Good Afternoon to all of you fabulous sighthound lovers and NCGL supporters! As I’m sure most of you have gathered, this has been a pretty crazy week for us at NCGL, and as promised – here’s an update
On Monday one of our NCGL volunteers was contacted by a kind family who had a litter of Greyhound crosses they wanted to find great homes for. A beautiful Greyhound x named Daisy had given birth to 11 adorable little landsharks on September 4th and they were having no luck finding good homes for her babies. When we explained our program and what we do, they were so relieved and were incredibly happy that we would take on these little bundles of joy, get them vetted and find some great homes for them. When we started to make arrangements to make our way north and pick up the family and bring them back to Calgary, they asked us if we had room for mom too – of course we did (hopefully….!)!
They had rescued mom from another situation and really wanted to see her in a good place on a warm couch. They appreciated how kind our volunteers were and felt comfortable letting her go to our program. They loved her so much but were excited by the thought of her retiring and spending the rest of her life being doted on like the queen she is.
And thus began the scramble to find enough foster homes, supplies and food for this extremely large family of chaos gophers who were arriving in just a few days.
Foster homes are the backbone of this organisation – without them we can’t take any dogs in. We don’t have a kennel so we rely on the generosity and love of our incredible foster homes to take in pups that we don’t know a ton about – usually last minute, help them adjust to this new life, drive them to and from vet appointments and teach them all the awesomeness that is being a house dog! We didn’t have nearly enough homes to take in such a huge litter but our amazing volunteers reached out to people, had people reach out to them and even had some family’s offer to take 3-4 of them! By Thursday we had enough fosters to give everyone a safe landing when they arrive on Saturday – things were going good.
All of a sudden on Friday at about 3 pm one of our volunteers was contacted by a kind gentleman who was looking for help to find his pup a loving home. Brownie is a sweet 4 year old male greyhound who was looking to retire from match racing. This family was so happy with how we’d helped with their previous retirees that they were hoping we could do the same for this sweet boy too. Of course we could! Only problem was he had to be in our program by Saturday morning as they were leaving the country for a while – here we go! Knowing we didn’t have time to secure another foster for an unknown dog, we reached out to the awesome folks at Springbank Pet Resort and as always, they came through with shining colours! Volunteer Dan made the trip to pick up Brownie and the awesome staff at Springbank even stayed late to make sure he made it there.
On Saturday volunteers drove 5.5 hours north to pick up mom and her sweet family of hooligans and bring them back to Calgary! Volunteers were treated to a lovely 6 hour concert filled with yips, howls, roos, growls and various acapellas featuring different singers throughout the drive as some woke up and some took a break. After a stop in Red Deer to get some photos of everyone and to distribute a few puppies to fosters there, we continued on to Airdrie where we met up with the remainder of our superhero foster families! Donated bags of dog food were handed out along with needed supplies, cuddles were given and pups went to their foster homes – *exhale*
13 dogs in a 24 hour period is a lot for our little organisation! Welcoming these beauties into the NCGL family is a huge financial and resource commitment and we’re hoping you all can help with that! We’ll be running a “Name that Puppy” auction starting at 6 PM MST tonight and that will run until 6PM MST Wednesday so stay tuned for that! We’re currently looking for some help to run an online auction to help us recover some of the huge expenses we’ve taken on this past summer along with the huge expenses we’re about to dole out to get these little cuties and the sweet adults ready for adoption. All dogs will have to be vaccinated, wormed, chipped, altered and both Daisy and Brownie require dentals. Anything you can spare would be a HUGE help!
For the past 22 years NCGL has been there for sighthounds in need and we hope to continue to do so for many, many, many more years. With the support of our volunteers, fosters, donors, followers and all of you we were able to help this big bunch of beautiful noodle horses – thank you so much
All of these hounds are currently being fostered in Southern Alberta, homes in that area will be given priority for logistic/time concerns. If you’re interested in adopting one of these sweethearts head over to our website to fill out our adoption application and submit it to adopt@ncgl.ca. Please be patient with us as we are 100% volunteer run and have a lot going on, we promise to get back to you!
Please note that puppy homes have special requirements. First off, puppies need to be potty trained and cannot hold it for longer periods of time meaning families who are away from home for 8-9 hours without being able to come home and let the puppy out and play with them for a little while won’t work. Puppies are a lot of work! They need socialisation and need to be taught all of the things that will help them become amazing adult sighthounds. They chew, they bark, they cry….they require LOTS patience and love! Greyhound puppies are not calmer or easier than other breeds of puppies, they’re the exact same as all other puppies so please keep this in mind when applying. Puppies are an absolute blast but are not for the faint of heart, but when they’re in the right home there is nothing more magical than the absolute joy of watching them grow into beautiful adults.
Both Brownie and Daisy will have to be fully vetted so stay tuned as we get to know them and figure out what kind of home they need!
Thank you so much for all of your support, stay tuned for updates and photos as we get them!
If you’d like to donate please visit the link below or click the “Donate Button” on this post, you can also pick up one of our 2022 NCGL Calendars!!