Genevieve and Richard Woodward adopted their first greyhound in 1993 in Britain from an animal rescue centre.
Since then, the couple has adopted four more greyhounds and are so keen on the practice they convinced their St. Albert neighbours, the Baileys, to adopt one, too.
"We didn't know anything about greyhounds. My husband just went to the rescue centre and asked for the dog least likely to find a home. They brought out this pitiful little black dog. Richard said, 'I'll have him.' And since then we've been greyhound mad," Woodward said.
The Woodwards presently own Charlie, a four-year-old greyhound, which they adopted through the Chinook Winds Greyhound Rescue Foundation located near Gibbons.
Charlie is a mottled grey colour and has one lop-ear and his nature is gentle.
"Our children were raised with greyhounds. Charlie is our fifth greyhound. Before we had children we had two rescued greyhounds; then we had two old lady-dogs and now Charlie," she said.
Most days the Woodwards and the Baileys walk their two big, very striking dogs together through the Forest Lawn ravine.
"I've had people stop me and ask me if Sam is royal," said Barry Bailey, adding that he is somewhat perplexed by the "royal" name himself, but there is no mistaking Sam's regal nature.
Sam is tall and stately with a sharp-looking black face. When the dog spied a small poodle, Bailey grabbed Sam by a tight leash. The poodle was clearly interested in the bigger dog, but Bailey warned its owner to stay away.
"He probably thinks it's a rabbit. He's been trained to chase rabbits," Bailey said.
The racing background of these adopted dogs is what it's all about. They have been 'rescued' from greyhound racing organizations in the United States. Perhaps never good racers to start with, Charlie and Sam have lost their usefulness. While other winning dogs can have an after-racing life on dog-breeding farms, the vast majority of greyhounds are euthanized once their racing days are over.
Regulated industry
Debbie Ward, vice president of the Chinook Winds Greyhound Rescue Foundation has been saving greyhounds since she took a vacation to Arizona in 1998.
"We passed by a dog-racing park and I wanted to go in, but my husband said that the dogs were badly treated. I came back and did some research and later we adopted a dog from a rescue group in the U.S.," she said.
Chinook Winds Greyhound Rescue Foundation was started in 2002.
"A man named John Hern, who had rescued thousands of greyhounds in the States died. In his will he left funds to start other rescue organizations. That helped us to register as a group," Ward explained.
Last year Chinook Winds Greyhound Foundation placed 135 greyhounds into adoptive homes all across Canada. The number of adoptees has steadily grown since the first year when eight dogs were placed.
"The Internet changed everything," Ward said, as she explained that the greyhound racing business has cleaned up its act since she made her first adoption 14 years ago.
"They are in business to produce winners. There was a public outcry and there's nothing wrong anymore. The industry is very well regulated. All racing greyhounds must be registered with the National Greyhound Agency," Ward said.
Regulated or not, the goal at Chinook Winds Greyhound Rescue Foundation is to save the dogs from euthanization once the animals are past their racing prime.
"Greyhounds love to run. You cannot deny that and overall, the dogs are not abused," Ward stressed. "They are monitored their entire lives on the tracks. It's after they leave the track that they need to be adopted," she said.
Good dogs with an honoured-pedigree and a fast record on the tracks could fetch up to $30,000, Ward explained.
"Some of those dogs would stay on their home farm and that owner may breed them. Others will be sold to other breeders, especially the studs, which are bred through artificial insemination. A sire could father 11,000 puppies through artificial insemination," Ward explained.
Once they are retired, dogs are sent to halfway homes before they are taken by various rescue organizations and then adopted out. Every six to eight weeks, Ward travels to Idaho to pick up several dogs and brings them home to her farm. The only time she doesn't make the trip is in the coldest part of the winter and in the heat of the summer.
"The dogs go to a halfway house in Oklahoma. There they arrange for 60 to 80 dogs to travel north to Coeur d'Alene, Idaho, where they are met by adopting foundations from other parts of the States and by us and by another group from Calgary. Usually we take 12 to 16 dogs," Ward said.
Kennel raised
The retired dogs range between two and 10 years of age. Most have never been inside a house in their lives, but they are used to being handled by people.
Once they come home to Gibbons, Ward has the dogs neutered. They are given the necessary shots and have their teeth cleaned. Then the dogs are fostered out for a conditioning/training period in other greyhound lovers' homes.
"They go to a foster home. We have a number of foster homes in St. Albert," Ward said.
The foster owners housetrain the animals but they also teach the pets to live with people and their belongings.
"They need to learn about stairs and mirrors and windows. Most dogs take a minimum of a week, but some can remain in the foster care for months," Ward said.
The adoption fee charged by Chinook Winds is $350, which Ward says is on the upper-end of what other adoption agencies charge.
"The adoption fee doesn't begin to cover the cost. For that we fundraise. But the fee is upper-end. We want it to be enough that the owners make a commitment, but yet they are not so unaffordable for people either. We don't want to make them elitist, expensive dogs that ordinary people cannot afford."
Both Bailey and Woodward said it took a few months for their pooches to get used to their households, but now the dogs seem to have made themselves at home.
"At first Charlie was territorial about his bed and he skidded around on the laminate floors. But he figured it out. I think he was homesick for a while because he didn't know us," Woodward said.
Bailey has owned several different dogs in the past, and says Sam is one of the most affectionate.
"They go from being a pack animal to figuring out that you are their new pack. Now, if we go downstairs, he has to come right down with us. He wants to be with us all the time," Bailey said.
It doesn't take long to get the dogs shivering as they stand and wait patiently for their masters at the ravine walkway, even though each dog has its own quilted coat to protect it from the wind.
Neither owner lets go of the leash. Not even for a minute.
"They can run 60 kilometres an hour. If Sam got loose, we'd never catch him," Bailey said, adding that for the most part the dog is a sprinter and doesn't need long walks.
"In summer we take him to the skating rink and let him run. He just goes round and round and then when he's had enough, it's time to go home. Greyhounds are easy, lazy dogs to live with," Bailey said.
For more information visit www.chinookwindsgreyhounds.org
