 dogs at the same time!
What a neat opportunity. I love dogs!
I loved reading about the greyhound rescue. I had wondered how it worked. I think it is awesome to use the prison system too for their training. Our dog, Bud, came from a Golden Retreiver Rescue...he is a great part of our family!
I am with Barb...I think YOU GUYS should adopt Gideon...he is a sweetheart!
Just to let everyone know... Gideon is most likely going to be adopted by his foster family! They LOVE him and he gets along great with their female Greyhound! He is such a sweeet boy and he so deserves a loving home! I hope he's found it!
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