How dogs from a small island ended up being adopted all around the world during a pandemic
One of the many islands located in the southern Caribbean is Curaçao, a Dutch island that sadly has an abundance of stray dogs. Many of them being puppies, who were abandoned at just a few weeks old. The pandemic did not help this situation at all, since many people started losing their jobs and therefore could not support their dogs, abandoning them all around the island.
Dushi Dogs, which translates to ‘Sweet Dogs’ in Papiamento, is a small nonprofit organization located on the island of Curaçao. It prides itself on helping its local stray dogs find homes all over the world. Sheila Botton and Samantha Dean, started the organization in early 2020, a few weeks before the pandemic.
The caring process
As animal lovers themselves, Dean and Botton realized how important it was to care for these animals and not turn a blind eye like many do. “They are living beings and as a mother, I wanted to teach my children the importance of caring for others beyond the scope of just people,” says Botton. She and Dean are always on call. Weekly they receive emails and texts from locals notifying them of litters of abandoned puppies found around the island.
Once the puppies have been found and secured the real work begins. During a short interview, Botton explains that “rescuing dogs isn’t all fun and games.” She adds, “Most of these puppies are but a few days old and in pretty bad shape.” Dogs can only travel after they are twelve weeks old. The adoption process for these animals is long and tiresome. It can take days before the dogs are ready to be placed in their temporary foster home. Although times may be tough, Botton says “the gratification we feel when we receive photos of the dogs in their new homes surpasses any stress or challenges we had to face to get them there.”
How COVID-19 affected DushiDogs
Due to COVID-19, the process of getting the dogs from Curaçao to their forever homes has become even more challenging. Dean says that “flight cancellations and new COVID-19 regulations have made what used to be a smooth route much more challenging. All our plans of simply sending the dogs out when they came of age flew out the window and we had to do a full 360.”
Before the pandemic the only major challenge that DushiDogs faced was finding a flyer, someone who volunteers to be the puppies’ guardian during the flight, escorting them from point A to point B. Now the adoption process is very difficult, as there are no more direct flights to Canada and the U.S from the island. Caught in this stressful situation, DushiDogs was able to find another way to get the dogs to their new home, such as going via Amsterdam a much longer route, adding anything from a few extra hours to a few extra days to the flight, and making the adoption process costly, ranging anywhere from 150 euros to 800 euros. Finding a flyer for the dogs is also way more challenging as fewer people are traveling to the island and those who do are hesitant when it comes to meeting with Botton or Dean to sign the documents confirming they will be the dogs’ guardians, due to social distancing rules. Currently to try and rectify this situation DushiDogs is looking into cargo planes that accept dogs. If this were to work out they would no longer need volunteer flyers.
In September, Alexandra Peppa adopted Sahara, a Wespointer, a common dog breed from the Island found at just seven weeks old covered in fleas. Now Sahara lives in Montreal with her forever family.
Peppa was one of the first people to adopt a dog from DushiDogs’ during the pandemic and had to deal with all the challenges that arose due to COVID-19. She said, “Sheila and Samantha explained everything to me and although it was complicated with all the extra paperwork and flight rearrangements, I didn’t feel stressed because DushiDogs was very reassuring.”
More recently, a group of puppies called the Fab5 (Joy, June, Thunder, Stormy, and Sky) were all adopted. Most of the dogs from DushiDogs are either re-homed in Canada or the United States which was exactly the case for the Fab5. Since Joy and June were adopted by two separate families in Montreal, while Sky, Thunder, and Stormy were adopted by three separate families in Virginia.
This pandemic has also made getting funds difficult for DushiDogs. But, despite the hardships, they have been able to pull through. Before the pandemic to receive the proper funding, DushiDogs would host social gatherings, one of them being a sunset boat tour of the island. Ever since COVID-19 has begun to spread and the new social distance regulations have been put into place, they have had to look elsewhere to find funding.
Now they have started a Gofundme page for all their dogs and are very active on Facebook posting about needing volunteer flyers, while also providing updates for their followers. All the money they raise goes towards taking care of all the dogs’ medical needs and providing their foster homes with the necessities they need. Today DushiDogs has been able to relocate over 8 Dogs and plans to help many more.
As for the future of DushiDogs, Dean and Sheila hope to expand it and not only help puppies find homes but older dogs as well, since it is so much harder for them. For now, until flights come back more steadily, they will be holding off on sending any more dogs overseas.
