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By Jack Beresford
Senior Reporter
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A dog who was rescued along with her litter of puppies has suffered the heartbreak of watching each of her litter get adopted while she remains at the shelter.
Margarita the 2-year-old pup was facing an uncertain future after seeing all of her puppies get quickly adopted from her shelter in Texas. The sad reality is that it's often harder to rehome adult dogs compared with puppies. A study conducted by the website Priceonomics using adoption data from the Petfinder website found that while 95 percent of puppies listed on the site found new homes, that proportion dropped to 75.5 percent among adult dogs.
Margarita's shy but friendly demeanor also made it difficult for her to make much of an impression on visitors at the shelter. However, she did succeed in catching the eye of Hearts & Bones Rescue, a foster-based dog rescue based in Dallas, Texas, and New York City, focused on saving dogs from overcrowded shelters in Texas.
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"Our team in Dallas visits the local shelters each week to meet dogs in need and bring them into our rescue," Katherine Hieber, Hearts & Bones Rescue's marketing manager, told Newsweek.
"We've got a soft spot for rescuing mama dogs and their young litters. They are often the most at-risk of disease in the shelter environment, especially because newborn puppies are too young to be adopted out to the public. We spend a lot of time in the maternity wing of the shelter and work very closely with the staff there, which is how we learned about Margarita."
Working to a mantra of "no mama left behind," Hieber said that Margarita was struggling when they first came to her. "Unfortunately, we don't know too much about her life before the shelter," she said. "She seemed very shy and shutdown in the shelter, but that's not uncommon. Shelters can be very loud and stressful for the animals, regardless of whether they're a mama dog."
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Hieber and the rest of the staff knew that a little love would go a long way for Margarita, though. A 2018 study published in Applied Animal Behavior Science found just 15 minutes of one-on-one petting was enough to provide a measurable boost to the well-being of a shelter dog.
Hearts & Bones Rescue's efforts for Margarita went well beyond a little petting, though. Hieber said: "We transport our dogs to our foster and adoption base in the Northeast, where there are an incredible number of people looking to adopt and our pups have a much better chance of finding a forever home."
Having been scooped up out of the shelter environment, Margarita arrived at her new foster carer's home in New York City last week and, according to Hieber, is "thriving."
"Fortunately, she's really opened up in her foster home," Hieber said. "She's incredibly sweet and friendly, so we think she'd be a great fit for any adopter."
The hope now is that, with Margarita feeling happier and more confident, finding a forever home is no longer a matter of if but when.
Do you have funny and adorable videos or pictures of your pet you want to share? Send them to life@newsweek.com with some details about your best friend, and they could appear in our Pet of the Week lineup.
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