A good reason to tatoo / microchip your dog(s) or cat(s)

Another one of Windsor's finest makes the news. Now I really don't know who leaves a purebred Yorkie out in the backyard unfenced and from the sounds of it, not tied up (not that I agree with tying a dog up), then takes off back into the house for a few minutes. Knowing every couple years dogs are stolen from this area from their backyards and sold.

I have a feeling the dog the neighbour has is most likely the Sullivan's. Unfortunately this is a story like all the rest that the news will never follow-up and report back on.

http://www.windsorstar.com/news/With+Dogfight+between+neighbours/6309648/story.html

WINDSOR, Ont. -- It’s a dog with an identity crisis.

Two dog-loving families have been barking accusations at each other in a bitter dispute over the identity of a Yorkie puppy.

After Art Sullivan’s puppy disappeared from his back yard, he learned his nearby neighbour Mirna Saric had recently brought home a similar dog. The fact that the little pooch answers to two different names isn’t helping things. Depending on who you talk to, he’s either Doogie or Peanut.

Police have been called. The families have had several confrontations.

“I took like three steps back and I said ‘Doogie, come here,’” said Sullivan, who lives on Millen Street. “He came right over and he stood right beside me. Then she was like ‘Peanut, Peanut’ and the dog ran over there.”

After a relentless campaign by his children, Emily, 8, and Jaylynn, 4, Sullivan said he broke down and got them a dog. On Dec. 24, he brought home the six-week old puppy.

The kids named him Doogie. Emily said she wanted the dog “real bad.”

“I was really excited,” she said. “I lay on the ground and he licks me. We run around in the back and he chases me. When he needs to go to the bathroom I put him on a leash. Or my dad just stands out there and watches him, but my mom doesn’t.”

On March 5, her mom Tricia Ouellette let the dog out the back door where there is no fence. She went back in to make a sandwich. A couple minutes later, she went back outside. Doogie was gone.

“When I had to go pick my daughter up at daycare, it was so hard to tell her we’re going to go home and she’s not going to see the dog come running at her,” said Sullivan.

They put up missing dog signs, and asked around the neighbourhood if anyone had seen their dog.

“A few days later we hear word that this lady, her boyfriend just got her a dog,” said Sullivan.

They said they went to the neighbour’s place a couple times but weren’t allowed to see that dog. During the course of various confrontations, both sides called police.

At one point, Sullivan went over to Saric’s place with an officer.

“The dog was excited to see me, I’m pretty sure the dog was excited to see me,” said Sullivan.

He called the dog, it came to him. Saric called the dog, it went back to her.

“We’re 100 per cent sure this is our dog,” said Sullivan.

Saric is just as adamant it’s hers.

Windsor police said there’s not much they can do because neither of the families have paperwork proving they own it. Sullivan and Ouellette have filed papers through small claims court.

Saric said she’ be happy to have her day in court.

“This is ridiculous,” said Saric, who also lives on Millen. “The Windsor police have been out here three times and obviously each time they were satisfied with what I had to say because I still have the dog. So if she wants to, she can take me to court.”

Unlike Sullivan, Saric said her dog is not a purebred. Hers is a Yorkie-Shih Tzu mix. She said she got her four-month-old dog, named Peanut, on March 1.

She took Peanut from it’s previous owner, who was sick. Since she got the dog March 1, Saric said, that previous owner died from a heart condition.

“I feel like they zeroed in on us because our dog may resemble the breed their dog is,” said Saric. “Their dog is a purebred Yorkie. Mine’s not.”

She said her dog has been microchipped, and she has had it scanned.

“And I’m saving that for my day in court.”

Saric later didn’t return a phone call asking for her veterinarian’s name.

Michael Severin, a veterinarian with Walker Road Animal Hospital, said the best way to settle the dispute is to check the microchip. Looking at tattoos if the dog has them, along with dental records or any medical conditions, would also help.

Severin, who isn’t involved, said it’s pretty hard to definitively settle a dispute over a dog’s identity just by looking at it.

But he added that while the dogs mostly look the same, they do have slight differences and people can usually identify their own dogs.

“I think one person is probably not telling the truth, because usually owners know their own pet,” he said. “We’ve seen it where they’re reunited months or years later and they can still recognize their pets. So someone’s not telling the truth, I suspect.”

© Copyright (c) The Windsor Star

ugh why would she leave the dog and go make a sandwich the poor kids!

This is pretty much the exact reason I got Tank chipped.
I had someone show up in my backyard claiming that Tank was theirs and was stolen from them. I figured it was bullshit and it just made me worried he'd be stolen. So the next day I got him chipped at the vet to ease my mind. I also spoke with the police who told me if I can prove I bought the dog and they couldn't, there was nothing they could do.

Turns out, several years later, I found out it was true that their brother stole the dog from their house and sold him. Glad he'd been mine for 4 years at that point.... he isn't going anywhere.

Kbullet, the area is really bad for dog nappings. There was a black Poodle stolen a few months ago, out of his yard. His owners have posters up all over the area looking for him. A Chihuahua taken out of it's owners car as he went in the store for a couple minutes. A Rhodesian Ridgeback puppy whose owner thought it would be ok to leave the litter unsupervised in their unfenced backyard while they went into the house. Just a few I can think of that happened over the past 5 years. You would think people would see a pattern in this area and not leave their pet dogs unattended. I say pet dogs because there are some farm working dogs that are left unsupervised, but for some reason strangers aren't stupid enough to go on to the property with a pack of farm working dogs.

This is what scares me about off leash training. If Panzer runs away and he's picked up by someone who decides to keep him. He is micro chipped but still freaks me out.

BigBrownEyes29 wrote:

Kbullet, the area is really bad for dog nappings. There was a black Poodle stolen a few months ago, out of his yard. His owners have posters up all over the area looking for him. A Chihuahua taken out of it's owners car as he went in the store for a couple minutes. A Rhodesian Ridgeback puppy whose owner thought it would be ok to leave the litter unsupervised in their unfenced backyard while they went into the house. Just a few I can think of that happened over the past 5 years. You would think people would see a pattern in this area and not leave their pet dogs unattended. I say pet dogs because there are some farm working dogs that are left unsupervised, but for some reason strangers aren't stupid enough to go on to the property with a pack of farm working dogs.

Kinda makes me glad Tank is mean to new comers... they wouldn't stand a chance at stealing him now.