After a huskie dog from Texas turned up at the Tullahoma Shelter last week sporting an Id chip enabling the shelter to find the owner who lived a thousand miles away, we couldn’t help but wonder about one of our current guests at Animal Harbor. We’ve been calling him Chase. Chase is a Boykin Spaniel, a rare breed that originated in South Carolina. The breed was developed because so many hunters in those parts like to hunt birds from small boats and needed a smaller retriever who could ride in the prow of a two man rowboat and jump in after the birds on command. Most Boykins have docked tails and Chase’s tail is the original length, but this doesn’t mean he isn’t a pure bred Boykin. Chase shows his Boykin nature in other ways. He has the natural inclination to retrieve and he does it like a pro. But more than that, he knows retrieving commands such as “Go get it”, “Leave it”, “Drop it”. And when he goes for the object in question, he returns in a knife-straight line. He also has the affectionate nature of the Boykin. Few breeds are can claim such reliably outgoing companions.

We think that he has an owner somewhere who is desperate for their lost dog. But where?

Our vet who visits Animal Harbor on an ongoing basis recently checked Chase for an Id chip like the one the Tullahoma Shelter found in the Texas huskie. We didn’t find one with the scanner that our vet brought with him. But there are several other types of chips, all requiring different scanners that our vet doesn’t possess. Chase could have one of those, or no chip at all.

Of course it’s also possible that Chase was abandoned like so many dogs are in Franklin County. This sadly happens all the time. But on the off chance that Chase might have an owner out there somewhere, we wanted to try our best to get the word out.