The scaredy-dog who ran away… and wasn’t tracked down for eight months
WHEN rescue dog Izzy was spooked on a walk and ran into the forest, owner Carol O’Neil feared she would never track her down.
But she and her partner Gerry Clarke did not give up hope, assembling a ten-strong team to hunt for the American bulldog day and night.
And after eight months of searching, Miss O’Neil, 55, was finally reunited with her beloved pet – thanks to a trained marksman with a tranquillizer dart.
Two-year-old Izzy, who had been saved from a puppy farm and was frightened of human contact, slipped her lead in Cwmcarn Forest near Newport, South Wales.
Taxi driver Mr Clarke and Miss O’Neil, a nurse, spent months combing the forest for clues before being joined by volunteers who had read about Izzy on social media. They even borrowed a deer cage baited with food to try to snare the dog. But, as Miss O’Neil watched through binocu- lars, Izzy managed to take the food without activating the touchpad that would have trapped her.
After five months, a farmer called the couple to say Izzy was venturing on to his land and had made friends with his dog.
But it was another three months before Izzy was caught four miles from Miss O’Neil’s home in Wattsville when a marksman shot the dog with a tranquillizer dart.
‘People have been amazing, I just can’t believe it,’ Miss O’Neil said. ‘I’ve had people out searching with me in rain, in snow and in mud – and almost all of them I didn’t know before Izzy went missing. I think most of my friends thought I’d lost the plot.
‘There were a few suspected sightings on the mountains, but they were all from a distance – it was a bit like seeing a unicorn.
‘When we got her back I bawled my eyes out. I couldn’t stop looking at her for days. I never thought I’d get this ending.’