Search on for deaf dog that escaped animal hospital

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Miss-Delectable

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Search on for deaf dog that escaped animal hospital - WTEN: Albany, New York News, Weather, Sports -

A dog is on the lam after it managed to escape from Shaker Veterinary Hospital over the weekend.

The veterinary hospital says somehow, the dog got out of its cage and then opened three different doors before getting outside.

According to surveillance video from the Shaker Veterinary, it was around 4:30 Saturday morning that Luna, a white bulldog mix, got through the last door and out into the cold.

Luna belongs to a local family who went away for the holidays and had left her to be boarded at the hospital.

There have been unconfirmed sightings around the Crossings in Colonie and even up by Siena College.

Making the search for Luna all the more difficult is that she is deaf, so it will not help to call her.

She does understand some signage, however.

For example, if you pat your knees, that's the sign for her to come to you.

If you see a dog fitting the description roaming, you are asked to call police.
 
Group to search for missing, deaf dog on Saturday

Group to search for missing, deaf dog on Saturday - WTEN: Albany, New York News, Weather, Sports -

We're learning new details tonight about a dog that disappeared after escaping from a local veterinary hospital.

One of Luna's owners says a group will be gathering Saturday morning at the Crossings in Colonie to search for the pooch.

Luna escaped from the Shaker Veterinary Clinic over the weekend by somehow getting out of her cage and opening several doors.

The incident was caught on security cameras.
 
she still has not been found but thier is now a photo up, I have been put looking for her
 
Search: Luna come home

http://www.timesunion.com/AspStories/story.asp?storyID=886968http://www.timesunion.com/AspStories/story.asp?storyID=886968

Luna is lost and Ralph Rataul won't rest easy until the 4-year-old American bulldog mix comes home.

The dog escaped from Shaker Road Veterinary Hospital at 4:30 a.m. Jan. 2, while Rataul and his wife, Shelley, were away and they've been scouring the Colonie-Latham area ever since.

On Saturday morning, as word of Luna's plight spread among dog lovers in the Capital Region, some 75 volunteers gathered at The Crossings park in Colonie and conducted an organized search.

By late afternoon, Rataul was adopting what he called a "more subtle approach," analogous to a deer hunter who sits in a stand rather than tracking his prey.

After Luna had been sighted crossing Watervliet Shaker Road near Dee Dee's Tavern later in the morning, Rataul was planning to stake out a garage which the pastor of a nearby Lutheran Church had lent him use of.

Rataul had put some of his shirts out in the snow, hoping his scent, along with a plate of leftovers and some dog biscuits would draw Luna into a jumbo-size trap they had set up in the garage.

If history is any guide though, Luna may not be easily trapped. The 65-pound dog escaped from her crate and somehow got through three doors at the vet's office where she was boarding. Luna is also deaf, which means her owners can't call her, and she is unable to hear traffic.

Initially, Rataul thought Luna was trying to make her way home to Rensselaer and some of the early searches involved walking and driving in an expanding circle.

But for the past few days, the dog has been spotted around Dee Dee's and the church, which abuts a slender stand of trees and a running stream, which could be serving as her source of drinking water.

Beyond the woods is a housing development but there's a pizza parlor on the other side of Watervliet Shaker Road where Luna may be foraging for scraps, said Rataul.

"She's certainly scrounging," Rataul said adding that "pizza is some of her favorite human food."

Indeed, Rataul said he realizes that Luna may not be in a rush to get home.

He's heard that the Loudonville-Latham area is inhabited by a Vizsla, also known as a Hungarian short-haired pointer dog, for close to a year after the animal went missing. The Vizsla, he said, is occasionally spotted but hasn't been caught.

"These little patches of forest become their new home," Rataul said.

At one point, Rataul noticed one of the many volunteer searchers, a neighborhood kid, breaking into a trot near the treeline and he clapped his hands and slapped his knees -- his signal for Luna to "come." (While Luna, who was adopted from an animal shelter in New York City, is deaf, Rataul believes she may be able to sense the vibrations from hands clapping.)

As it turned out the youngster appeared to be jogging to keep warm.

With the sun sinking and the temperature at 18 degrees and dropping toward an overnight low of 0, Rataul braced himself for a cold night.

His wife intermittently ran the motor in their Chevy and Rataul hoped his strategy of putting out food and scented clothing would bring Luna home. "You're dealing with a very anxious, deaf dog," he said.

Anyone with information on Luna's whereabouts can call 427-8454 or 458-9669.

For more on this story and video of Luna's escape from Shaker Vet, see Mark Ramirez's A Dog-Owned Life.
 
Deaf dog who escaped Latham animal hospital located safe

Deaf dog who escaped Latham animal hospital located safe - WTEN: Albany, New York News, Weather, Sports -

NEWS10 has learned that a deaf dog that escaped from a local animal hospital, prompting a mass volunteer search, has been located safe.

Luna, a white bulldog mix, managed to escape from Shaker Veterinary Hospital in Latham in the early in the morning of January 3rd.

The veterinary hospital says somehow, Luna got out of her cage and then opened three different doors before getting outside.

The dog belongs to a local family who went away for the holidays and had left her to be boarded at the hospital.

During the search, there were unconfirmed sightings of Luna around the Crossings in Colonie and even up by Siena College.
 
Couple who found Luna refuse reward money

Couple who found Luna refuse reward money -- Page 1 -- Times Union - Albany NY

The couple who found Luna in their Loudonville backyard a couple of miles from the veterinary hospital where the deaf dog escaped have turned down the reward money.

Instead, the couple who asked not to be identified, want the money to go to charity.

After Luna, a bulldog mix, disappeared Jan. 2, Ralph Rataul and his wife, Shelley, put up an $800 reward, which included their money, a contribution from Shaker Veterinary Hospital on Maxwell Road and donations from friends.

Luna was found at 12:30 p.m. Monday in the backyard of the couple's Springwood Manor Drive. The street runs alongside State Police Troop G headquarters on Route 9 across from Siena College.

Rataul said half of the reward will be donated to the ASPCA and the other half to the Mohawk Hudson Humane Society in the name of the couple who found the family pet.

The couple tried to get Luna inside, recognizing the dog from a story that appeared in the Sunday Times Union, but Luna resisted. So, they called the veterinary hospital and the hospital staff call Rataul.

Luna, who was adopted three years ago as a rescue dog and was probably deaf from birth, saw Rataul but didn't immediately recognize him. "At first she was scared, but then realized it was her dad," said Ken Wolfe, assistant director of the hospital.

Rataul said Luna backed into a corner where two fences merged, barked at him, and he feared "she was going to bolt at any time." But slowly she realized who he was and approached him, and when she reached him, jumped on him.

"I'm overjoyed," Rataul said at a Monday news conference. "This is unreal. She's home, she's safe." The couple feared the worse, primarily because of the dog's handicap. She can't hear someone calling her, nor traffic.

"She's not an outdoors dog, not a hunting dog, but some instinctual stuff must have kicked in" for her to survive, he said. "Whatever she was doing, she was doing it right." Luna dropped 12 pounds but despite the ordeal she was in good shape, the vets said. She weighted 65 pounds when she took off.

"She's going to be on GPS all the time now," Rataul quipped.

Wolfe said it's possible concerned citizens throughout Latham and Loudonville left out food for the dog, after her plight hit the news. And, Luna may have found water that wasn't frozen. Siena students left food for her in a barn, not realizing she was the missing animal. When they learned it, they called the shelter, but by then Luna had moved on. Dee Dee's Tavern on Route 155, near where the dog initially had been seen, left out prime rib for her, Wolfe said.

The security company phoned Shaker Veterinary officials at 4:30 a.m. Jan. 2, alerting them that the alarm had gone off, Wolfe said. A video camera showed Luna pushed open her crate door. She went through several more doors and opened the main door of the hospital by pulling down a handicapped handle and pushing it open, he said. She had been boarded for a couple of days before the escape. It wasn't the first time her owners had boarded her there.

"We've had the locks changed," Wolfe said. And, no longer are there types of handles like the kind Luna pulled to get out, he said. The hospital opened in 1973 and it's the first time a "dog escaped the way she did," Wolfe said. Dogs have gotten out of their crates, but no dog has gone out the door, he said.
Over the weekend, 200 volunteers searched parts of Colonie for Luna, including at The Crossings park. Others bushwhacked through woods, Rataul said. One of those searching the park was Alyssa Callee Carpenter of Albany, who said Luna's disappearance made Facebook pages.

Family members and friends of hers spent hours driving around Loudonville on lunch hours and after work looking for her, Carpenter said.

"This story really hit home," she said. "It really made everyone's day to hear that she has been found."
 
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