Rescue dog Patsy gave her new owners the slip – then dragged them almost a mile through countryside, woodland and brambles to uncover the litter she gave birth to during six weeks on the run
Rescue dog Patsy looks very happy, her puppies snuggled up next to her.
But the two-year-old’s introduction to parenthood was a little more traumatic; After kidnapping Christine and Leslie Reading to their new owners, she dragged them almost a mile through countryside, woodland and thorny bush to the litter she had birthed over the course of six weeks.
Mr Reading, 74, told how he crawled on his hands and knees through blackberry bushes to get to the seemingly cold and lifeless puppies, then placed them on top of his jumpers in an attempt to warm them up.
He managed to resuscitate three of the four little puppies, and the former company boss and his wife, also 74, now plan to keep one of the dogs at home.
Just 24 hours after Patsy, a cocker spaniel and chihuahua cross, was picked up by the Readings on March 17, they snuck under the garden fence and then charged towards 12 square miles of private woodland on the other side of the Herefordshire valley.
The couple spent weeks searching for the ‘beautiful’ dog – putting up ‘missing’ posters, making calls on Facebook and distributing flyers within a five-mile radius of their home in Yarsop, Herefordshire – until Patsy was finally captured in a farmyard almost four miles from her home.
‘By then it had been seen in five other villages or hamlets,’ said Miss Reading. ‘But whenever he got scared he ran for miles and I couldn’t get in front of him and set a humane trap.’
Eventually the views began to focus on the farm near the hamlet of Brinsop.
Patsy and her pups snuggled into the arms of owner Christine Reading after her big escape
Footage from motion-activated camera triggered by Patsy’s capture after walking into a trap in a barn on a farm almost four miles from home
“Patsy is a wonderful mother and thankfully all thoughts of running away are gone,” Ms Reading said.
The farmer allowed Miss Reading to set a trap with a pressure plate attached to a motion-sensitive camera.
“We caught a cat and a farm dog before the camera notification went off again and we finally found out we had Patsy in the barn,” said Miss Reading.
The couple thought that was the end of the drama. But two-year-old Patsy spent her first night under the roof of Readings, howling constantly in distress.
Realizing she was breastfeeding, they took her to a vet, who confirmed that Patsy had recently given birth, and the Readings realized they had to go out again, this time to search Patsy’s litter.
Mrs. Reading took Patsy back to the farm, hoping to find the puppies in the outhouse. But after a long time, Patsy set off for the countryside.
As the terrain grew tougher, Mrs. Reading called on her husband to take over the business.
He eventually found the four puppies cold and seemingly lifeless after Patsy dragged him into woodland near St George’s church in Brinsop, almost a mile from the farm.
‘We moved quite far into the forest,’ he told the Daily Mail. ‘Then he disappeared into the thorn bushes and I had no choice but to follow him because I didn’t want to give up the lead and lose him again.
Ms Reading said Patsy was ‘settled back in and doing well’ after her adventure
Pictured in the distance is the private woodland towards which Patsy was seen heading after escaping from the Reading house.
‘On the other side of the thorns there was a great oak tree, and there by its roots were puppies.’
Mr Reading said of the discovery on April 29: ‘I thought they were dead because they weren’t moving, but when I laid them on my jumper I soon began to feel one of them writhing.
‘He eventually crawled up my arm and eventually came out, so I had to catch him quickly!’
The couple have decided to keep the mischievous pup – the only black pup in the cream litter – at home and are considering naming him Tubs ‘because he’s a bit chubby’.
Mr Reading alerted his friends to his location using the What3Words app and they arrived armed with pruners to cut him through the undergrowth.
The Readings, who among them have six children and 19 grandchildren from previous marriages, took the litter directly to local vets.
Unfortunately, one of the cubs (the smallest and female) did not survive. The other three (all males) are currently growing at home and relatives are lining up to take in the remaining two cubs.
Miss Reading, the former boss of the haulage firm, said: ‘We bought Patsy from a woman who was renting a flat and was told by her landlord that she couldn’t keep Patsy.
‘He settled right in and was happily running around the garden. But he found a hole under the fence and escaped.
‘I last saw him running towards the private forest; I think he was trying to run home.’
Ms Reading said the dog’s previous owner had warned the couple that the dog might have been pregnant by her chihuahua a few weeks earlier, but added: ‘she did not appear pregnant’.
The average gestation period for dogs is nine weeks, so Patsy must have given birth just a few days before she was caught.
“I think the fact that she gave birth helped her stay in one place,” Ms Reading added.
‘Patsy is very thin but she has a beautiful sheen to her coat. He has settled back in and is doing well.
‘We put up more wire fencing in the garden to prevent his spectacular escape from happening again!’
