Simon (formerly Miigwech) ... a year later!

Simon welcomes the New Year!

A year ago (on January 19th, 2013) a caravan of 3 vehicles drove from the Twin Cities to Leech Lake Reservation. On that trip, we had a special guest, Kelli (who was working for the ASPCA at the time) who was visiting from California and wanted to join us on a transport to experience the work we are doing and to meet Ken Washington (Leech Lake Chief of Police) and Rory Haaland (Leech Lake CSO). It was a bitterly cold morning as we left at dark from the Twin Cities that Saturday morning. On that transport 36 animals (from Leech Lake and Red Lake Reservations) were transported back. Ken Washington took us on a tour of tribal housing, and on that trip Kelli and I saw dogs out in the cold shivering, and a week later were communicating by email with each other, haunted by the images of shivering dogs and asked each "What can we do? I wonder how many igloos we could get donated?" ... and that led to Kelli reaching out to her network and by the following week we had 150 dog barn houses being shipped to the Leech Lake Tribal Police headquarters (a generous grant from PetSmart Charities) and the birth of a The Yukon Project.

Simon/Miigwech on Rory's lap at the Leech Lake Impond

And on that historic transport a year ago, we also asked Kelli to name one of the dogs coming down on transport from Leech Lake. We were on the 'M4' transport so all the animals coming down on transport would have names beginning with the letter 'M'. Kelli picked a sweet pitbull puppy ... and she named him 'Miigwech.'

Miigwech (renamed to Simon) was placed up for adoption through our partner Minnesota Pitbull Rescue. Last week we saw a photo of Simon posted on their facebook page so we commented and shared the updated photo on the Leech Lake Legacy facebook page with photos of Simon from a year ago.

[To read more about the transport a year ago and the birth of The Yukon Project: http://leechlakelegacy.blogspot.com/2013/01/the-yukon-project-150-make-their-way-to.html]

We got more information from Simon's new mom and had to share with you more photos :)

"My husband & I wanted to adopt another dog so our 2 year old pit, Ruby, could have a brother:) We found Simon on the MN pit bull rescue website & fell in love with him. He has now been with us for about three months. In the last month he has really started to come out of his shell. He's goofy, sweet & always hungry! They love to go for walks & play with our dog walker. She is the one who found Ruby stray in North Minneapolis. We had hired her a few years ago to take care of our aging pit, Tesco. He passed away about 2 years ago.

Simon finished his first round of training at the Canine Coach & did really well! He is not dog to dog aggressive, but Ruby is & we had them in a dog to dog aggression class together. I have him signed up for Obedience one starting in February. I would love one day for him to be a registered therapy dog! He's so sweet & snuggley I think he would do really well!

Cheers, Angie"

Simon/Miigwech arrives in the Twin Cities on 1/19/2013

Simon and Ruby

Simon, Ruby and mom

Simon (with sister Ruby) on his first morning at his new home!

Snuggle buddies