No One Could Tell What Kind Of Dog These Tiny Hairless Puppies Were

[catbyte]

Last edited Mon Apr 22, 2019, 12:26 PM - Edit history (1)

It completely surprised their rescuers!

BY LILY FEINN

One chilly winter morning, a man on his way to work stumbled across six little animals in desperate need of help.

The nearly hairless puppies huddled together in the woods — far too young to be away from their mother. Their skin was so pink and chapped they hardly looked like dogs at all. The Good Samaritan brought the puppies to a nearby shelter in Sylacauga, Alabama, where staffers were shocked by the mistreatment the young dogs had experienced.



“They were so smelly that the shelter staff had to wear masks in order to bathe them,” Nicole Zaguroli with Second City Canine Rescue (SCCR), a nonprofit rescue in Illinois, told The Dodo. “They were in very bad condition; they had scabies, they were malnourished and cold.”

The dogs’ lack of fur made identifying their breed nearly impossible — but staffers believed that since they weighed in at only 5 pounds, the pups belonged to a smaller breed.

“The staff thought they were cocker spaniel mixes based on their appearance when they came into the shelter's care,” Zaguroli said.



Jacquie Cobb, president of SCCR, saw a Facebook post from the shelter pleading for help with the puppies’ extensive medical care and knew she had to do something. Cobb brought the puppies to Auburn Veterinary College, where they were being treated for scabies, and then placed them in foster homes.

“Two homes stepped up and agreed to split the puppies between them,” Zaguroli said. “The puppies required significant care to meet their medical needs, so our foster homes truly were their angels!”



With medicated baths and proper meals, the resilient dogs’ health improved. Slowly, white curly fur began to cover their bodies — but there was still the question of what breed to list on their online adoption posting.

“We made a best guess of Great Pyrenees/poodle mixes because the little amount of hair they did have was so curly,” Zaguroli said.

It became pretty clear, as the puppies started to put on weight rapidly, that they are in fact the opposite of what their rescuers assumed, Zaguroli noted: “One of our adopters did a DNA test and shared the results with us today and they are 100-percent Great Pyrenees!”

In just a few months, the puppies have transformed into healthy, active dogs.



Soon, it will be difficult for their families to imagine that the over 100-pound pups could ever have been so small.

https://www.thedodo.com/close-to-home/tiny-bald-puppies-grow-into-huge-dogs

[rzemanfl]

1. I never heard of this breed before yesterday. Lemme get the link and edit.

On edit-here: https://www.democraticunderground.com/10181209114#post13

[Lochloosa]

4. My mother had two in Texas to keep the coyotes away from her goats.

They hate coyotes.

[rzemanfl]

6. Did you mean to reply to the OP? n/t

[shenmue]

2. Squee!

[2naSalit]

3. Big doggies!

They are used out in my area as herd guard dogs for sheep.

[mitch96]

5. My neighbors GP barks ALL THE TIME!

I love the dog, very affectionate and beautiful.. BUT if a gnat farts in the next county he barks, and barks, and barks... Only down side I can see in this beautiful breed..
m

[PoindexterOglethorpe]

7. It's the incessant barking from

some dogs that has made me dislike dogs a great deal. Maybe it's music to their owners' ears, but it sure as hell isn't for the rest of us.

[LakeArenal]

8. My neighbor has George Hairyson.

He’s a dream. Love him.

[calimary]

11. LOVE that! George Hairyson!

Yeah, yeah, yeah!

[Javaman]

9. the look like...

Fredonia Sniffhounds.

Cute little tykes.

[Doreen]

10. Wow, I worked in shelters for years and

that is the most drastic transformation between just found and ending result. My first thought was Springer Spaniel then I saw the last picture and before reading what people said they may be I guessed Great Pyrenees. Oh wow, is what I keep saying. I am usually extremely good at calling breeds, even the rare ones but this one took me by total surprise.

They turned out gorgeous.

[Karadeniz]

12. I fostered a pit mix who was in worse shape. She also was bloody from scratching. The solution

solution to that was to keep her slathered in human lidocaine creme, just in case anyone ever needs that info. What the photos don't show is the inbetween stage. After a few mange shampoo, the hairs that were just hanging by a thread fall off and puppy is totally bald! Mine was a female and at the time we had a sphinx, also female. A friend of mine dubbed them the Naked Ladies! Since the mange can return and is largely a function of a poor immune system, I decided to keep mine. All her hair grew back except for a few spots that were scar tissue from having been cut or where the mites did render skin unable to regrow hair. Her mange never returned and she's so energetic, we say that if we had her stamina, we could conquer the world!

[prodigitalson]

13. Mutation? Or maybe a Xolo in the family tree? nt

[Duppers]

15. Ya didn't read the full post?

They are GP's.

[Bayard]

14. Heartbreaking and disgusting

That someone would dump these little lovebugs. Wonder what animal cruelty laws are like in AL. By the time I got to the last pic, I said--those are Pyr's!

It also doesn't make sense that they would be dumped for monetary reasons. Purebreds are sold for $200+. They are especially valued in our area with the huge Amish population, as LGD's--livestock guardian dogs.

We have three Great Pyrenees, and they are the greatest dogs. They were all rescues. Yes, they bark a lot. Its their job, to be on the alert for anything that might threaten their "flock", and warn their owners. A lot of that is curbed if you keep them in at night.

If the pups were in this kind of shape, you have to wonder what happened to the mom.

[Duppers]

17. Some people don't deserve

to be on the planet, they are so cruel.

[Duppers]

16. The article said six puppies but...

the photos are only showing four. Wonder if two of them died?