Peppy the pound hound's adventures

Spectrum, by Phyllis Dalton

Three years ago we rescued another Heinz 57 from Anchorage Animal Control.

We picked the black Lab mix with the white chest and toes. She made eye contact and her amber eyes were alert with hope. This poor mutt had been in the pound for six weeks.

Her former owner had been incarcerated and he couldn't find anyone to pick her up. Time was up for her, adoption or extinction. We both got lucky.

We named our new dog Peppy, cause she was full of it. She could tear up the road when she got loose. We should have named her Shadow. Since my husband is retired he took her in the truck wherever he went. She dogged his every step in the house to make sure she wouldn't miss out on any trips. My husband loved her company. There was never a closer bond between man and dog.

What Peppy loved to do most of all was to go the cabin on the Kahiltna River. This entailed driving to Deshka Landing, launching the riverboat and then an hour and a half ride past the Deshka, the Swentna and the Yentna to the Kahiltna. It was so remote, there weren't more than four cabins in the area. There Peppy could run loose all day long, go down to the river bank and slurp up some icy, cold glacier-fed river water. She could even swim the 100 yards across the swift water and up the 90-foot bluff to our friend Darrell's cabin. We sure were surprised a 40 pound dog could make it across. Best of all she loved boat rides to go fishing in the open boat. Total freedom, that's what she loved about the river. She didn't even have to wear her clanking collar. As Peppy matured she decided it wasn't worth the effort to swim the river.

It was another lazy sunny Friday in August when a small grizzly sauntered out of the high grass behind the cabin. Peppy caught the scent near the outhouse and barked frantically, her hackles raised. Either insatiable curiosity or animal instinct drew her to other animals no matter how dangerous. She sniffed out a porcupine at the cabin and received 114 quills in her snout for getting too close.

Later another grizzly was out in the clearing in front of the cabin. My husband took his 30.06 out on the porch and fired it into the air to scare the bear away. His shadow slipped out behind him and tore away when the blast sounded. Gone in a flash, at first my husband wasn't worried, but when she didn't come back by dark he knew it was a life or death situation. He was miserable, half expecting her to casually stroll up from the bank any time, but sick that a bear might have gotten her. Searching, another awful 24 hours passed. On Sunday, full of regret, he made the trip back home.

At home everywhere he looked was an empty space where Peppy used to be. He went back on Tuesday to make sure that she was really gone. Day four of misery and guilt, man, the protector, had been her downfall. Before launching they told the lady at the store at the Deshka landing that Peppy was missing.

Tuesday afternoon I got a phone message saying a dog was found on the river the previous weekend. Excited and relieved, I called Ron with River Express. There was no way to tell my husband, his cell phone was turned off. Arrrghh. Sure enough, Ron had picked her up on a sandbar in the middle of the Skwentna on Saturday afternoon. The Skwentna -- that was unbelievable, the spot where she was found was 25 miles upstream. Could our little Peppy have gotten that far on her own? Or had she been picked up by another boat and had jumped or fallen out. It was another minor miracle that Ron had been going through this isolated area.

Ron took her into Wasilla to do some errands and take her to the veterinarian to see if she had an identification chip in her ear. While he was in the tackle shop she jumped through his truck window. This wasn't the first time an open window beckoned. Many times in her daring youth she had jumped out the window in Anchorage.

Rescued and lost again. What a roller coaster. We were so relieved a bear hadn't got Peppy and she didn't drown. Now if only she could survive the heavy traffic on the highway. My husband spent Thursday and Friday posting flyers all over town, offering a $1,000 reward. A lot of money for a mutt, but people have been known to spend a lot more for open-heart surgery on their pets. A thousand dollars may be a lot for a mutt, but not for your best friend.

Three more calls came in between 6 and 9:30 p.m. on Friday concerning the same dog running near Church Road, a busy intersection along the highway. False alarm.

Saturday at 11:30 I got the call. "I think we have your dog!" I called my husband in Wasilla. Five minutes later he was at their door. It turned out that three kids in the family had rescued Peppy on Monday, three blocks from the tackle shop. Even though they already had two at home, they adopted her as their new dog. Friendly, loving Peppy had found another rescuer. On Friday at school registration they saw the flyer. After eight days everyone shed a few tears except Peppy. The mom was thrilled to get the reward to help with back-to-school shopping and we were ecstatic.

Peppy covered a lot of territory in eight days and we were blessed to have many caring people helping to bring her back to us. You can bet she'll never be without her collar now!