The Search for Hank

It's not the best picture of Hank, who is normally quite photogenic, but this image shows his condition after six days of non-stop running in a big loop.  He is very muddy, but he is not too skinny.  Hank found many sources of food, and it was at one of these food sources that he was finally caught.  He went into a back yard where a bowl of dog food sat uneaten, and the homeowner closed the gate behind him, trapping him.

Kelsy and I started the search for Hank about twenty hours after he escaped.  Kelsy found hot spots in the trail, where the scent was stronger for 100 yards or so, and then it went back to normal.  She searched for Hank again the next day after we had another sighting.  What we learned later was that Hank was running the same loop over and over.  Several times a day, according to the sightings, Hank would run south on the BPA trail, west a couple of blocks, north from 19th Street to 29th Street, west from 68th Ave to about 60th Ave, then south through a ravine, and back toward the southeast corner of his range.  Hank's loop was probably about 3 miles, and he ran it many times each day.  By the time Kelsy and I first searched for him, he might have run this course three to ten times already.  We couldn't sort it all out.  On our last search, Kelsy led me to an ominous gate with rusty razor wire and a No Trespassing sign.  Using a little computer detective work, we got the property owner's phone number and asked for permission to search the property, 160 acres of woods.  After an interesting conversation between the property owner and a volunteer from Saving Great Animals (the organization that brought Hank form Taiwan) the property owner agreed to let us search, under some severe restrictions.  He said he had five dogs that were trained to kill any dog that came on his property.  He put them inside, but if we deviated from the allowed search area, he would release his dogs on Kelsy.  Uh, no thanks.  That was the low point of the search for me, but I reasoned that if Hank had been killed by his dogs, the crazy man would probably have told us, and if his property was full of vicious dogs and coyotes, Hank would probably move on.

The next day, we received new sightings.  Hank was moving fast and looking scared.  After one sighting, Kat responded with Kody and a snappy snare.  She caught up to Hank in someone's yard.  Kat approached Hank very slowly, using calming signals.  Kat avoided looking directly at Hank, and she kept track of him through her peripheral vision.  The homeowner must have misinterpreted this calming approach as Kat's inability to visually locate the dog. After many minutes of this slow approach, the home owner flung open her door and shouted, "There's the dog right there!"  Of course, this caused Hank to bolt again.  The next step was to set up humane traps and a wildlife camera.  One of the traps caught a raccoon and a cat (at separate times).  The wildlife camera never showed Hank at the one trap that was monitored.  This afternoon, after six days on the run, we got the call that he was trapped in a fenced yard.  The homeowner had managed to loop a leash onto Hank, and he was tied to a railing when we got there.  The vet says he is dehydrated, but otherwise in good shape.

While at a foster home, Hank had shown surprisingly good behavior, considering what he had been through.  His home in Taiwan had burned down, killing his entire family, and they had to catch him with a blow dart tranquilizer.  Now he has spent six days evading coyotes, killer dogs, and people chasing him with good intentions.  He will need some time to recover, but I predict that Hank will make a great companion for someone in the future.  I hope they put a GPS collar on him, though.

The search dog was just one tool in this case.  While Kelsy and I were unable to pinpoint Hank, our two searches did corroborate the later sightings, and it helped piece together a picture of Hank's movements.  We tried the magnet dog and the humane traps.  The Yard Trap is actually one of our recommended techniques, and the homeowner who caught Hank just did it instinctively.  The large signs were also an important tool, generating many sightings.  At least 15 volunteers from MPP and SGA helped at different stages of the search.  Someone from SGA commented that one of the biggest ways MPP helped was just to advise them that catching Hank was possible, even likely, at a time when they saw little or no hope of catching him.  It would have been nice if Kelsy could have found Hank, but this case was ultimately solved by the big MPP-style signs.  I often tell people who ask for our help that the big signs have found more dogs than Kelsy has.

Both times we searched, the wind was gusty from the south, and the temp was below freezing, with low humidity, not ideal conditions.
Temp: 31F
Feels like: 24F
Cloudy
Humidity: 54%
Wind: SSW at 7 mph
Updated: 2/26/11 1:05 PM PST

Name:		Track 033
Date:		Feb 25, 2011 2:28 pm
Map: (valid until Aug 24, 2011)		View on Map
Distance:		2.49 miles
Elapsed Time:		1:24:50
Avg Speed:		1.8 mph
Max Speed:		6.1 mph
Avg Pace:		34' 08" per mile
Min Altitude:		285 ft
Max Altitude:		459 ft
Start Time:		2011-02-25T22:28:40Z
Start Location:
	Latitude:	47.276436º N
	Longitude:	122.357431º W
End Location:
	Latitude:	47.281319º N
	Longitude:	122.367629º W