Buddie
Family Jewel
Keri Hooks’s curiosity was piqued one day when a black-and-tan hound mix emerged from the woods behind her North Carolina home. Though the pooch visited a few times, she never seemed comfortable enough to stay. One afternoon Keri followed her back through the woods and made a harsh discovery—the dog lived in a local junkyard known to be the site of criminal activity.
“I called animal control and the officer, who was familiar with how dangerous the place was, cautioned me not to go back. He was a big man and was afraid to go there himself!” says Keri, who was not one bit happy with the answer she received. With cell phone and pepper spray in hand—and against the protests of her husband—she went back on her own to search for the hound mix.
She found the canine chained under a mobile home. Keri was frustrated that she couldn’t help the dog right then, but she would get her chance. “Two weeks later, she broke loose and came back to our house,” Keri remembers. “That’s when she became part of the family.”
The skinny pooch was timid at first. “We learned that she’d only eaten grits and oatmeal in the junkyard,” Keri remembers, “so we had to teach her how to eat solid food.” But severe malnutrition and a bad case of heartworm didn’t deter the canine, whom Keri named Buddie, from making a full recovery and going on to claim her place at the heart of the family.
“Buddie got her name because she knows no strangers,” Keri says. “She adapted well to our eight cats—they all pile up and sleep on the couch together. And she’s wonderful with us humans. When we come home from work, she gets this goofy smile and does a little dance.”