Ja-lene Clark:
Wise Dogs, Rogue Elephants

From my window view at a tiny country café, I waited for my breakfast to arrive, daydreaming while I watched the cars race by. Across the highway, I noticed a little cocker spaniel mix and my heart leapt with fear as she started to mosey through the heavy traffic on Highway 7. My first instinct was to run out outside and rescue her! With all the traffic and because she was taking her time, I was praying that a car would not hit that dog.

All of that happened in just a few moments. Before I could take any action, by some miracle, that little pooch managed to avoid all the traffic and safely trotted into the café’s parking lot. A family in a minivan had just pulled into the café parking lot. I knew the family had witnessed the event because a lady quickly hopped out of the van and starting trying to coax the dog to come to her. The dog’s response was to tuck her tail, keep her eyes on the woman and cautiously walk at a safe distance past her. As the dog passed my window I also could see that the she was obviously pregnant.

My “must rescue pregnant dog!” impulse was on high alert. The waitress came by to fill up my coffee and I asked her if she had seen the dog. She said, “Oh sure, almost every day! She lives out in the woods somewhere and comes here to get fed every day.”  

I was intrigued. The waitress confirmed that she was indeed pregnant and said this was not her first litter of pups.  Waitresses, cooks and customers had at some point tried to get the dog to come to them but she refused to let anyone touch her. When it came to food, she did tolerate being around humans…at least a little bit. She had a method. Go to the kitchen door. Wait for someone to spot her. Back off and wait.  Watch for one of the staff to come out with a plate full of scrambled eggs, sausage or bacon. Wait for that person to leave and then eat.  I thought that was quite an intelligent plan! The waitress said the dog also had a regular boyfriend that sometimes joined her for breakfast at the café…a tall, thin friendly male that looked like a cross between a birddog and a lab.

The waitress said that with past litters, her food preference actually changed to pancakes after she had the puppies. She would refuse eggs, bacon or sausage and hold out for pancakes. The waitress guessed that the pancakes might be easier for her to carry back to her puppies. They had seen her carrying mouthfuls of pancakes off into the woods. 

I asked her, “What happens to the puppies?” She explained, with the first litter they were aware of, the staff saw her with the puppies trying to get across the highway to the café. Sadly a car hit and killed one of the puppies that day, but the waitresses were able to successfully capture the two remaining puppies. Their Momma watched the capture and then quietly went back into the woods.  The waitress said, “It was the craziest thing…it was like she knew that it was the best thing for them.”

With the next litter, the staff made a note of approximately when she delivered the puppies. After five weeks they decided it was about time for the puppies to try to join their mom on her daily jaunt to the café so they followed the cocker-mix. They heard the puppies yelping and although it was a little early to take the puppies from mom, they did. And they found them good homes.

While listening to the interesting life of this little dog my rescue instincts vanished. If I were to name her it would be Little Miss Independent because she had built herself a lifestyle that she enjoyed. She had freedom, a boyfriend, a place she loved to live, knew where to find food, fed her family pancakes and when it was time, she let her puppies go so that they have homes.  Who was I to intervene and change her lifestyle?  I couldn’t imagine how hard it would be for her to adapt to what we humans believe is the finest living standards for a dog…I could imagine that she would be very depressed if she was fenced in or lived as a house dog.

After listening to the waitress, I remembered something I had read about an elephant overpopulation problem in South Africa’s Kruger National Park. Rather than thin the heard by euthanizing some of the elephants, the park decided to move many of the adults. The females and calves would go to the Pilanesberg Park preserve. Since matriarchs led the herds they had decided it was best to not take the bull elephants along. All was quiet on that reserve for twenty years until a rash of strange deaths began to occur to the park's rhinoceros population. In a very short time 10% of the rhino population was attacked and killed and because the rhino’s horns were still intact, poachers were obviously not responsible. Who were these brutal culprits? After investigation, they discovered that a rogue band of adolescent male elephants were responsible for the rhino’s deaths. The rogues had even started harassing park visitors' vehicles and this behavior was disturbingly dangerous. The elephant case was perplexing because this type of violence was not normal behavior for these gentle giants. After the rangers caught this rogue band in the act harassing rhinos they discussed euthanizing them. Thankfully, they hesitated, until a wiser solution was offered. The park officials realized that the young males were mating too soon and as a result were experiencing huge bursts of testosterone, which made them aggressive. Plus these males had no role models or competition from mature bulls for mating rights. The rangers began to wonder, what would happen if older bulls were reintroduced into that elephant society? Amazingly, when the mature bulls arrived those teenage males stopped harassing the rhinos. The problem was solved without euthanizing the rouges. (click here to read more in the CBS news story The Delinquentsl)

My mind raced into realizations while watching Little Miss Independent trot back across the highway to her hidden home. She had a perfectly happy, well-rounded life. That little dog did not need rescuing even though I felt that was the thing I was supposed to do. We’d expect good people to rescue her. But was rescue the right solution for her? We learned from the elephants that they have an obviously intelligent set of standards for family/society and that that culture includes rules and guidelines governing appropriate behavior enforced very well by the elephants. Fascinating! It also seemed like Little Miss Independent had created her own vision of dog heaven on earth!

All of nature has rules that we humans have yet to fully comprehend. I find it extraordinary that we have made such fantastic technological advances and yet we know so little about whys of the inner workings of the beloved beings who inhabit this planet alongside us. If we place the regulations that govern humanity onto the natural world we can innocently disturb the natural rhythm of life and do harm.  After this lesson from a wise dog and rogue elephants, I am learning to become more observant because I can realize that I have so much learn about life from the wise creatures on our beautiful planet.

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