Little Scared Lost Alice

She is an extremely timid dog who only allows me and 3 other people to actually pat and love her. She’s super scared of men and children. The Milly’s team advised us on what to do including leaving scent items, walking with our other dogs. Speaking softly.

We did a letterbox drop of everyone in the vicinity of where we thought she was hiding as well as posters and a huge social media campaign to keep her face out there.

We didn’t have any leads to go off until Wednesday when I ran into someone who saw a poster on my bin outside my house and told me he and a lady tried to catch her on the day she went missing and then she disappeared when he turned around.

Wednesday afternoon I found a way into the bush and wandered around with my Kelpie, Luna, to leave scent and see where she may be hiding. Thursday afternoon, 15th December 2022 at 5.10pm we had a sighting by someone across the road from the school farm, they saw her in near the beehives but by the time I arrived she had moved. At 8.10pm the same night my staff member drove past the same spot and saw her but once again. Once Alice was sighted, she fled.

The hard part was not having access to the school farm after hours so we couldn’t even go in to follow her. Millys supplied a #4g camera and it was set up in a different spot that we thought she was using but only caught on camera a fox and a bush Turkey taking the mince. Friday 14th December morning we had access to the school farm, so we went in and looked around where she was seen and left out food and the camera to try and spot her, all day we only saw birds who kept eating the food.

Friday 16th December afternoon at 2.30pm we set the Millys drop and run trap up the way #Milly’s advised and put it right before the gates and being closed for the school holidays knowing we only had access once the following day unless she was caught (we had a phone number for someone to open the gates up). I left work and decided to pop past as the spot she was seen at is only a 3 minute walk on the same street that I live on. She was there!

As soon as I saw her, I sat down and didn’t make a noise just quietly watching knowing the wind would be blowing my scent over to her. I watched for about 15 minutes until she finally decided to go into the trap!! We quickly called the person to come and let us in and it was the longest wait of my life while Alice was frantically trying to get out of the cage, barking and scratching.

Alice came home with me 1 year ago today, so we call it her Gotcha day today (now double gotcha day!) as after 6 days missing, Alice was now caught, safe and home.