A PUPPY struck by a car on a Romanian road and left
for dead instead winged her way across the globe and is in search of a
Carmel home, according to her rescuer, Nancy Janes.
The founder of Romania Animal Rescue, which aims to help control the huge
population of homeless dogs there, Janes found Anamarie in the city of
Galatsi, where an estimated 12,000 dogs live starving on the streets. Janes
decided to give the puppy, who is partially paralyzed with a broken back, a
chance at life.
“She was just on the side of the road, and I knew nobody would have the
money to take care of her, to do anything for her,” said Janes. The puppy,
almost 6 months old, pulled herself along the ground with her front legs,
dragging her motionless lower body behind her.
“I was going to take her to a vet there and have her put to sleep, and
then I thought, I’m just going to try,” she said.
Janes had the young dog vaccinated and cleared to enter the United States.
Next, she bought a little wheeled cart that holds the puppy’s hind legs
and rear end off the ground while she propels herself with her front legs.
As Janes and her husband, Rory, vacationed in Carmel this week, she grew
convinced someone from this wealthy dog haven would provide a home for the
crippled Anamarie, a small collie mix.
“The city she came from is absolutely filthy.” Principally a steel
mining area, like so many towns in the former Soviet bloc, Galatsi is
poverty stricken, according to Janes.
Anamarie is not the first dog Janes brought to the states from Romania to
find a better home. She founded her small nonprofit Romania Animal Rescue
about five years ago with the intention of helping the out-of-control
population there.
“I was hiking in Romania in 2001, and the situation with the dogs was just
mind-blowing,” she said. Homeless dogs roam the streets, where they are
hit by cars, abused and starved.
“The government will go out every once in a while and put out poison for
the dogs,” she said, but those that escape continue breeding, and the
population booms again. Janes’ group offers neutering at no cost.
She visits the country at least twice a year and has been known to bring
home a few of its more heartbreaking cases.
“I’ve brought back nine on various trips, but a lot of people get mad
when I say that because we have dogs here who need help,” she said. “But
it’s just so completely different there. The dogs have a 0.0001 chance of
living a decent life. The rest are going to be absolutely miserable —
always starving, thirsty and abused. People throw rocks at them.”
The couple’s ranch in the Mt. Diablo foothills, where they keep three
horses, is also home to seven dogs, but Janes worries Anamarie will get trod
underfoot by a horse or bullied by the other canines. The property has steep
hills difficult for the puppy to navigate in her cart, so she’s often
confined to the porch.
The ideal home for Anamarie would include a yard with a soft lawn where she
could relax. “She just likes to be petted and have chewies and lie in the
grass,” Janes said.
And Anamarie needs an owner who can provide some specific care. Janes
believes she might regain some feeling in her legs, but the poor pup’s
paralysis makes her incontinent. At night she’s diapered and in the
morning, washed, just like a baby.
“But everybody’s just in awe of her, and she’s very cute, too,”
Janes said. Anyone interested in adopting Anamarie should call (925)
337-1277. Janes said she is willing to travel to Carmel multiple times if it
means finding her Romanian orphan a proper home.
