Annabelle.

A challenging little girl.

Annabelle

On the night of February 26th, I sat in my car as I watched Annabelle enter the trap.  We had been trying to catch her for 3 months.  At least a dozen volunteers had invested hundreds of hours in tracking her movements and devising schemes to trap her.  Useless Bay Sanctuary volunteers trucked in a giant trap, 10 feet long, 6 feet tall, and 5 feet wide.  We assembled the trap and tested it, making sure the optical switch would properly release the magnet when Annabelle broke the light beam.  We tested it, and found that the door wasn’t closing as reliably as we would like, so we used a rope tied to a stake in the ground, and a couple of bungee cords, to pull the door closed faster and hold it shut tight.  It tested perfectly and closed securely.  I set the trap to go live, and we all retreated to our cars to wait for Annabelle to show up. She arrived at her usual time, looking for food and friends in the usual places.  As I sat watching Annabelle go into the trap cautiously, recording video from across the street, Tino was beside me in the passenger seat, and Raphael was behind my seat, looking over my shoulder.  Tino watched Annabelle go in, and he muttered commentary, as he often does when he sees dogs.  Raph huffed and gave a small bark, and I told him to be quiet.  It didn’t seem like Annabelle heard us, over the noise of traffic.  She ate the pieces of cheeseburger that led her to the back of the trap.  She looked over her shoulder several times, to the door, but everything looked okay to her.  She took one more step and broke the light beam, and the door swung shut before she could get to it.  She was trapped! 

All of our planning and work had paid off.  I jumped out of the car and got to the trap in about 3 seconds, to make sure she was secure.  Dina got there about the same time.  We were just discussing how great it was that she was finally trapped, and how we should get her secured for transport, when Annabelle went to the corner of the door and pushed with her nose.  She is compact and strong, and she managed to push the door out of the frame just enough that she could squeeze her little body through the crack.  She was gone.  She had been in the trap for about 20 seconds, and then she escaped.  Dina and I couldn’t believe it.  The only other animals to escape that trap, out of dozens that we had trapped, were a pit bull who climbed the kennel walls and chewed a hole in the cover, and also a black bear that we accidentally trapped.  The black bear basically ripped the door open.  Little Annabelle probably weighed about 35 pounds, and we had no idea she could force the door open like that.  We were devastated.  We disassembled the trap, and started to try to think of a new way to trap her.

On December 4th, 2022, I received a message from a local shelter that Annabelle had escaped on November 12th, and had been seen recently near a church in Lynnwood.  They knew we had experience in catching difficult dogs, and they wanted us to trap her.  I agreed to help and I got more details.  Annabelle had come from Texas, with her siblings.  She was six months old when they arrived from Texas, and escaped on the second day in Washington. They had been living in an abandoned house in Texas, and a local rescue had trapped her and her brother and sister, and also her mother.  They had been taken to a Texas shelter that was overcrowded, and she and her siblings would probably have been euthanized if the Washington organization hadn’t agreed to take them. Annabelle’s mother did not make it out of that shelter.  Annabelle was being walked with her brother when something spooked her, and the volunteer lost control of the leash.  She ran off, dragging the leash. They put up fliers but didn’t get any news until three weeks later.  I got the details of where Annabelle was hanging out, and I went to set up a humane trap.  I talked to the people who lived near the church, and they told us her patterns.  We set up a trap and two cameras, but she never went close to it.  We could see her footprints in the snow, and we saw that she stayed away.  I figured that she must have remembered being trapped in Texas and was too smart for us.

The next week, she was seen a block away, on someone’s doorbell camera.  I talked to the homeowner, and they agreed to let us set the giant trap in their yard.  I set up my camera on the back wall of the trap so it would tell me if she was coming around.  I caught her on camera on December 10th.  She ate the trail of treats leading up to the trap, and she looked in, but she never crossed the threshold.  Then she stopped being seen in the area.  I can’t prove it, but the most likely reason she stopped coming to that area would have been because someone saw her and tried to catch her, spooking her away.  Dina Graham put up many signs in the area.  The few sightings we got seemed to be other dogs, plus a few pranks by local kids.

On January 8th, a dog that looked like Annabelle was seen about a mile southeast of the last place we had seen her.  The pictures were blurry.  We tried to follow up on the lead, but couldn’t locate her.  Two weeks ago, we learned of more sightings in that same area, near 60th Avenue and 203rd Street in Lynnwood, and it started to seem like it could be her.  On February 21st, Dina and I went to the area of the most recent sightings.  I was able to capture video of the dog we believed could be Annabelle.  I set a humane trap, and she wandered around it, but didn’t seem very inclined to go in.  This dog seemed so much more confident than the timid dog we had seen in December.  She was still staying away from people, mostly, but she had been eating out of the hand of one local resident.  She did not look starved.  She looked strong and healthy.  She didn’t go in the trap that night, but we had a confident start in eventually catching this stray dog, whether or not it was actually Annabelle.

February 23rd, Dina and I went to the area and worked with Richard.  He sat on the ground near the trap we had set up, and he tossed treats to Annabelle.  He got her to come fairly close to the trap, but she wouldn’t go in.  I set my wildlife camera to watch the trap, and I saw her investigating the trap several times overnight.  On February 24th, I brought Fozzie with me.  Annabelle tried to play with Fozzie, but he was only interested in the teriyaki chicken I had for Annabelle.  She ate out of my hand.  Fozzie didn’t mind her, but unfortunately he didn’t really play with her.  We learned more about Annabelle’s habits, how she had people she visited regularly.  She would play with a local dog named Luka, and Annabelle had a range of territory from 54th to about 64th, and from 202nd to 204th, where she would wander, being fed at several homes.

On the night of February 25th, we set up the big kennel trap.  A volunteer, Carmen, brought the cutest, sweetest puppy, named Moose.  I sat on the ground with Moose, feeding him bits of cheeseburger, and Annabelle came around to visit.  She had a wonderful, happy play session with the puppy, and I fed her bits of cheeseburger.  We didn’t have the battery for the trap, because it had died, so we were using a rope to hold it open.  We put Moose in a 48 inch trap and put him in the back of the big kennel trap, along with lots of cheeseburger bites, hopping Annabelle would go in.  She visited the puppy from the outside of the trap, but she wouldn’t go in.  The next night, February 26th, we got it all set up, with a new battery, the door closing perfectly, and we caught her.  And she escaped.

We spent the next few days making sure she was staying in the area and sticking to her patterns of visiting Richard and Luka.  We thought of various ways we could catch her.  Richard had walked Annabelle to his townhome, and he would leave the door open as he walked in.  Annabelle would follow him to the door, but she wouldn’t go in.  We set up a clam trap, a different sort of trap where you pull a rope to close the frame of the trap, like a clam shell, and the net encloses the dog.  Luka and his owner, Jessica, could get Annabelle to come to the clam trap, but she didn’t seem very comfortable there.  We were hoping she would sleep on the blanket in the clam trap and get used to it, but she stayed away.  She would sleep under bushes and in the ivy nearby, but she wouldn’t sleep on the nice blanket we brought her.  When Annabelle would go walking with Luka and Jessica, Dina started to join them on their walks, so Annabelle would get used to Dina being around. Dina brought a snappy snare with her, pretending it was a walking stick, to get Annabelle used to it.  Annabelle would eat from Dina’s hand, but still wasn’t calm enough that a slip lead or a snappy snare could be used.  As Annabelle would follow Luka and Jessica and Dina, they found that they could lead her up an enclosed stairwell, and Dina had the idea of trapping her in the stairwell.

I came the next day and looked at the stairwell.  It was enclosed on the sides, and the entrance was nice and flat and square, so we could block it with one of the panels from the kennel trap.  Then on Sunday night, March 5th, Dina recorded video as Jessica and Luka lured Annabelle into the stairwell and all the way to the top of the stairs.  Annabelle went all the way to the far side of Jessica, and her view of the opening was blocked by Jessica.  It seemed very plausible that we could trap her in the stairwell.  We decided to go for it the next night.  We didn’t want to rush things, but on the other hand, every night she was still in the wild was another chance for someone to try to catch her and scare her off to some new area.

On Monday night, March 6th, we arrived before sunset to set up and plan.  Kari brought one of the fence panels in her truck.  I set it in place, beside the stairwell entrance, and practiced how I would rotate it into place as quickly and quietly as I could.  I was there with Dina and Kari, Diane, Janelle, Jennifer,  and Judy.  We had Diane go to the eastern edge of Annabelle’s territory to watch for her.  Annabelle had been sleeping in the neighboring apartments most of the day, but had run off to the woods in the east before sunset.  We used the time while she was away to prepare.  Judy kept watch at the nearest intersection.  We planned that Dina would be in the stairwell with Jessica and Luka, if Annabelle would tolerate it.  Otherwise, she would be just outside.  Dina would use FaceTime on her iPhone to let me have a video of what was going on, so I could plan my approach to place the fence panel across the entrance to the stairwell.  Janelle would come up behind me and help me hold the panel. We would keep our feet firmly planted at the lower corners so Annabelle couldn’t force her way out.  Then Kari and Jennifer would come up behind us with a very large net, as a backup in case Annabelle somehow managed to force her way past the fence panel.

As we were going over our plans, as it was starting to get dark, getting closer to the time Annabelle would be coming, one of the residents came home to the apartment building.  Dina had talked to him the day before.  We had permission from all the residents near the stairwell, and they knew what our plan was, and to stay inside.  This man, who lived at the top of the stairwell we would be using, said he was surprised that seven people would come out to help one little dog.  He said he worked in human services, I can’t remember the exact phrase he used, and that seven people wouldn’t normally come out to help a person in need.  I said, in a joking manner, that we wouldn’t have shown up for a human.  It’s true, though.  All of the volunteers are dedicated to helping dogs.  It’s not that we wouldn’t want to help a human, if we could, but all of our skills and experience are aimed at helping dogs.  Once you catch a dog, usually you can help that dog go on to have a great life.  My own four dogs were all unwanted by their previous owners, and are living a great life with me.  Certain lost humans are not so easily helped, in my experience.  Besides, I have never met a dog I didn’t like.  Even the ones who didn’t like me.  Even the dogs who bit me.  I loved them all.  I couldn’t say the same of every human I’ve ever met.

The resident went upstairs to his apartment.  We all returned to our cars to get warm for a bit.  Then Jessica texted us that she was coming out with Luka soon.  The full moon was rising between the clouds that were illuminated by the last light of the day.  Diane was in place at the east end.  Judy was watching from her car at the intersection.  Kari and Jennifer kept their station at the sidewalk, ready to run up with the net.  Janelle was ready near the stairwell.  I walked with Dina and Jessica and Luka on their regular route.  Luka’s tags jingled loudly, calling Annabelle out to see her friend.  We walked most of the loop and were returning toward the apartments when Diane messaged us that Annabelle was coming up behind us.  She caught up to us at the apartments, and she played with Luka.  Dina had beef tacos in a paper bag, and fed bites to Luka and Annabelle.  She seemed okay with me being around.  When we got to the stairwell, Annabelle didn’t seem to want to go up while I was nearby.

Dina turned on FaceTime, and I watched on video as I walked away to the far end of the parking lot.  Once I was away, Annabelle was more comfortable with going up the stairs.  Dina tried sitting on the bottom step, but Annabelle didn’t like that, so Dina stood outside.  After a bit of coaxing, with Jessica and Luka going up and down the stairs a few times, Annabelle entered the stairwell.  Eventually, she went all the way to the top. She stayed up there for about ten seconds.  Dina was talking softly into her phone, telling me I could go, but I wanted to wait a bit for Annabelle to get more comfortable.  Annabelle came back down out of the stairwell, looked around to make sure all was quiet.  Then she went back up.  My heart was thumping as I quietly moved closer to the stairwell.  I could see that Annabelle was all the way at the top, on the far side of Jessica and Luka, and her view of the opening was blocked.  I put my phone in my pocket, walked up quietly to the entrance, reached for the panel behind the shrubs, and quickly rotated it into place.  The stairwell was sealed.  Janelle came up behind me and helped hold the fence panel in place.  We put our feet tight against the bottom edge.  Annabelle looked over Jessica and Luka, and saw that she was trapped, but she didn’t freak out.  She gave up.  She let Jessica keep her at the top of the stairs and pet her.  She didn’t try to escape.

I was so relieved that we had caught her.  Dina and I didn’t want to let down our guard, though, knowing we had caught her once and she had escaped.  Even though Annabelle seemed resigned to being caught, we proceeded with maximum caution.  Dina squeezed in past the fence panel with a snappy snare, and she went to the top of the stairs and gently got the lead on Annabelle without too much trouble.  She didn’t really put up a fight.  Once the lead was on, I went in with a folded 48 inch trap.  I unfolded it and set it so the open end was on the top step, and the other end was resting on my knee.  They tried to scoot Annabelle into the trap, but she was a little reluctant.  Dina passed the lead into the opening of the trap, and I grabbed the end of it from the far end of the trap.  With me pulling on the lead and Jessica and Dina gently pushing from behind, we eased Annabelle into the trap.  She was truly safe.  Just to be sure, we put about a dozen zip ties on the doors of the trap, probably more than was necessary.  We loaded her into the back of Dina’s car, and Dina drove her to Terri’s house for safe boarding.

I went to visit Annabelle today.  She seemed very calm.  Resigned.  We were in the fenced yard, and she was with a few dogs she had been introduced to, Nick and Nari and Gunner.  Annabelle was wearing a martingale collar and a harness, with two ID tags and a GPS tracker.  A long cable was attached to her, even though she was inside the fenced yard.  I got to pet her and take a few pictures.  She seemed accepting, but I noticed her looking at the various entrances and at the fences, perhaps looking for ways to escape again.  I’m sure she will settle down and learn to be loved by people.  She is only nine months old, and she has lived most of her young life on the streets, surviving.  She will adjust to a life of couches and safety, and playing with dog friends and being loved.

More than a dozen UBS volunteers, and many local residents, and a few dogs like Luka, helped Annabelle come in from the cold.  She was on the streets of Texas from birth, then in a Texas foster home for a few months, then on the cold streets of Lynnwood from November 12th to March 6th, through one of the coldest and snowiest winters in Seattle history.  She survived, and eventually she let us help her.  I’m so relieved that, after we caught her and she escaped, we were able to catch her again.  UBS will take every precaution to keep her safe in the future.  We will help her find a permanent home where her new family will take all of the precautions to make sure her days on the streets are over.  We love you, Annabelle.