If Lucy could speak, what a tale she could tell.
The two-year-old border collie has spent much of her young life - 299 days to be exact - on her own after first escaping from a backyard last August. She managed to elude her captors for close to 10 months, with sightings being phoned in across the Tri-Cities.
Lucy's solo travels came to an end last week when Petsearchers Canada, a pet detective business that tracks missing animals, was able to capture the missing K9 with the help of some Coquitlam residents.
"She was definitely a challenge," said Alesha MacLellan of Petsearchers. "She wouldn't put herself in a situation where there wasn't an exit route."
Lucy's bond with humans is fragile, MacLellan said. She was initially rescued from a hoarding situation in the United States where she was forced to compete with 150 other dogs for food. She was eventually adopted by a family in the Tri-Cities but manage to squirm her way out of a harness and escape the home.
Al MacLellan, Alesha's husband and co-worker, was able to briefly capture Lucy at Port Coquitlam's Gates Park last October but she was able to escape out the door of his truck.
She eventually turned up in Coquitlam near Adler Avenue, where Peter and Hoshiko Barrington noticed her frequenting the alley behind their home. The couple contacted Petsearchers and agreed to help capture the dog.
Because Lucy is so fearful of humans, her pursuers set up a series of feeding stations starting at their back gate and leading into the Barringtons' yard. The couple diligently monitored the food, making sure there was something available at all times, even getting up in the middle of the night to re-stock the stations, Peter Barrington said.
"We had to watch," said Peter Barrington. "Even when she wasn't there, we had to keep an eye out so when she did finally come, the food was there."
Over a period of weeks, Lucy started to inch her way into the yard, at first just grabbing the food close to the gate before quickly exiting. When she finally became comfortable enough, she ventured all the way onto the property and the Barringtons were able to close their gate and capture the animal.
Lucy is now in the possession of the MacLellans but once she becomes more accustomed to humans, she will be placed with a family.
So far, the dog has made some progress, becoming more comfortable with humans and even taking food from Al MacLellan's hand. She may never be an off-leash dog, Alesha said, but with some care and attention, her relationship with people could be normalized.
"She has never had the opportunity to build any trust," Alesha MacLellan said. "It could take months for her to come around. To be a normal dog, it could even be a year or more."
Peter Barrington said he hopes Lucy ends up with a nice family and is even considering adopting the animal himself.
"We have given it a lot of thought but I'm approaching 75 and she is just a young pup," he said. "We are still chewing on the idea.
"We have become very attached. When she didn't turn up for a feeding, we became really worried."
