wo much-loved dogs that wandered off from a campsite into the West Australian bush have been found safe and well.
The disappearance of the black labrador and miniature dachshund – which live at Mt Trio Bush Camp and Caravan Park, which sits on a working farm bordering the Stirling Range National Park – sparked a mass search.
Many grey nomads who have stayed at Mt Trio will know the dogs … and the Albany Advertiser newspaper reports that the fact that the pair had gone missing attracted attention from people as far as Kalbarri and Broome.
Happily, Tibby the black labrador and Scooter the miniature dachshund puppy, were found 14 hours after they disappeared.
Camp manager Margot Byrne said the dogs were found eight kilometres from Mt Trio by a group of eight hikers who had just finished a climb of Talyuberlup Peak.
“We were very worried,” Ms Byrne told the Albany Advertiser. “It was a very good ending and we are terribly grateful to the hikers.”
Ms Byrne said her theory was that Scooter had taken off towards the national park and Tibby had gone with him to keep him safe.
It seems that the dogs’ recently-received Christmas gifts might have been what enabled them to be safely reunited with their owners.
“We had given our dogs Christmas presents, they were brand new dog tags with our phone number on it,” said Mrs Byrne. “It was very good timing. We must have known something.”
The Albany Advertiser reports that, despite being ‘exhausted’, Tibby and Scooter escaped unscathed from the ordeal and ‘managed to sprint to dinner’.
The disappearance of Tibby and Scooter is not the first time a famous pet has gone missing form a popular campground. Last year, a chicken known as ‘Salt and Pepper’ hitchhiked away from WA’s Sandfire Roadhouse after sneaking aboard a visitor’s caravan.
The Mt Trio campground, run by Margot Byrne and her husband John, is still recovering from the effects of a devastating bushfire which swept through the region a few years ago.
