Hungry, Hungry Scout Finch

As I sit here writing, Scout Finch is trying to lick my laptop because she will never be fed again.

At least that’s what she thinks.

Let me go back. Scout Finch is my rescue Chihuahua. I’m very passionate about animal rescue and have worked with several groups across the Southeast. I was fostering small dogs when this Chihuahua with a tiny head and ghetto butt came to me. I was in love.

I named her Scout Finch after my favorite book in an attempt to make her less Chihuahua-ey. She’s not. She doesn’t bark. She doesn’t snap.

The only problem is that she’s convinced I will never feed her again. She was given up on New Year’s Day of this year by some (bad word) people who wanted a new puppy. She was less than 2 years old and taken to a very high kill shelter in rural Georgia. I got her at the end of January after her decontamination, spay, ect.

And she will never go hungry again.

She, however, doesn’t believe me when I say that.

Some dogs beg and whine and then don’t eat vegetables or other foods that don’t taste good. Scout eats everything. For a while, I tried to train her that eating people food is bad. But as things went on, I realized that my little puppy still lives in fear.

That’s heartbreaking.

You take in rescue dogs so they can realize what it’s like to have people love, but often we don’t take into account that they still have very real fears from their previous lives. You can tell a person to trust you, but you can’t tell a dog that. You can’t tell her that she will always have food. You can’t tell her that the reason you don’t fill the bowl all the way up is so she won’t get too fat (girl has some belly issues as it is.)

So what do I do? On my first days in Columbia, I found the dog bakery in Five Points where the owner advised me of some great healthy treats since we’re going for quantity.

Have you ever had a similar problem?