Samaritan rescues, returns dog
Staff writer
A dog is home safe and sound with her family after an adventure that found her traveling from near Florence to Sterling.
Jazz, an Australian shepherd, went missing from the home of Jeff Wyss in rural Florence on Saturday.
“My dad noticed she and Venice, our other dog, were gone Saturday, but Venice came back about five hours later, but there was no sign of Jazz,” Jeff’s daughter Mandy Wyss said. “Dad road on horseback through pastures until dark on Saturday, then again on Sunday.”
Mandy and her boyfriend joined the search Sunday and rode several miles on four-wheelers searching for Jazz.
“I knew she was out there and we had to find her,” Mandy said. “She feeds cows with dad and goes in the semi with him all the time.”
After finding no sign of Jazz Sunday Mandy looked to social media for help. Eileen Sieger saw Mandy’s post and contacted her saying she had seen Jazz earlier that day.
“A friend called me and told me there was a dog running down U.S. 150 close to our house,” Sieger said. “We went right over and there she was, but another car was stopped ahead of her on the side of the road.”
A fellow dog lover was able to coax Jazz into his car. Thinking she was abandoned, and Sieger knowing of no one nearby who owned a dog like Jazz, the man took her home with him to Sterling.
“I wish now I would have taken her as then she would have been closer to her owners,” Sieger said. “Later I saw the post and connected Jeff with the fellow who took the dog. A good ending on that one.”
Mandy said after exchanging a few messages with Sieger, it was obvious the found dog was Jazz. Sieger was able to put Jeff and Mandy in contact with the man who picked up Jazz, and they picked her up Monday.
“My family is very thankful that Jazz came in contact with honest and caring people and God must have been with her because Eileen said she could have been hit so many times,” Mandy said. “Losing Jazz would have been heartbreaking for my parents, me and my sisters, and our kids. Jazz has become a huge part of all our lives.”
Because U.S. 150 is so far from their home, Mandy believes that someone found Jazz running without a collar and decided to take her home.
“Venice and Jazz are very close and we didn’t think that if Venice knew where Jazz was that she wouldn’t have come home without her,” Mandy said. “We thought that someone had picked her up and she had gotten away.”
Mandy said she and her family are just thankful that Jazz is now home safe and able to run, hopefully not as far, with Venice again.
“It was a whole series of circumstances that came together for the good of this dog that was returned to her owners a long ways away,” Sieger said.