A dachshund lost in Australia is still alive after more than a year, and still apparently wearing her pink collar. But she has proved elusive to recapture.
The tale begins in November 2023 when a couple took their pet miniature dachshund, Valerie, to Kangaroo Island off the coast of Adelaide. But Valerie escaped from her pen and rushed off into the bush.
The couple scrapped their plans and searched for their pet for five days with the help of locals before finally giving up and returning to their home in New South Wales.
“It was like finding a needle in a haystack,” Valerie’s owner Josh Fishlock told the “Today” show in Australia.
(Yes, the Australian island where Valerie went missing is called Kangaroo Island. Its Aboriginal name is Karta Pintingga, meaning “island of the dead.” Given Valerie’s predicament, we’re going to stick with Kangaroo Island.)
Now, more than a year after Valerie’s disappearance, hope has sprung. “Based on firsthand accounts and video evidence, we now know that Valerie is alive,” Kangala Wildlife Rescue said in a statement on social media last week. She was spotted about 10 miles from where she disappeared, in Stokes Bay, and was identified, in part, by her pink collar.
Efforts are now underway to rescue the dachshund, but that has proved difficult. “She runs at the first sign of humans or vehicles and despite the best efforts of dedicated island locals, Valerie has been impossible to catch,” the wildlife rescue said.
“We are using surveillance and various trapping and luring methods in the area she was last seen to try and bring her home,” the statement said. “This is a tiny dog in a huge area, and we will need help from the public to report any sightings and a lot of luck.”
On Thursday, a man who identified himself as “Jared, one of the Kangala team members that’s involved in the rescue mission for Valerie,” offered a heartening update in a video update: “We have seen her. We’ve managed to narrow down the search area to one specific point.”
“We were initially skeptical, but we kept getting more and more sightings,” Mr. Fishlock told “Today.”
Her other owner, Georgia Gardner, told The Guardian: “She was not a very outside, rough-and-tough dog. To think that she even went one night outside in the rain, oh my gosh. To think that she’s gone a year and a half is incredible.”
While the first image of a dachshund might be of a cute little wiener dog, the breed has some real survival skills.
“Dachshunds aren’t built for distance running, leaping, or strenuous swimming, but otherwise these tireless hounds are game for anything,” the American Kennel Club says in its description of the breed. “Bred to be an independent hunter of dangerous prey, they can be brave to the point of rashness.”
The wildlife rescue said, “We hope to be able to update you all with an amazing outcome.”