Jake, a coonhound, wandered a long way from his Arizona home — more than 2,000 miles to be exact.
“We are just really baffled by it,” said Renae Metz with A Darrah Bull Bully Rescue in Pennsylvania.
A good Samaritan found the 7-year-old dog near a YMCA in Roaring Spring, Pennsylvania about 100 miles east of Pittsburgh. When they scanned him for a microchip, they found one, and it came back registered to Phoenix.
“We thought maybe a truck driver possibly found Jake in the middle of the night and didn’t know what to do with him and brought him home, but we don’t know that that’s a fact,” Metz said.
After finding the microchip, they made the phone call to Jake’s owners.
“We have a 7-year-old coonhound here who is registered to you, are you missing your dog?” Metz asked the owners.
It turns out they were, for the past year. Jake disappeared from their north Peoria home. Getting Jake back wouldn’t be easy with a brand new baby, but Metz wasn’t about to give up on getting the dog home.
“We have 20 different drivers, three overnights and a lot of stops for Jake,” Metz laughed.
Metz’s sister is a transport coordinator for rescued animals. She used the power of Facebook to put out the call for help and arranged for his return.
From Tennessee to Arkansas to Oklahoma to Texas and New Mexico, over the past three days, the volunteers took photos along the way. And then Monday afternoon, Jake was reunited with his owner in Holbrook.
Click on the map below to follow the route the volunteers took to bring Jake home:
Now Jake is back where he belongs and thanks to a lot of volunteers, pretty well-traveled.
Metz said Companion Animal Hospital in Roaring Spring kept Jake from when he was found until he left for his trip home on Friday. A Darrah Bull Bully Rescue has set up a crowdfunding page to help Jake’s owners with the expenses of boarding and treating him. Click on the link to donate.
Written by Angie Koehle for WKBW.
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