That is amazing, and miraculous your dog was found! I am SO happy to know you had wonderful people helping you! What a story! Can you tell us more?
I had to have surgery on my EYEBALL (imagine a high scream-y voice on that word), so I left my service dog with my parents for the day.
I warned them not to let him go out in their fenced yard alone, to take him out on lead but he turned out to be wilier than I was. My dad took him out on lead and when they went back in, my dad turned his back for a second to open the door and my service dog slipped out of the collar and was gone.
I am convinced he was looking for me.
The whole ten days he was gone, he was in an area about a quarter mile wide by maybe a mile long. There were two creeks in the area and railroad tracks. Even though it is a suburban environment, with the creeks and RR tracks, it was amazing how much wildlife was in the area (raccoons, possums, deer, fox, etc).
His breeder flew in to help with the search. Since she is an older, grandmotherly kind of person, she felt comfortable talking to neighbourhood kids without making their parents go berserk.
It was amazing to me just how much kids experience that their parents didn't know about! He had several encounters with kids (he loved kids), where he'd approach, give them kisses, play with them for awhile and then move on. And the kids hardly ever mentioned it to their parents. To the kids, it was just part of their day, like "played with Judy, climbed the willow tree, played with a strange dog, picked some flowers, read a book..."
In the end, it was just a matter of placing me and my voice within his earshot. His breeder was following him down the RR tracks and I was on the street near them. As soon as he heard me calling, she said his head went up and he went rocketing off the RR embankment to me.
He was clearly happy to see me but it was sort of like he was checking off a mental to-do list: find Mom, get burrs taken care of, con someone out of treats... As soon as he was done greeting me, he put the burrs under my hand and demanded I
do something about them. The horror, his coiffure was disarranged (I spent more time on his hair during his lifetime than I ever spent on my own).
Other than the burrs, he was perfectly clean and in good condition. So much so that he took up his service dog duties that afternoon, went to a restaurant with me that evening and didn't look at all out of place.
I lost him to cancer nearly a year ago and I miss him more than I can say. If love and money were all it took, he would still be with me. It's just that he finally met an obstacle that even his heart could not overcome.
