The “E” Transport and Lilah

Most of the dogs we rescue from the Reservation do not come with names.  Because I am an (anally) organized person and because I believe that every dog deserves a special name, I decided early on in the process that all of the unnamed dogs in a given transport would be named with the same letter.  So for the first transport, all of the dogs were given names beginning with the letter “A” - Andrew, Aspen, Annie, etc.

My most recent transport was last Saturday.  Since it was the fifth transport, all of the dogs were given names beginning with the letter “E”:

• Edgar and Emmit - two Corgi mixes rescued from the Bemidji Impound by Nancy (dogs that come into the Bemidji Impound are given five days - if they are not claimed in five days, they are euthanized - Nancy makes sure that no dogs from the Impound are euthanized - Yay Nancy!)

• Edwina - a six-month old black lab mix who had been chained to a tree during a storm - her mother was killed when lightning struck the tree to which they were chained

• Eddie, Elsa and Ellie - three-month-old black lab siblings

• Emmy - mother of Elsa, Ellie and Eddie

Also on the transport were Duke and Dutchess whose owner had recently died.

Additionally on the transport were 13, six-week-old kitties (the first kittens I would be transporting from Leech Lake).

As I drove into the impound lot to pick up the dogs, I was working out the puzzle in my head as to how exactly I was going to fit nine dogs and 13 kittens into my Toyota RAV 4.  My friend Diane was riding shotgun on this trip and I wasn’t quite ready to tell her that quite possibly she would have at least two dogs in her lap for the three-hour ride home.

Just as I was turning into the lot, a car dodged in front of me and accelerated down the road to the impound, leaving a cloud of dust in its wake.

I pulled into the lot, stepped out of my car and started into the building to begin my assessment of the animals we were supposed to transport.  The woman from the speeding car stepped in front of me and asked, “Are you the woman from the Cities who rescues dogs”?  Before I could answer, she started to tell me about someone named “Lilah” who needed rescuing.  She was talking so fast that I could only catch a word here and there - “Lilah”, “starving”, “abandoned”.

Eventually, the woman (Connie) was able to tell me all about Lilah.  She was a black lab whose family had moved and left her behind.  When Connie found her, she was dehydrated, starving and in heat.  Connie gave her water and food and somewhere safe to stay out of the path of the male dogs on the Reservation.

Eventually, Connie could no longer afford to feed Lilah.  She had somehow gotten wind that we were rescuing dogs from the Reservation.  She decided to find me and ask me if we could add Lilah to our transport.

Even though my mind was shouting, “How are you going to fit TEN dogs and 13 kitties in your car”, I agreed to transport Lilah.  I was really hoping that Diane wouldn’t mind three dogs in her lap.

Eventually, the impossibility of fitting that many animals in my car became a reality.  Amazingly enough, Connie volunteered to follow us to the Cities and personally transport Lilah.  In the end, Duke and Dutchess rode with her (a much more comfortable ride than three hours on Diane’s lap).

This transport makes a total of 51 dogs we have rescued from the Reservation.

Eleven more dogs are being transported on Saturday thanks to Nancy and Kristin.

See you again soon.