Uncertainty

A few developments happened today. We got a call from the Lexington School to the effect that a few of their children reported seeing Raven just south of the school. They were not able to provide a concrete location as to how far south, however. Elaine went out there to look around, but no Raven.

Last night on Craigslist someone posted the following:

Found Female fluffy black dog with extremely long matted fur.Has stickers and leaves stuck in coat. No collar. Have been out of town on vacation for 3 weeks and it appears the dog had taken up residence in our garage (using doggy door) Very nervous/anxious and is hard to approach. We have shut the doggy door via the outside and will hold her there until morning. Looks to be a sheepdog or similar breed. All black with a few specks of silver. She was EXTREMELY hungry and is being fed and taken care of here.

Please contact if you think this is your dog. Please be able to show proof of ownership

We have written them via craigslist anon email - the only option possible, but they have not responded yet. Finding that Raven was up north in West San Jose - where she started her ordeal - would be at odds with our tracking data which suggests that she was recently far to the south (e.g., by Lexington Reservoir). It's certainly possible that she is the dog in question, and hopefully these people will contact us and we will be able to find out - but we don't know until they do.

The one solid thing to acknowledge is the ongoing support of the wonderful people on our find_raven list. Randi has been checking shelters; Mary Ann has been putting up posters, and that's just what I can think of off the top of my head. Thank you sincerely all for your help, time, attention and compassion.

Movement within the Lexington Reservoir area

We did a second day of tracking based on Monday's sighting at Lexington Elementary School, mostly to see if Raven stayed in the area. We know it is very rare to be tracking and to come across the object of your search. Mostly, we are tracking to know where to do promotion and feeding stations at this point. Here is the track:

R7 at EveryTrail

Map created by EveryTrail: GPS Trip Sharing with Google Maps

We started at the CDF alma station where we had left off the previous day. Raven went south back towards the school but veered off towards the shore of the reservoir. She basically went south from there until she could not go south anymore. If you look on the google map, the reservoir appears full but the reality of the situation at this point in time is that the thing is maybe 1/4 full. The south end, where the creek comes into it from the mountains is pretty much just a mud flat with a creek running through it. There are some houses along Oakmont Drive and she basically headed for them and skirted their backyards which look out over the expanse of reservoir to the north. We passed an old bridge which normally would be under water. Because of the low water levels, it was walkable and covered with grass. This is some road remnant of the old town of Alma we later learned which was submerged to form the reservoir.

Passed the Oakmont area homes, raven actually got into the creek and then went north for a short while on the eastern side before doubling back south in the creek bed itself. She progressed into increasingly muddy and reedy areas until we encountered what appeared to be a beaver dam with an actual small but rather deep pond behind it. We were not sure if Raven had gone further south at this point, but we knew that we could not go further south. Cursing under our breath and hungry for lunch, we backtracked ourselves towards the Oakmont area and came out onto that street only to find that Dino had the scent again - Raven had not gotten past the pond but we don't know how she got herself from there to Oakmont. Elaine brought lunch at the intersection of Oakmont and Old Santa Cruz highway and then we were walking north again on Old Santa Cruz.

The Lexington Elementary school is not far, and Raven must have realized this, because she basically made a bee-line there. We stopped at the entry gate after realizing that Raven had gone into their campus to check with the office to see if it was okay that we be there. It was, so we proceeded. Raven had gotten in through the main gate and proceeded to do about three or four loops around the entire campus. At first she was exploring and looking for food, but the later loops started to be more about checking out the fence for a way out. Somewhere in the middle of the campus track segment, Raven had actually walked into their cafeteria building through door 1 and then across the length of that room and out the door 2. No one noticed her - this might have been early morning or late in the afternoon when few people were around. We saw various food items on the ground here and there so it was apparent that this was a decent place for her to get a meal.

From the school she walked north on Old Santa Cruz until she got back to the CDF station, which she entered again and did another loop around, leaving there by picking up the trail that runs through their backyard - an extension of the Los Gatos Creek trail. She took this trail (which she knew well from the previous day) straight north to the Dam and then walked across the dam due east until finding the boat ramp parking lot. She explored the area there and then went down to the water where we stopped for the day.

The last thing we did was significant. While on the dam we took the dogs down the north side to the actual Los Gatos Creek Trail terminus from where you can get to Los Gatos or Campbell and asked Dino and Dot to tell us whether Raven had headed North. The answer was no.

So - we see here more of the same behavior that she's been engaging in - continuous movement - searching for food and new movement opportunites. One of the things we noticed today is that with the exception of her visit to the Lexington school, she was not near garbage cans. We are thinking that maybe she has been hunting and this accounts for her ability to maintain such an energy level in an area where she has much less human food opportunities. Not sure. If this is the case, it's a bad thing because that makes her less likely to stay near people -- and there are a lot of opportunities to go into places where no one lives (so she becomes invisible completely) and where we cannot track her. all she needs to do is to go south or east and she disappears.

I was debating whether it made sense to continue tracking after today and have decided (with the assistance of Monica and Elaine) that for the moment, further tracking won't help. The reasoning is this. If she is merely staying in the Reservoir area, more tracking won't help us. If she goes further south or east, tracking won't help us because there really aren't many people in those directions (if any in some directions!). She didn't go north. West is cut off by 17 and we saw no signs of crossing 17 (although she could do that). If she did go west, it's pretty much the same as if she went east - few people and roads and difficult to track her there. We have a very poor understanding of the area and the prospects for where people live and where she might be seen if she goes east south or west, so if you live in the area and/or have an intimate knowledge of the terrain there, can you please comment and tell us if we're missing something? That could be helpful.

We've kept the feeding station at the CDF in place so maybe she will make the rounds again and find the food and we'll get her to come back there on that basis. Or maybe she won't. This is not a situation which can be forced, unfortunately.

Tired now. More as we have it, but at this moment I'm not expecting more for a bit unless something pops at the feeding station. Would be that this was an easier task.

Raven tracked to the west side of the Lexington Reservoir by Lexington Elementary

This morning (Wednesday) we received an email from a woman saying that she had seen raven on monday morning just as she was pulling out of the Lexington Elementary School in the area by Lexington Reservoir south of Los Gatos. She described a large black poodle, moving fast, crossing the street several times and then running away. She saw a collar and thought it was odd that this dog would be alone. She was not aware then that Raven was missing but did figure it out based on some sort of electronic networking we as a group have done - perhaps through facebook or similar.

Since the report seemed very credible; since my father is in town helping us with child care (Monica is away on business); and since Jackie was available to do tracking (originally she was scheduled to be out of town this week), I arranged for Jackie to meet me at the Lexington school with Elaine. Jackie got there about 1:30 and we were quickly able to determine that the sighting was Raven (as Dino and Dot easily picked up the scent heading down Old Santa Cruz Highway south from the school driveway. I recorded the days track which appears below:

R6 at EveryTrail

Map created by EveryTrail: Share and Plan your Trips


Starting at the elementary school (which by the way google locates inaccurately on the map) about 10:20am this past monday , raven quickly crossed over onto a spit of land adjacent to the reservoir where roads were being constructed for houses. She tried to go down to the water but didn't seem to make it. A layer of burr-covered dried out plants by the water's edge was sticking to Dino and Dot and our shoelaces and it seems likely that Raven - to whom these sharp burrs would easily adhere - would have picked up a couple thousand of them in a matter of minutes. The presence of these burrs may have made the short distance impassible.

She doubled back and went along a little inlet and then back onto the roads that were being build for houses. She moved through the woods from these houses and came across a graphiti covered concrete holding basin the size of a swimming pool adjacent to the road but down the slope so as to be impossible to see from the road. She moved past the basin up a driveway and came out by the CDF Alma Station Helibase into which she went exploring. She moved along the periphery of some of the buildings. As we moved into the station we spoke with some firefighters there all of whom were very nice but no one had seen her.

She moved down the slope behind the base and picked up a trail there. Several times she did loops from the trail towards the water and then ended up doubling back to the trail. As she came into a large dirt parking lot directly to the north of the CDF station she did several of these loops. We think the narrow trails there, the upslope portions of which were covered with people's garbage may have attracted her attention as they would have smelled of food. But several times she looped and came back to the parking lot not finding anything satisfying there.

She continued to move north from there and ultimately made her way into a marshy area where the remains of an old concrete boat ramp or similar were located. We spoke with some fishermen there who had not seen her. Near the water (which was easily accessible here) we saw some very large animal tracks none of which looked terribly friendly. The largest of these was made by a pad-footed animal with claws and was easily 4-5 inches across in width (see the photo of the print with my shoe for comparison - also notice the burrs on my shoelaces). Perhaps a mountain lion? Hard to say, but nothing I'd like myself or my dog to meet at night or during the day either.

Raven pressed forward through a very marshy section before turning back around, heading south again and ending back up at the CDF station again. This time she found their living quarters and mess hall and did a few loops around there, going up the porches.

It was starting to get dark about then and neither Jackie nor myself had any desire to be out in the woods at dusk. We continued to track just a bit from the CDF station - passed several houses under construction and then found that concrete basin again - went up the hill towards the road and came out by the CDF station for a third time. This is where we ended for the day.

The last time we saw this sort of crossing paths we tried to set up a feeding station. It did not work, but it seemed like it was still a good idea so that is what we did again tonight with the kind permission of several of the men and women and one of the captains manning the station. With any luck she will find it and have a decent meal.

Though raven is now expending a lot of energy to move about, she isn't moving anywhere in particular. Her movements seem very random (more than before), with lots of loops and with a frenetic character as though she cannot rest. Jackie says she is probably very hungry and this is why (combined with her general tendency to move quickly anyway) she keeps going on like this. It's all about finding the next bit of garbage she can eat now. No time for anything else.

Since we now have a pretty recent sighting we also have a basis for doing another findtoto.com robocall in that area, so Monica scheduled one which apparently went out this afternoon while I was out tracking. Perhaps our elementary school mom is not the only person who has seen Raven.

By going south into the Lexington Reservoir area, raven has left the relatively safe confines of the Los Gatos to Campbell trail and entered open and far less populated territory. There are real wild animals there and much less food. This is not a good move for her to have made, but on the other side of the coin, at least we have some sense of where she is recently. before this we had no sightings for two full weeks and were really feeling that there was nothing to do to advance the search but post flyers semi-randomly in areas that seemed logical. Now we know to focus our efforts near the reservoir.

We know that Raven moves quickly and does not seem to stay in any place. So tomorrow we will track again and perhaps see if she has moved on from Lexington. I hope not. I hope she finds our food and the nice firefighters at the CDF station. but anything could happen.

What Raven might look like now

We are coming up on a month that Raven is missing now. We have no new sightings since two weekends ago at the Campbell Farmer's Market. It's depressing and we are dealing with the sort of coming out of shock and coming to terms with the idea that we may never see Raven again. Then again, just today, on the mailing list, someone posted a story about a dog who was lost for three months and then got reconnected with its people. So there is hope, but it's impossible to know what will happen.

What we do know is that if and when Raven is found, she will not look like the nice photographs we've got posted at right, but instead like the rescue poodle pictured at left. Poodles have hair - not fur and they do not shed. Instead, their hair keeps growing and growing and they get shaggier and shaggier. The only way their coat stays a reasonable length is through grooming and cuting/shaving. Raven's coat was already at the long side of the spectrum when she was lost - that was about three months of growth (from the shaved-to-velvet baseline) and she will now be at four months and counting. The hair is also very fine, so it tends to get matted when it gets wet, which is also likely.

The poodle in this photograph is not Raven. I'm not sure who this dog is, actually, but the photo was contributed by Susan Wilson who does volunteer work with Bay Area Poodle Rescue as an example of what lost poodles look like upon being claimed at a shelter. They look like sheepdogs or something similar; so different in fact that people may not realize they are poodles unless they have a photo like this for reference.

So - if you see a female dog that looks like this one down in the Los Gatos Creek, or in a shelter, please give us a call. We miss our baby very much.

Mark

Sunday evening - stakeout night 3

About now is the third evening of our dogfood stakeout. No luck so far regarding Raven. We have been urged to be at the site 24 hours, but we are finding that this is just physically impossible to comply with. I (Mark) was physically shaking with fatigue the other day so much so that people sent me home to rest. I'm not used to feeling that way. Others are not too far behind me, I don't think. Our thought is that the Octoberfest and 5k events of the weekend may possibly have made Raven more skittish than normal and now as the weekend ends and things quiet down more we maybe will see her. But quite possibly this is just wishful thinking too. At any rate, we will keep the stakeout going for a while longer as we're able and see what happens. We don't have any better ideas.



This is a photo of our stake-out set up. After we took it we added in the scent items, our worn clothing, directly underneath the plates of dog food. Monica bought a whole case of canned food and we have been putting out new plates (with that fresh from the can smell!) a few times a day.

I'm not personally shocked that the City of Campbell doesn't want our posters around. Cities like this are run by their respective Chamber of Commerce groups, and those chambers are all about the money. Lost dog posters maybe distract people from buying things or disturb the city's charm or are too depressing or something along those lines. It's of a piece with my earlier experience with Safeway, where the supermarket would not let me post a poster. I wonder what a Campbell city manager would do if s/he lost a dog in the area and needed to recruit the help of local people in order to secure the return of the dog?

I want to recognize again, all of the folks who were not on the stake out but were helping in other ways. Wendy and her kids, Veronica and her family and also Randi and Gary of Poodle Rescue all came out to walk the trail, talk to people and hand out flyers etc. Campbell did not have a farmer's market this weekend, but we did have a presence at the alternate event, their Octoberfest, so that many of the vendors there knew to be on the look out for Raven.

rain slows down the search, but does not stop it

It rained like crazy throughout most of today just like the weather-people said it would. We had planned to go to work today and actually did both do that - both on account of the rain and because after spending most of the last two weeks searching in one capacity or another, things were piling up pretty high. I didn't end up getting that much done, however, as my mood was low and half-way through the day we had a power-outage which knocked me offline (I work from home). Can't work without electricity. After an hour it was time to pick our daughter up from daycare and do the evening routine. Life goes on even when you feel a bit shell-shocked.

Amazingly, though Monica and I were not actively searching today, some of our friends (new and old) who are more local to San Jose were.

Elaine continues to go out to Campbell in the early morning hours to see if Raven will walk by. She has her food dish and kibble to dump into it to make the sound that would normally bring Raven running. Today she noted that wet kibble doesn't make the same pleasing sound as dry kibble, and anyone outside trying this trick should bring a plastic bag. Though this is an overly serious feeling time, a little humorous observation does help to lighten the mood.

Mary Ann Monahan-Frank spent some time searching under bridges today and posting flyers (now water-proofed somehow).

Cathy Scott searched near where Dell is adjacent to the perk-ponds (along the trail south of Campbell).

Various people on our yahoo groups list contributed suggestions for new places to search and helped to continue to get the word out through other dog rescue groups and dog-related groups.

Towards the end of the day, at Randi Plotner's urging, people started to introduce themselves, as it had become apparent that many people on this newly formed list did not know each other. So people contributed their story and a little bit about how they could each best help. The common thread is, of course, a love for dogs. It is neat to see a new group come together.

I know this awful situation - to lose a treasured pet - is a universal thing that many pet owners can relate to (and which many have experienced too), but it is still unexpected and amazing that kind people who were strangers to us until very recently are out there helping us look for Raven - actually out in the pouring rain looking for a lost dog. We are so grateful and (in this aspect) fortunate.

Mark

Sunday Wrap-Up: Raven seen in Campbell, she may be traveling on the Los Gatos Creek Trail

Well, we rushed to the Campbell Farmer's Market this morning after receiving word that Raven had been sighted. We found the man who had seen her in front of Bistro Twist and spoke with him, and he was fairly certain that it was her and gave a physical description of the dog complete with collar so we feel reasonably certain that it was her. This was at about 7am during market setup and Raven was moving up East Campbell Ave heading west between 1st and 2nd streets. We split up, with Monica going down towards the creek and walking south, and myself and Veronica and her daughter Isabella walking the length of East Campbell Ave but without result. No one else we met had seen her, but we talked to many people and put up flyers.


Given that we have a sighting from last Sunday (10/4) afternoon at the Campbell Farmer's Market was breaking down; a sighting in Los Gatos on Monday 10/5, and then another sighting today 10/11 at the Campbell Farmer's Market again, it would appear that Raven is staying in the Los Gatos creek system between Los Gatos and Campbell. As our new friend who we have not yet met Kit Lofgren points out:

If she has been seen BOTH this week and last at the Campbell Farmer’s Market AND at Oak Meadow Park in Los Gatos in the time in between, it is highly likely that she is traveling along the bike path/trail between those two locations. There is also a dog park at the mid-point. This is VERY GOOD news because it indicates that she is staying off of the roadways. Additionally, the fencing along this corridor is designed to keep animals off of Highway 17. In short it is about the safest place she can be.

Where does this leave us? Though this is great news (that we have a sighting and a bounded area to search), it is still a giant area to search and we did not have any success today. We were confident enough to purchase a FindToto.com automated calling set for the Campbell area to commence tomorrow, and perhaps that will turn up more information. We will be back in the area looking for her. Elaine suggested that it is probably beyond Raven's abilities to know that "Sunday" means market day, and that she was sighted on East Campbell Ave may be less a function of market day than just that on Market days she is more likely to be sighted, and she may be touring these areas daily or almost daily in search of food and just not be being seen in the early morning hours most days. Her plan is to spend some time in the early morning hours on East Campbell and see if Raven sprints by. Myself, I have work to get done in the AM, but I will be out on the Los Gatos Creek Trail south of Campbell Park tomorrow afternoon doing more looking.

We've been in touch with our Pet Detective Jackie Philips, and are on her schedule to pick up with the tracking on Thursday, her next availability.

Interestingly, we got the call to check out the market about 11am. About 9:30 am we got the email response back from the Animal Communicator we had talked to the other evening, Suzi Dalling. Suzi had asked me to send her some concrete questions to ask Raven, so I (skeptical as I am) worked to comply with that. I had asked her to convey to Raven how concerned we are and that we are looking for her, and then a bunch of questions designed to try to narrow down where she might be. Suzi had sent back that she understood that Raven was staying in a place where there was always water (although roaming around looking for food from there), that the place was wooded, with a park a short distance to the east and that it was nearer to Campbell than Los Gatos. I'm not sure what to make of that, but it is at the very least an excellent guess and a coincidence. It is in accord with today's sighting.

As a final note, it continues to be amazing to me how different people react to our story and search. We were in the coffee shop at the Pruneyard Mall area (in between the creek trail and downtown Campbell) this afternoon and the young woman behind the counter was sympathetic to the point that she posted our flyer near the coffee lids so that customers would see it. This young woman was excited to show us pictures of her dog on her cell phone. Another man on a bicycle saw us putting up flyers on a bridge over the creek nearby the Pruneyard, and yelled out "graffiti!" as he road by. Clearly he saw us as nothing more than litterbugs. I suspect that this guy does not have a dog. When it is your family member who is missing, you will do anything to find her and get her back home again.

BREAKING: Sighting @ Campbell Farmer's Market

BREAKING SIGHTING: We understand that a fellow "sergi" or "sergy" selling sausages near "Bistro Twist" at the Campbell Farmer's Market saw a "black poodle with a pink collar moving fast" this morning during setup. It's presently Sunday the 11th of October and the Market is still happening. A week ago she was sighted at this same market during the closing period (around 1-2 pm). We are heading down there as soon as we can with the hope of sighting her ourselves.

IF you are in the Campbell CA area and can respond with us, can you please?

Mark

Regrouping: Tasks, Yahoo Groups & Animal Communicator

No new word of Raven. No confirmed sightings since Monday - five days ago. This is demoralizing and depressing, but as the odds of safe return go way down if we give up, we'll just have to live with this feeling and persevere.

We are fortunate to have the assistance of concerned and sympathetic friends and family

• Monica's mom came into town yesterday and helped search Los Gatos yesterday. Today she helped us by visiting the various shelters without luck.
  
• Mike Murray who we know through German Sheppard Rescue is looking into possible ways to obtain media exposure for this search
  
• Friends at Pet Food Express where Mike works have been putting up posters in their stores
• Randi Plotner of Bay Area Poodle Rescue is looking into communicating with their network of adoptee families to possibly help with the search and has been very helpful with searching and coordinating.
  
• Kit Lofgren and Mary Ann Frank, independently, are searching in the Los Gatos area
• Veronica Presedo-Floyd, also of Poodle Rescue, has opened her home to us while searching and has been very active in searching herself and in helping to coordinate things.
• and more - which I'm too tired to record now, but which are no less appreciated.
  

I (Mark) was able to devote about half the day to the search process. and spent some of it working on a list of things that we need to be doing in order to advance this search process along. These things include:

• inspecting the Animal Shelters frequently and in person
• posting "lost pet" notices on animal shelter websites where this is provided for
• Keeping the Craigslist posting current
  
• Placing ads in large and small area newspapers
• Educating various pet-related professional groups regarding Raven's loss
• Vets
• Groomers
• Doggie Daycare Facilities
• Pet Supply Stores
  
• postering area dog parks
• postering adjoining cities to Los Gatos
• Seeking media opportunities so as to broadcast word and awareness
• Attending pet-related events and handing out flyers
  

We are figuring, given the rate of travel we recorded, that we need to cover the entire south bay area, and that may not even be enough if someone picks her up and drives away with her (but if that occurs, it's a whole other ballgame anyway).

We've covered some of these tasks (Monica and I, Elaine and others above), but could use assistance with executing some of the rest of them. If anyone wants to help us find Raven by , now would be a good time to raise your hand (you can write me at mark@dombeck.com or call 510-325-6979)

We have established a Yahoo groups list to help coordinate communications regarding this search. http://groups.yahoo.com/group/find_raven/ Feel free to join/subscribe and/or pass this on to others who might be interested.

Finally, on the advice of some people we respect, we have begun the process of hiring Animal Communicators to see if they can give us any sort of lead regarding where/how to search for Raven. Animal Communicators are people who report being able to speak with animals at a distance, not in words, but in pictures and emotions and feelings. My wife and I are not familiar with this sort of thing and are skeptical, but at this point in time, we are quite willing to try it and see what happens. A consultation will occur tomorrow and we're supposed to have a report via email by the evening tomorrow, so more about that sometime tomorrow, I suppose.

The end of the begining

Monica has recorded the details of the last two days pretty well. The situation today is that we have confirmed sightings of Raven in Los Gatos from Monday, but nothing since then. This suggests the possibility (perhaps the strong possibility) that Raven has traveled out of Los Gatos to parts unknown since Monday and this is why people are not seeing her and reporting it. We know that we've reached a kind of critical mass within the city regarding people's awareness of the situation and it seems strange that no one would call if she was slinking around.

The decision now is do we track again or not. At the moment, tired and fatigued and needing to get some work-work done, I am thinking probably we do not track more at this time. Jackie and Dino and Dot are not available until Monday, and this would put us days behind. It's not a question of the freshness of the scent as Dino can track scents up to 5 weeks old without issue, apparently. More to the point, we don't know when Raven left Los Gatos, if she did, and we might spend a full day simply noodling around that city and not get the direction of her travel out of the city until multiple days of tracking were completed. Unfortunately, tracking is like listening to an old school cassette tape with the fast forward button broken. You can only follow the track as it was laid down. You cannot skip ahead without someone calling you with a confirmed sighting and we don't have that.

We are thinking that yesterday and today mark the "end of the begining" phase of our search. Initially, we have charged ahead trying to find her ourselves. It has become apparent that this is quite unlikely to happen - Raven is too fast and too evasive at this time. And the rest of our lives have been suffering and need our attention at this point too. We don't have the bandwidth to continue the search with the level of energy and single-mindedness that we have put out previously.

So, we are thinking through what we can do, and have been listening to many people's good advice about how to conduct a less aggressive search. As I have time to digest it all I will post what we come up with here. Certainly, this will involve craigslist postings and other website postings, regular checking at the animal shelters, continued postering of areas where Raven might have gotten to, newspaper ads, etc. If this is going to become a long term effort, we have to arrive at a program we can sustain over the long term. More on the shape of this effort soon.

We have been truly touched by the many people who have put forth an effort to help us. This may not be the place to acknowledge everyone's contribution personally, but I want to make clear how thankful we are.

I slept in my own bed last night and spend the morning and evening with my daughter. It's nice to have a little normal again.

Mark

Los Gatos

Raven tracked to Los Gatos residential neighborhood (near Bean Ave and Bayview Ave). Los Gatos and Monte Sereno (sic?) residents, please look out for our black (poodle) dog!

Please call 510-325-6979 even if all that has happened is that you've seen her a while ago. Knowing exactly where and when she was at a place may help us jump ahead in the scent track and get closer to her.

---

The nice GPS track that I was able to post yesterday is not available today, for several reasons. I will try to draw it up later when I have a better internet connection, but for now I will have to describe it.

We started the day at the perk-ponds where we left off yesterday. Dino picked up the scent heading south, but I, not really understanding the way this all works still at this point in time, went off to the north calling her name, thinking she might have doubled back. waste of time. The first lesson is this: In matters of tracking a dog, do not try to outsmart Dino. Only Dino knows what is going on in any real fashion. And the second lesson is this. Raven moves. She doesn't seem to stay in one place very long. So if there is Dino evidence that she is moving south, don't go to the north. She just isn't there anymore.

Minus myself, Dino and company continued south along the creek and then went out into a neighborhood. I can't describe where exactly as I was not there, but while I was walking north, I encountered our friend Sally and her friend Mary who were jogging, and they were calling out to Raven without success and asking people about her, etc.

ultimately, Raven's track had gone all the way down the creek - through vascona lake - all the way to Los Gatos, CA. As she approached town, she left the creekside and went along the frontage road that leaves town to the south and heads into a ramp into 17. She went down the ramp some and then doubled back towards town.

After leaving the ramp to 17, raven walked some ways up Wood road. She walked across a swanky assisted living facilty driveway and exited on Broadway and then headed northwest to the end of that road. At the very end is an old victorian era home that is not lived in (but there is a renter in the outbuilding). The steep driveway there consists of several switchbacks, and at the first switchback there are three abandoned raised garden beds. Behind this is woods. Raven walked up the driveway, passed the raised beds and directly into the woods.

This frustrated us to no end, as we could not follow her. Jackie is very professional, and there are rules about what roads you can go down and where you have to stop. You can go down a private road if the gate is open (which it was) but you cannot trespass. So we required permission to go forward, but no one was home to give it. We left signs and requests to call us at the terminal driveway and turned around back into town. By this time it was something like 1pm. we had started at 8.

Fortuitously, my brother Glenn called at this time. He looked up the area on Google Maps and reported that there was a fire road that traversed the area raven had gone into. He thought we might have some luck picking up the track again at the entry points to that fire road. Accessing that fire road proved to be a challenge. We tried a few different roads that appeared to provide entry, but these all terminated in far-too-expensive houses. My brother had suggested we try Sheldon Ct. and so we did, and that ended up being one of the ends of the firetrail. You cannot park there, so I stayed with the van while Jackie and Dino and Dot went in along the trail seeing if they could pick up the scent. Meanwhile, Glenn was able to come down and help us search.

At this point I was feeling quite low. There is an intense emotional side to this sort of search process that parallels the physical journey you are experiencing. We were feeling so hopeless on Saturday, and then the rapid progress we made with Jackie and Dino and Dot on Sunday really lifted our spirits. it seemed like Raven would be just around the corner. And then to find that she had gone into a place we could not go was a glass of cold water on our hopes. Jackie had warned us that it was unlikely that we'd be able to track to a place where Raven would be so we knew this intellectually, but emotionally, you hope.

about this time, I started thinking about what we looked like to others, moving through these cities like some traveling carnival of drama, "excuse me sir, have you seen my dog?!". "Help save my dog!" The evening before in Campbell, I had asked a table full of men if they had seen raven and one of them pointed to a tiny stuffed dog shaped toy he happened to have on the table, "could it be this dog you mean?". He grinned the grin of a guy who was content to take cruel pleasure in my loss. Asshole, I thought. This is not the typical experience. The typical experience is sympathy. A person sees your aggitation and urgency and feels bad for you. Dog owners expecially so. But the line between "this is happening to you" and "this is happening to me" is not broken. Real empathy doesn't much happen (not that I expect it to). Your pain is a reminder of why they are glad this is not happening to them right now. We move around this life thinking we are in control and this shit won't happen to us. And then, out of the blue, sometimes it does, and other people have a hard time breaking their own denial to understand you at those times.

Maybe 4pm or so Jackie Dino and Dot arrive back at Sheldon Ct. Good news. Dino picked up the track about 1.5 or 2 miles in and followed it out. It seems that Raven had entered the woods and not liked it - maybe smelled the scents of hikers and bikers on the fire trail and moved that way until she found herself on it and then she moved down the hill back towards Sheldon Ct. Apparently Dino is trained to only follow the track from older to newer, so as he was entering, from newer to older, he did not think to alert Jackie to that fact.

At that point, basically Dino tracked Raven moving down the hill back towards the Los Gatos downtown. We hooked up with Glenn who had been talking to people around town. We stopped for the night at Bean and Bayview.

So - again, I find myself amazed by the good judgment of my dog, and also dismayed by her lack of insight into her predicament. If only she would stay in one place, we could reach her. But she can't know this. Being a dog, she deals with what is in front of her directly only.

This is a sensitive time right now. Strategically, the purpose of this tracking is not to stumble upon raven, although that would be highly desirable. the purpose is to be able to target postering efforts so that people throughout town can know to look for her and that she is lost so that the lucky person she reveals herself to can help. We are prety confident she is in Los Gatos in the last 12 hours and maybe is there right now. So we need a break - someone to see her - someone to catch her.

One thing seems to be predictable. She will move again. She could go towards Saratoga, or towards Blossom Hill or back towards Campbell. Who knows? The only way to know is if we track her, and the expense in cash and time and energy is very large. Not sustainable for too long. And the dogs are tired. Dino and Dot were balled up like donuts at the end of the day. This mode of search cannot go on indefinitely. We are weighing our options.

We love raven - we are bonded to her and she to us - this is why the drama parade is happening. Because something real is happening for us - a real loss. It looks odd from the outside only because the bonds that drive it are invisible from the outside. Just like Dino appears to be doing magic by following the track because we cannot perceive the scents. It's perfectly obvious to him why he goes where he goes. What's wrong with those humans who don't get it?

Pilgrim's Progress

Raven is still not found but wow have we made progress.

Today was an amazing experience. We set out with Jackie Phillips, a pet detective, and her tracking dogs Dino and Dot. Starting at the last confirmed sighting point (Junipero Serra Lane and Hazel Dell) we recorded the following trail:

http://www.everytrail.com/view_trip.php?trip_id=379716

Raven1 at EveryTrail

Map created by EveryTrail: Geotagging Community

Some of this track is interpreted - the GPS was not recording the whole time and where there are gaps, the line is drawn in from the last known point to the next. So this is not 100% of what we walked but it is pretty close.

The beginning part of the trail is not recorded as I had not thought to download the right app for my iphone, but it went like this.

Raven started out by crossing 280 at Saratoga (South ramp) heading north, and immediately went down into 280 itself. She walked along the freeway's southern edge for a bit - a very dangerous and noisy place! - getting as far as Saratoga North exit ramp and ultimately backtracked back to Saratoga North ramp, exiting by the Harker School (sic?) - a very swanky looking private highschool. She spent some time there as the track went circles around and around, but ultimately she left, heading east on the road just north of 280. This is where the track map starts.

At St Tomas Expressway, she turned and went south until she hit Starbird park. At this park we met two nice women Dede and Tina (I think) with dogs who had seen her , they reported, on Thursday morning something like 7am. Apparently she had tried to play with these dogs, but one of them was an aggressive acting pit and the owner had held that dog back for everyone's safety.

She wandered out of the park and into an apartment complex with many Mexican families and the strong smell of food. Raven had looped around this complex, checking out the dumpsters but ultimately exiting through neighborhood streets, and ultimately ending up a little further south.

At Payne Avenue she turned and started heading due east, crossing S. Winchester Ave and going further east until roughly N. Central ave when she headed north towards Marijane Hamann park. She walked the perimeter of this park, and then, upon discovering a pedestrian skyway across Highway 17, she crossed that skyway.

She continued east, I think on Downing Ave until hitting S Bascomb Ave where she turned south. Here's where it gets really interesting.

There was until recently a Pet Store on S. Bascomb called Bangcok Pet Supply or similar, - part of a larger strip mall complex. Raven found herself in the back area of this particular strip mall for some reason and did her perimeter dumpster check thing. The owner of Bankcok had recently put up a Craigslist annoucement saying that he was out of business, and that there were two large (87 gallon) acquariums he was leaving in the back for the first poeple who could pick them up. This ad was posted on Tuesday the 29th September, and we think it likely that the tanks were gone pretty quickly but apparently people have been showing up to see if they were still there for the taking. When we got there, a fellow was there in a van looking for the tanks. We tracked raven to a hiding spot behind the north dumpster, but Dino could not find a track out of the area. So Jackie thought that someone had come in looking for the tanks, found Raven and put her into a car or truck. So - Jackie had said that Dino could still track the scent of Raven even if she was in a car, and what she did was take Dino across the street and had him check all the corners of the egress areas, and sure enough Dino picked up the track on the far side of the road. It progressed south along Bascomb Ave until abruptly jerking to the west right at the light rail crossing, which also happens to be a creek crossing and a nature trail. It appears that Raven was in a car or truck, and then just jumped out of that vehicle, probably as it was moving and took shelter by the creek. Amazing!!

Down in the creek area is a hidden tent where some homeless person lives. We tracked raven down there and put a poster under the homeless guys's tent front door - maybe he'd seen her? The creek extends to the east and west of Bascomb, and we tracked Raven exploring both ends.

About 100 feet to the south on Bascomb is one of the EBay.com campuses - the Whitman campus, and Raven had gotten there and spent a lot of time going in and around that area, and neighboring condominiums Hamilton Crossing (?). We met a woman not far from there Marcella who reported seeing her in on Thursday afternoon on the median strip of grass in front of the EBay building (apparently a hot dog spot for the EBay workers). This contact with Marcella was on the creek nature trail just north of the EBay complex.

Raven did some exploring to the east of EBay - getting as far as the Valley Christian School and checking out their perimeter/dumpsters before then doubling back west, this time on Hamilton and then picking up back on that nature trail/creek area.

Once back in the creek area, she ultimately went south on the nature trail, crossing under creekside way and then turning left off the nature trail to an easement that connected the nature trail to the road into the historic downtown of Campbell, CA. Phil, who co-owns the self-serve dog wash in the south part of Campbell reported that he saw what was probably Raven on Saturday at 5pm emerging from that connector trail.

We walked up the street into Campbell's old downtown (very cute) and met a few people who said they had seen her. One person said that they had seen her at the Farmer's Market today (Sunday 10/4) in the early afternoon. Another guy at the Orchard Coffee Shop said he had heard about a stray dog being captured by someone who had fed/watered it - we aren't sure this was Raven though.

At this point it was getting to be late in the day, and I stopped accompanying Jackie and Dino and Dot for a while - trading places with Elaine (our friend) and Jackie, Elaine and tracking dogs continued on to search part of the Los Gatos Creek trail. We ended the day at Dell Ave near the ponds. 12 hours of tracking. The trail continued on but we had no daylight to continue to use to follow it. We will pick it up tomorrow morning.

So that is what we have learned and this is an amazing amount of information.

1. Raven was not poisioned. It is highly likely that she is still alive and in the Campbell, CA area.

2. Raven is resourceful and finding ways to take care of herself.

3. Dino and Dot are canine gods.

One of the take-home lessons for us so far is that our posters were failing to draw any sightings, because raven was not in the area we were postering. She had traveled over 6 miles across several days - very far from where she had started. If we had not engaged Jackie and Dino and Dot, we would never in a million years know to look in the Campbell area.

We do not have Raven back yet, but I have to say that I feel an enormous sense of relief knowing that she has done as well has she has done, knowing where she has been (having walked it with her in a way) and that she is likely still alive and hopefully findable.

I'm dead tired so that's all for now, but pretty good stuff, huh? Go Dino!

Mark

I want to put in a postscript about how impressed I am with Dino and what he is doing. Dino is picking out one scent that is over 4 days old from, what, ? - thousands, hundreds of thousands of scents that are all jammed together in a 3D tapestry. He is able to keep one specific thread in mind while ignoring the others (save for minor lapses for squirels and easy to nab food) and do this without visible effort of any sort. That the wind (or cars going across a freeway) may have disbursed the scent doesn't matter much. It's more diluted, but he's still able to find it. I'm guessing this must be in the range of 1 in a billion molecules he is picking up (I'm pulling this figure out of the air but it's got to be something like that). He is a little walking, kibble-eating gas chromatagraph. It is so impressive; I am so in awe.

A short update for Saturday evening. Raven is still lost. We checked the area shelters, etc. but no result today.

I'm thinking of this day just passed as a day of preparation.

A few people sent us some great tips on how to better execute our search task. One of them was to create really large florescent posters with large short headlines of no more than five words, and then our letter-sized poster in the center to provide the picture. So we started work on building these things. This involved purchasing materials, building stencils and starting to mark up the poster boards. We tried to do it freehand but we are not artists and the stencils really make it more legible. Shortly, we will post these hard to miss and easy to read from a speeding car posters in key intersections so as to reach more people.

The posters will read: "Lost Dog - Reward - Sick!!!" This communicates the key concepts, including that raven needs medicine, in as few words as we could come up with. There isn't room or attention span to explain things on these posters.

The second preparation we did today was to contact a "pet detective", again on the advice of a kind person who shared suggestions with us. So - tomorrow morning bright and early we will be out with this woman and her two scent dogs and see if we can't find the scent trail that Raven left as she bolted from the pool on Wednesday.

Our detective suggested to us that we hold off posting the large posters until we had a better sense of where Raven might have gotten to - which seems like a perfectly reasonable thing to do - posters will work much better if we can get them in an area where Raven is now. So when we have data from the search tomorrow, we will use it to target our further postering.

We had some more time in the day, so on the advice of a friend's friend who had an intuitive hunch Raven might be North West of the origin point, we went out to the Pruneridge area just West of Lawrence Expressway. We put up some of our standard posters there but no one had seen her. Many sympathetic people but no information.

On the way home we were passing by Saratoga Creek which is tucked behind a sound wall on the side of Lawrence Expressway. And as I had wanted to search there, I had Monica drop me off and I walked the length of that open trail, again talking to people and postering and calling her name. No luck, but many nice sympathetic people, some of whom took posters to distribute to their friends. This creek is a big dog walking place, it's easy to see, as it is secluded (what passes for secluded in this area of the world) and beautiful. There's water there and it is nearby the origin point. I thought it reasonable that Raven might have gotten there and then camped out, but no such luck.

And that was the day, pretty much. Our baby girl Sofia is crying for the attention of her Daddy, but I don't have the luxury of spending too much time with her at the moment. Maybe in a few days....

More as I have it. Please keep the suggestions coming as they are really helpful. And the supportive stories of pets that have been lost and found are inspirational too, I might add. It's nice to know that this sort of painful limbo can have a pleasant resolution.

Mark

Safeway, apparently, hates my dog

It's the evening of day 2 since Raven ran away from our friend's backyard near Moorpark and Williams in San Jose.

No leads. Lots of well wishes, many very heartfelt (thank you), but no leads. feeling fatigued, frustrated and more than a little helpless. This is a huge area and I know we are doing all we can do and have the assistance of a number of people in networking and even a few helping with canvasing, but no matter how hard we work, we just can't force the outcome. We need luck, providence, and the assistance of some good samaritans or Raven is lost to us.

I had to work in the morning, but was out in the afternoon spreading the word . I went down to see the folks at valleywater.org (your friendly water district) and they were very receptive and helpful. Apparently they do find lost persons in those creeks. A man I ran into down there said just a few weeks ago their crews found a demented man wandering around in a watershed area who had been lost for 9 days. Still alive.

Later in the afternoon, I put up more posters, this time in the area bounded by Bollinger on the south, Stephen's Creek on the North, Lawrence on the East and Miller on the west. I didn't have much time but I did what I could. I also spoke with a number of people in this area who were walking about - all of whom were very sympathetic.

So - nearby on the corner of Miller and Bollinger there is a Safeway supermarket, and I think to myself - they get a lot of traffic; that would be a wonderful place to put a poster. But, as it turns out, Safeway has a policy that prohibits any community oriented postings. They have no bulletin board; not even a tiny crappy one hidden away in some back hallway. A woman at the store said that they used to let people tape lost dog posters on the window where people would see them while walking in and out. I ask the manger on duty if this might be possible or if there is any way that they could assist me but he quickly brushed me off saying that it's against store policy to post anything like that. It was clear that he didn't want to get in trouble with his boss. My conclusion is (surprise) that Safeway is interested in taking money out of the community, but not interested at all in giving anything useful back. I guess this isn't news (that Safeway is an impersonal corporate vampire). God forbid that love should ever get in the way of commerce. Perhaps I'm being harsh; I know I'm not objective about this, but still....

Driving home, I stopped at a nearby Indian food place for dinner - Tandoori Cafe I think. The food there was great and they had no problem with me taping a poster on the window.

BAPR update and Vet note: (poison not likely)

Some updates:

1) Randi Plotner of Bay Area Poodle Rescue has rallied her network to help. She reports:

Several of us put posts on Facebook. I emailed Loree Levy who does poodle rescue in San Jose and spoke to Sara Rogers of Southbay Purebred in San Jose. She lives close to the intersections of Brentwood and Borina (in San Jose). Also email Nancy Lyon of Ohlone Rescue in the Fremont area.

Our volunteer in Los Gatos Veronica Presedo-Floyd is calling all the area vets and shelters. I called AVID to make sure Raven's chip was registered -- they had your information -- and gave them my home phone number. I contacted the President of Mission Trail Poodle Club and a woman who organizes poodle meet-ups in the San Ramon Valley area. I posted a notice on a dog-related message board and included a link to the blog.

Randi's email address is PudlRsq@aol.com. Bay Area Poodle Rescue's hotline number
is 510.286.7630.

2) We spoke with Raven's vet who suggested the following:

She confirmed that if Raven was seen running 2 hours after she left the area with the poison (she came out of the pool around 12:30, and went through the fence, then was spotted at 3pm), odds are very VERY good that she did not ingest any. Had she ingested a little, she would have been weakened by then, especially after spending the time in the pool. (She) also indicated that in this kind of situation, no news usually means good news. In this area, with so many people and so little space, people are very quick to notice a dead dog. Live dogs can hide and move. She will also pass the blog info on to her contacts, including other local vets.

Friday Morning Oct 2nd

No new news as of 10:10am this am pacific. I just got a call from a woman who said that someone had taken our poster off her tree and that she hoped that this meant Raven was found but that she did not have information about the dog. I can't blame people for not wanting to see posters like this, but I hope that affected people will allow them to remain up long enough for them to serve their purpose.

Via email last night, we asked friends to tweet/link to this blog last night and to ask their friends to re-tweet and repost so that friends' friends could become aware of Raven's loss. This morning various return emails and phonecalls have been rolling in - some messages of support and some with helpful tips on what else we can do. One good suggestion was to call all the area vets to see if they might have Raven. So I will do that today. Thanks to all - many eyes and minds will function better than just our own to solve this problem.

I have work I cannot put off doing this am, but expect to be out canvasing later today. We will also (via our friend Elaine) be visiting all the area shelters today for inperson inspections. More data as we have it.

Mark

Raven is Missing!

Thank you for taking the time to read about our dog Raven who went missing in San Jose, CA on Wednesday, September 30th, 2009 about 2pm in the afternoon near the intersection of Williams and Moorpark (near the border of Cupertino and close to Archbishop Mitty Highschool). It means a tremendous lot to us. With your help, we can hopefully recover her.

CONTACT INFORMATION

Mark Vigil Dombeck: (510) 325-6979 mark@dombeck.com

Monica Vigil Dombeck (510) 387-1367

Elaine (our friend who lives in San Jose): (408) 316-1125

If you have seen Raven, please call us!! Even if you are not able to hold on to her until you can summon us, or the Animal Control people, it will help us very much to know that she was seen in a particular place at a particular time. This will focus our search efforts.

ABOUT RAVEN

Raven is a 6 year old Female Standard Poodle, Black in color (mostly pepper with just a little salt starting to creep in), and weighing approximately 45 pounds. The photo above was taken just a couple days ago and should be more or less exactly how she looks now (minus the wear of being lost).

Her hair is not cut in the conventional poodle fashion. Instead, we generally just shave her a uniform length save for her topnot. At present, her hair is quite long and she looks like a muppet. We were going to take her to get her hair cut in just a few days....

She is (or was) wearing a pink leather color which has tiny deeper pink pokadots on it. Suspended from the color are several metal tags, including:

1) an Alameda, CA Dog License (her license number is A001098)

2) several stamped metal tags with our cell phone numbers on them. I believe one of them says "I'm staying with Monica 510-387-1367 ". The other cell number would be mine (Mark) and that is 510-325-6979

Raven is also microchiped via the AVID company. AVID is aware that she is missing, and I have confirmed that our contact information with them is up-to-date.

Raven needs daily medication for a chronic medical condition! She's fine so long as she gets her daily medicine but without it, over time she will develop problems again which could become serious. That she has not had her medication for a couple days now lends urgency to the need for us to find her quickly.

Raven is a very friendly dog, but she is also somewhat of an anxious dog. When you first meet her, it is frequent that she will hold her distance and bark at you for a bit. Generally, offering her some cookies or similar tasty food (meat works well) will help break the ice.

Raven is not familiar with San Jose! We live in Alameda, CA far to the North. She frequently has visited San Jose to spend time with our friend Elaine and her dogs, but not to the point where she would be familiar with the Greater San Jose area.

WHAT HAPPENED (as we have pieced it together)

Our friend Elaine (a highly experienced dog owner) was dog-sitting Raven for a few days. In the early afternoon on Wednesday, 2009-09-30, our friend's two German Shepard Dogs (GSDs) and Raven managed to break through our friend's home's backyard fence (located within a block and a half of the intersection of Williams and Moorpark) and get into a neighboring yard. Something like the following happened:

• The two GSDs found and ate some snail bait or similar poison and shortly thereafter had seizures, died and were found on the sidewalk. It is not clear if Raven ate any of the poision.
  
  
• At around 2pm Raven managed to get herself into a neighbor's pool and could not get out. Barking furiously, she attracted the attention of some kindly PG&E employees who were nearby. They managed to fish her out of the water, but thereafter she bolted away from them.
  
  
• A neighbor (located near the intersection of Moorpark and Hazel Dell Way) reported to us that she saw Raven moving along Junipero Serra Lane (parallel and just north of Moorpark; just south of 280) heading East. She is sure this was about 3pm.

This all we know, and the last we have word of her. Please contact us if you can help locate Raven, in any state, so that we can be reunited with her.

HOW WE'VE REACTED

This is a very emotional loss and we are very frightened for the safety of our Raven. She is very much a full member of our family and her loss is horrible to contemplate. Dog owners will understand this.

OUR RECOVERY STRATEGY

We (Monica and I) have done the following to get the word out:

Starting Wednesday night, we started putting posters up with a photo of Raven, and our contact numbers. We did a lot more of this today (Thursday). Generally, we have focused on the area bounded by: 280 on the North, Lawrence Expressway to the West, Saratoga to the East (although I placed some posters further East of Saratoga this afternoon).

The posters say, and we will offer to anyone who is interested, that we are offering a reward of $500 USD for Raven's safe return, or information leading us directly to Raven's safe return.

I have been walking the neighborhoods in this area, calling her name and handing out more posters. No luck so far, but many people are sympathetic and have said they will help if they see her.

We have been to the San Jose Animal Care Center to register Raven as missing, and to do a physical tour of the present inmates there. Raven is not there as of this afternoon.

We called two other animal shelters in the area (the Silicon Valley Animal Control Authority in Santa Clara, and the Humane Society of Silicon Valley in Milpitas). Staff there who answered the phone said they were not aware of any dog being present there meeting Raven's description. Everyone we talk to (including shelter staffers) tell us that we need to do a physical inspection of all the shelters at least every other day. We are going to do that tomorrow (Friday), and on a going forward basis....

We have created this blog to serve as an information clearinghouse regarding Raven's loss.

WHAT YOU CAN DO TO HELP

If you live in the San Jose, CA area, please keep a careful eye out for Raven. She might be in your backyard or your neighbor's backyard or wandering the streets (dangerous!) near your house. Please tell your neighbors that Raven is Missing!

We hope that you will contribute any information you have about Raven's whereabouts here in the form of comments, and also any suggestions for further steps we might take to increase the odds of a safe reunion.

Post a link to this blog in your FACEBOOK, or tweet (or re-tweet) about it on TWITTER, so as to help get out the word. The more people in the Greater San Jose area who know to look out for Raven, the better her chances are (we hope).


Sincerely,

Mark

510-325-6979

mark@dombeck.com