Spring is a happy time at the ADANA Dog Rescue Centre in the hills above Estepona, on Spain’s Costa del Sol, with sunshine, cool air, and flowing streams in which the dogs can play. Such conditions mean extra volunteers and more opportunities to get the dogs out more often; especially important among the new arrivals, as we assess their characters and energy.

Three notable (and rather diverse) April arrivals are Walid, Sullivan and Ritzy – who joined us along with her four puppies, Eeny, Meeny, Miny and Mo. Continue scrolling to get better acquainted with this delightful bunch!

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Ritzy: Small dog, big heart, bigger tongue

Ritzy is a tiny Podenco cross with enough personality to fill a couple of Great Danes… and her pups seem to have inherited her playful enthusiasm. As a volunteer sat in their pen, making a fuss over Ritzy, one of the pups (small enough to sit in the palm of one hand) managed to get its front paws around his arm and its mouth around his wrist, whereupon it attempted to shake him as if he were a soft toy.

Only Mo remains unadopted, of Ritzy’s pups, but we’ll also accept offers for Vesa.

Walid: Too excited to control all of his legs

Walid, meanwhile, is a Galgo – Goofball cross; gangly, awkward, engaging and loveable, but seemingly unable to control all of his legs all of the time. His excited prancing, when approached, can be approximated by imagining Bambi attempting to Riverdance.

Walid seemed unused to leads and walks upon arrival, much keener for affection and play than for leaving the shelter. With some patience and sausages, it’s been possible to walk him increasingly further as his confidence grows, although affection and play remain his favorite things.

Sullivan: A rascally little beast

To understand Sullivan, it is first necessary to meet Arturo, a longer-term ADANA resident, who arrived as a puppy, last summer.

Arturo: A rascally little beast

An extremely loveable if rascally little beast, Arturo was difficult to place in the common pens due to his infinite, boisterous energy and desire for very robust play. While not typically aggressive towards other dogs, his energetic and ill-mannered demands for play could quickly escalate, as other dogs became either intimidated or annoyed.

Arturo and Kira

One volunteer intervened, fostering him at home each weekend, allowing him to blow off some of his puppy energy and meet other dogs of a similar kind. Kira, a small and very anxious arrival from around the same time, also benefitted from the same treatment, with the volunteer fostering them alternately, allowing each to gain confidence and social skills.

Through this period, each would have undoubtedly gotten used to the scent of the other, so it was no great surprise that they were eventually placed in a pen together.

Kira is now a very different girl; more confident, trusting and affectionate, not to mention happy! Arturo, meanwhile, remains the loveable, rascally, boisterous bundle of energy he always was. A walk with Arturo means pulling, corrections, affection, play and the inevitable tug-o-war with the lead if he starts to get bored.

Sullivan or Arturo. One or the other

It was very clear to all who met them both that Sullivan was obviously Arturo from maybe two years in the future, who had come back in time to impart vital information to his puppy-self.

Not only is he a perfect doppelganger for Arturo +2 years, but his rough-mannered, boisterous energy is also a precise match. Both want to play with everything, neither can be entirely trusted to do so, and if you start a cuddle with either, you should first clear your diary, as it could last for some time. They are one and the same: rascally little beasts, separated by about two years. We await the inevitable Terminator.

Bulé and Jason. I don’t remember taking this, but I can tell by Jason’s face, there are treats

When the time came to place Sullivan in the common pens, he was moved in with Bulé, Taz and Jason (see previous story) but, his manners being what they are, a fight ensued almost immediately. However, the instigator was not the one we expected. It was not Sullivan, belligerent Bulé, or confident, bullish Taz, but anxious and timid Jason who immediately challenged this strutting interloper.

While we certainly don’t encourage any dog to show aggression, it really is some testament to his new-found confidence that Jason would seek to cement his place in the pack, in the face of such a confident and robust dog as Sullivan. A month ago, it would have been unthinkable!

Naturally, when a dog is introduced to new pen-mates, a volunteer will observe in case of such a situation, but this time, no action was required. Bulé operates a matriarchal dictatorship, and she was all out of matriarchal. Channeling her inner rhino, Bulé charged into the fray, butting Jason in one direction, and Sullivan the other, reaffirming her position as queen of the pack, and leaving the boys to bond over grumbles about how it wasn’t fair.

Sullivan. Pretty sure

Lucky: The beast never sleeps, except often, the lazy, great oaf

All of this leads us to a tricky, final anecdote.

In any other month, at this point in the story, I’d be setting up for a Lucky joke, but that’s difficult this month. We had noticed that his eyes were becoming increasingly cloudy, and in early April, it was decided that he needed a visit to a specialist.

He is a very large dog, nine years old, overweight and lazy, not to mention oafish, so we feared bad news. However, it was not the worst, with the complaint determined to be an issue with his immune system; chronic, but treatable and certainly not terminal. While his eyesight is very likely to fade over time, he currently remains his usual happy, ebullient and mischievous self.

Best pic I ever took

I was one of the two volunteers that went with him to the vet. We held his head and gave him cuddles as several swabs were pushed into each of his eyes, and he did not make a sound. His tail waved throughout. If the trade-off for all the cuddles was a stranger putting things in his eyes, he was still going to call it a win.

Lucky: April’s goodest boy.

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