A random van was seen in Middlesex, England, with one of its windows open—so someone could throw a small black pug onto the street.
A horrified pedestrian immediately rushed over to the pug to see if she was okay and brought her to a nearby shop to get checked before contacting the RSPCA.
The poor little pug named Peggy was immediately rushed to a local vet. Although Peggy didn’t have any injuries from being thrown from the van, she was in very bad shape from wherever she’d come from. Peggy was incredibly skinny with bald patches, and had clearly been used to breed litter after litter, until she physically couldn’t do it anymore.
“Mentally you could see she was scarred too, you could see the sadness in her eyes — God knows what she’d been through for most of her little life,” Liz Wood, deputy manager at the RSPCA’s Millbrook Animal Center shared.
“I suspect she’d been kept as a breeding machine to produce puppies which could be sold… for large numbers. Then, when she came to the end of her shelf life, they discarded her like rubbish. It’s heartbreaking and utterly despicable to treat a dog like a disposable object.”
Peggy’s rescuers knew she would need tons of extra care to heal, so Liz decided to foster her.
While Peggy was a little nervous at first, she was getting less anxious each day with the help of her foster siblings. Liz brings Peggy with her each day to the shelter to interact with other dogs.
“We’re starting to see her cheeky side now. She barks when she wants food and she makes funny little grunting noises when she is pleased to see you—her whole body wags, it’s adorable! She’s such a sweet dog and will make a wonderful companion for someone.”
Peggy is currently still healing, but once she’s fully recovered she’ll be ready to be with her forever home.
The RSPCA is still looking into who could have been responsible for this and will continue to fight against puppy farms and backyard breeding in general.
“This is why we need tougher regulations around the breeding and selling of dogs and we hope proposals by the government to bring in licensing and new regulations will help,” Liz shared. “We’re also urging the public to consider rescuing a dog, like Peggy, instead of buying a puppy. The RSPCA has thousands of wonderful dogs of all shapes and sizes, with different stories and backgrounds, waiting for their forever home.”