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Beano/Barbos

How Beano/Barbos escaped death

Wild dog escapes, is kidnapped, finally rescued

Beano was found starving as a puppy by Elaine from Scotland. He was running about wild on the beach at Santa Maria. She decided to rescue him. She had him castrated, deflead and treated for other pests by Fatima the vet in Santa Maria. He had an anti-rabies injection even though the Cape Verdes like Britain is rabies-free.

But then she had to leave to go home. So she paid some Italians living near the Aeroflot to feed him and keep an eye on him. They did not do so. Like other starving dogs in Santa Maria he ran along the beach calling at cafes where tourists would feed him from the table and put out water.

But at the Turtle Shack he was kidnapped, driven by car to Palmeira, the port at the other end of the island and abandoned. The Italians did not mention to Elaine that he had disappeared. So she booked a flight to Lisbon and a cage at a dog rescue home in the Algarve and shipped a crate to Sal, to bring him via Portugal to Scotland..

Beano, as she called him, evidently did not like Espargos and ran all the way to Murdeira on the West Coast. Here he met a Russian family who fed him and put out water, at their holiday villa. They resolved to send him to Switzerland. They called him Barbos.

After they returned from their holiday he was again taken to the same vet and repeated the same anti-rabies treatment. Apparently she did not recognise him. So another crate was ordered and he was about to fly to Geneva where Sophia lives.

It was too dangerous to leave him at Murdeira, where they still kill dogs with strychnnine, even in their own front gardens. We knew Vlekkie and Robbie whom the resort leaders had killed. So it was arranged that another Italian would look after him for €10 per day - about as much as a bed in his dormitory hotel. Barbos evidently did not like this place which also housed fierce cats and within five minutes he had escaped.

He was found later the same day outside the Aeroflot hotel by Nicky who runs SOS Cats and Dogs who brought him back to Murdeira - into the death zone again. Sophia in Geneva was overjoyed. But by sheer chance the two Italian families lived close together and Barbos had run back to his former minders near the Aeroflot, where he had lived semi-wild before being transported to Palmeira. They recogised Beano and alerted Elaine for the first time that he had run away.

Elaine traced us and with the aid of photos of a slightly younger Barbos we were able to confirm him as Beano. He is now safely in Scotland, where he does not like the rain. Hopefully Sophia and her family will be able to rescue another dog to replace Barbos.