It's like being hit in the face with a shovel. Totally unexpected. Elemental. Inconceivable. Excruciating. It puts me on my backside and robs me of my breath. I stare, unblinking at the image before me, as my mind fights for a foothold, desperate to make sense of the message being machine gun fired to my brain. The image stares back at me, daring me to look away. I don't. I can't. I'm paralysed. By disbelief. By horror. But most of all by the sheer beauty of the emaciated creature on my computer screen. As I sit there, I swear I feel the image being burned onto my soul. This is a moment that will change everything, my first visual encounter with a dog I don't recognize, a dog I have never heard of, a dog destined to become a part of my life, a part of me. This, is a podenco.
I grew up with dogs. My first memories involve dogs. There was never a time when dogs were not a part of my life. Dobermans, Rottweilers, German shepherds and Weimaraners. Dogs, always dogs. Pedigree dogs. Knowing what I know now, I am almost ashamed to admit that I chose a dog for its breed, its temperament, its looks and its pedigree.
That changed back in 2007 when we adopted a German shorthaired pointer bitch from Spain. She came as a companion to our grieving young Weimaraner who was sinking day by day following the death of his mate, and my soulmate, from an aggressive stomach tumour. I had thought my world would end when my beloved Marley died and at this stage I had neither the time nor the inclination to start again with a pup. A rescue dog was the obvious answer but if I'm honest, it was simply a solution to our immediate problem, rather than a desire to save a life. Back then, I knew nothing of the horrors faced by the hunting dogs in Spain. I had not yet seen behind the curtain.
I fell hard for this beauty. It was love at first sight for us both and she pulled us and our grieving boy out of our depression and gave us all a reason to carry on.
Fast forward six years. Princess Nala is still by my side but now we have a problem and find ourselves confronted with a legacy from her former life. She has Canine Leishmaniasis. My wonderful vet explains this illness to me but it's still just two words. I have to know more. I google these unfamiliar words and am immediately assaulted by horrific images and terrifying descriptions of painful deaths. Fortunately, I'm a hardy type and after the initial shock has passed, I immerse myself in this world, determined to find out all there is to know and determined that my princess shall survive. The Internet being what it is, it's easy to cover a lot of ground in a short time. This site, that link, this study, this group. I begin to realise that this illness is indeed survivable, it's only about the right treatment. I feel myself relax for the first time since the horrible ulcers appeared on her head and paws. Days pass and the medication starts to have a visible effect. She's getting better. She sits by my side as I continue to browse and then smack, out of the blue, there it is, my shovel in the face moment as I come face to face with my first podenco.
The photo was taken in what I now know to be a perrera, a killing station, and she is looking straight into the camera, looking straight at me. She is medium sized, a beautiful rust colour with just a dash of white at the end of her long tail, as if someone had dipped it in paint. She is so thin I can count her ribs with ease and her pelvic and hip bones are clearly visible. She looks like she has recently given birth and my mind darts in that direction - where are her babies? As devastated as her torso appears, she still somehow manages to stand proud and when I examine her face and head, that pride is confirmed. She has a longish face with a beautiful pink nose and her eyes are liquid amber. Never have I seen such expression in a dog's eyes. Dejection, fear, loss, despair are the first things I see but wait, look a little deeper, there too are hope, pride, intelligence, loyalty, love. Yes, love. I'm sure as I look at her that despite whatever has happened or will happen, she is still capable of love and of all those other positive things. Her body is broken but her spirit is not. And her ears, oh Lord those ears. Huge, proud, pointy ears which look more than capable of picking up radar transmissions. Beautiful. I stare at her, mesmerised. I have no idea what breed she is, none at all. For now, all I can do is stare at her. She has captivated me and I vow in that moment to find out all I can. I need to know.
I think about her all day as I fight to concentrate on my work. It's not happening though and I close down my translation document and try to find the page where I saw her. I start to panic as I search through my history of the last 24hours. I must find her, I must. And then, there she is. I read about her. She's a podenco. I try out this new word. Podenco. Podenco. She's about two years old and has indeed given birth recently. The location of the pups is unknown. God! There are lots of comments under the story, all in German. I live in Austria and my German is good but it will never be my mother tongue. I go to Google UK and enter the word podenco. The number of results is overwhelming and many of them relate to podenco rescue. Rescue? From what?For almost 12 hours I sit and read. History, breed characteristics, the different types of podenco, their character. I look at photos, hundreds and hundreds of photos. I should be working but I can't stop reading. I pause only to walk and feed Nala. She remains by my side throughout. And then, halfway through the day, I venture onto one of the rescue sites. What I read there, what I see there is incomprehensible. The podencos, along with the galgos, are used for hunting. Many of the hunters abandon, torture or kill the dogs at the end of, or even during, the hunting season. The dogs are seen as objects with no soul, no feelings. They are born to be utilised and then simply discarded like rubbish. They are underfed and treated badly, chained up in either dark and squalid conditions or out in the open with no protection from the scorching sun or the cold and the rain. The hunters believe that this treatment sharpens their hunting instinct. Naturally, they are often proved wrong. Could you run if you were hungry, thirsty and exhausted. Could you?! I find myself constantly shaking my head, not only at the senseless cruelty but also at the flawed logic of these hunters (I refrain from referring to them as people). These beautiful, athletic, noble dogs are set up to fail from the beginning. Undernourished and mistreated from birth, under trained but overworked thereafter. It's mindless. And failure, I soon discover, comes at the highest possible price. The dogs pay for 'their' failure with their lives, and tragically this death is not quick and painless but often slow, torturous and lingering. I can't believe it. This is Spain in 2013. I stroke my princess as I read, now very much aware that as a hunting dog, her life also probably began this way. Six years ago she came to me without my knowing her history or her origins. Now her Spanish borne illness has led me to the truth. I've seen behind the curtain and it's now impossible to look away. My Spanish princess has led me to the podenco.
The weeks pass and I begin my search. That I would adopt a podenco has been a given from the very moment I set eyes on that beautiful girl. She is now safe with a new family and I'm on the hunt for the perfect match for me and my princess. It's not easy finding an organisation willing to let me adopt. Many of the dogs I'm interested in are with associations who have connections to the UK, Holland and Scandinavia but not Austria. Podencos are about as common as kangaroos here in Austria but at least everyone here knows what a kangaroo is. Eventually, I find a organisation based in Germany willing to take the risk of no real back up if it all goes wrong. I find my little podenco beauty and I'm over the moon. Sadly, it's not to be. Trust issues arise and after much soul searching, I withdraw from the adoption. I'm simply devastated. And then, Beverley Farmer, whom I had dubbed 'the pod lady' on account of her knowledge and years of experience with podencos, offers to let me adopt one of her available dogs for adoption. She has helped and advised me throughout my experience with the German organisation and it seems a bond of trust has developed between us. I'm blown away. Yes, I have now immersed myself in this world and I'm learning every day about the wonderful animal that is the podenco, but to be offered a chance to adopt from the pod lady herself, is an honour indeed. I'm determined that the podenco I choose for Nala and me, will have the best life I could possibly give him or her. The adoption process is flawless and with Bev's guidance I make my choice. Not that it's easy, there are three very different beauties whom I love on sight and I go round and round deciding which one. Eventually I settle on a five year old boy, who I name Rico, Mister Rico. He was with hunters and then with another rescue organisation before ending up in Bev's care in November 2012. Bev describes him as a perfect gentleman. The more I learn, the more pictures I see, the more certain I am that he's perfect for us and once my decision is made I nearly lose my mind waiting for him to begin his journey home. Several times I almost get in my car and drive to get him. Because Austria is off the beaten track as far as podenco adoptions go, I have to drive 600km into Germany to meet the transport traveling up from Spain. It's both the best and the worst drive of my life, I just can't wait a moment longer to meet my Mister Rico. And then suddenly there is the van and there he is. Another shovel moment and my friend has to give me a nudge to snap me out of my reverie. He is beautiful and I love him fiercely at first sight. Time proves that we have indeed made exactly the right decision. He fits seamlessly into our lives. He belongs to us and we to him.
The pull of these dogs, the effect they have on your life, is difficult to put into words. Podencos are loving, calming, loyal, intelligent, elegant, athletic (but also couch potatoes), noble, gentle, playful, trusting. They are all these things but so much more. No list of adjectives can do a podenco justice. No long descriptive sentence, however emotional or beautifully written, can convey what it means to have a podenco in your life. As Dostoyevsky said, "...there is immeasurably more left inside than what comes out in words..."
A year ago I had never even heard the word podenco. Now it's part of my everyday vocabulary and I am committed to helping raise awareness of the breed and their plight. You will hear those who share their lives, sofas and beds with a podenco say again and again that you can't have just one. And they are right. I now have not one but two of these beauties in my life as Mister Rico was recently joined by another of Beverley Farmer's rescues, Little Leo, a mini podenco pup rescued in the nick of time from a killing station. He's been with us just four days but I love him completely. He's part of our family now and family is everything.
So what is it about podencos ? If you have a podenco by your side as you read this, you will know that one word is too many to define them, and a thousand words are not enough. Podencos have a presence, a lure, a peculiar power that can't be defined or explained. Podencos just ARE.
Alex Frederickson - October 2013.
