Labrador Shanie has been missing since Saturday, much to the disappointment of one of its owners, five-year-old Kayana.By Sarah Schwager
A LYNBROOK family is desperately searching for its beloved dog, missing since the weekend.
Lenyss Zuniga and her three children aged 11, 10 and 5, were devastated when their four-year-old pet labrador Shanie went missing on Saturday.
The family acquired a new dog, Chloe, a two-year-old labrador, three weeks ago to breed with their purebred white dog.
Ms Zuniga was attending a wedding in Warburton on the weekend and had a friend dog-sitting when she received a call that both dogs had escaped while her friend was at work on Saturday.
After numerous doorknocks and responses from flyers, Ms Zuniga discovered the dogs had dug under the fence to a neighbour’s house.
Chloe was later picked up on Thompsons Road, Cranbourne North, near Merinda Park Railway Station, but Shanie was nowhere to be found.
Ms Zuniga said it was not like Shanie to run away, and in the past when the dog had escaped the family had always found him waiting on the front doorstep.
“We are absolutely destroyed at the fact we’ve lost him,” she said.
“As soon as I heard I came straight back (from Warburton). It’s just not like him to run away.
“We found Chloe at Thompsons Road but there is no way Shanie would’ve lasted that long. He’s really a people person, he would’ve gone into the streets.
“But she has come from an abused background and she has no sense of loyalty.
“I’m guessing she bolted and he ran after her. He’s just got a new girlfriend and so he followed her.”
Ms Zuniga said her children were besides themselves with worry. She said to make the situation worse, after a whole day of posting up flyers to advertise the lost dog around Lynbrook, many had been ripped down.
Notes posted around and outside Lyndhurst Village Shopping Centre by Ms Zuniga and her friend Heidi Sanason were all taken down.
Ms Sanason said they had received the okay from some of the shopowners to display the posters, and were careful to avoid posting on the windows as they had been told this was not allowed.
“When we picked up the kids from school on Monday we were hopeful someone might be in touch,” Ms Sanason said.
“We went around there and someone had torn off the whole lot without even the common decency to ring first. The kids were just devastated.”
The centre management at the shopping centre did not reply to the News by deadline.
Anyone who has any information or who has seen Shanie is urged to contact Lenyss Zuniga on 0424 363 947.
