A beagle mix named Tinkerbell, once a stray taken in by a Mobile-based animal rescue group, is adjusting to a new life more than a thousand miles from the Gulf Coast after being adopted by a family in Dewitt, New York.
Tinkerbell was one of dozens of dogs and puppies gathered by Save A Stray, a Mobile rescue organization, before boarding a transport van bound for the Northeast in late February. The trip was part of an ongoing partnership between Save A Stray, Angels’ Arms Animal Welfare Connection and Helping Hounds Dog Rescue, a New York-based shelter that has worked with Alabama rescues since 2012 to find homes for animals in areas with fewer adopters.
Before making the trip north, Tinkerbell spent time in foster care with a Mobile couple, Cathy and Richard Shields, who cared for her while she waited for a permanent home to be found.
“I was elated that finally Tinkerbell was adopted. I was getting antsy,” Cathy Shields said of the wait.
Once she arrived in New York, Tinkerbell didn’t stay unclaimed for long. A family with three children who had been asking for a dog decided she was the right fit, according to Kathy Gilmour, who works with Helping Hounds Dog Rescue.
“I can only imagine the excitement in that house when they got home from school,” Gilmour said, describing the moment the children learned they had a new pet.
Gilmour said the family felt their children were mature enough to help care for a dog and take on some of the responsibility themselves.
Tinkerbell was part of a larger group of roughly five dozen animals that made the same trip from the Mobile area earlier this year. According to Gilmour, about a dozen of those dogs were still waiting to be adopted as of mid-March, while the rest had already found homes in the region.
The partnership between the Alabama and New York rescue groups has become a routine part of how Save A Stray manages the volume of strays and surrendered animals it takes in around Mobile. Transport trips allow dogs that might otherwise wait a long time for adoption locally to reach shelters and adopters in areas with higher demand.
Local volunteers help prepare the animals for transport, coordinating veterinary checks and paperwork before the dogs are loaded for the long drive. Foster families like the Shields play a key role in the process, giving dogs a stable, comfortable environment while permanent adoptive homes are located.
For Tinkerbell, the arrangement worked out just as organizers had hoped — a Mobile stray now has a family, a yard and, undoubtedly, a very enthusiastic welcome home from three kids every day after school.