John Coward of Cedar Hill has always had an affection for wolves, and for older dogs. So when he spotted 8-year-old Lobo at Tri-City Animal Shelter in March of 2024, he knew he had found the dog he was looking for. Lobo was a husky, but his coloring and features were most definitely lupine.

Lobo had arrived at the shelter as a stray months earlier, passed up again and again for adoption. He was friendly and animated, even while battling a case of heartworms. But when John came back to the shelter a couple of days later so his wife could meet Lobo, “He was an entirely different dog,” John recalled. “He was listless. He was shy. And I said, ‘Is something wrong?’ ”

The shelter staff said Lobo was probably missing his friend. “His friend?” John asked.

He was told that another husky had come in at the same time as Lobo, and that the two had bonded. So John asked to see Lobo’s friend. As soon as she came out, Lobo lit up. John watched them play for a few minutes. “Okay she comes, too,” he told the staff. “I could not imagine breaking up that kind of love.”

Because he was taking home two dogs, both of whom were being treated for heartworms, the shelter waived the adoption fees. But in truth, he said, “I would have paid whatever they wanted.” John and his wife named Lobo’s friend Tala, in the Lakota Sioux language, to also honor her wolflike features.

Since they became part of the Coward family, Tala and Lobo have rarely been apart. When one goes to the vet without the other, the one at home will whine until they are reunited. They take walks together, and sleep side by side. They are rarely more than a few feet away from one another.

Although John went to the shelter with the intention of only adopting one dog, he is happy he came home with two. He could not imagine Lobo living without Tala, Tala living without Lobo, or him living without them both.

Deborah Binder’s first puppy from Tri-City Animal Shelter was what they call in the biz a Foster Fail. She was supposed to temporarily care for a collie mix named Charlie, who was just a few weeks old. Deborah already had two dogs. “And then I had three,” she said. Charlie stayed the next 14 years, until she passed away from old age.

That was in 2011, shortly after Deborah started volunteering. At the time, her mom Susie was already an avid shelter helper. Deborah, who taught herself to groom her own dogs, would host a salon for the strays who came in with dirty, matted hair. She took photos of the animals for adoption. Then she started fostering, and never looked back.

After Deborah adopted Charlie, she began taking in more foster animals. She kept a couple—a dog named Jersey, her cat Shiloh—but got more comfortable with sending the puppies and kittens on to loving homes. “At first you think nobody can take care of them like I can,” she said. But then she came to realize that every foster out the door makes room for more puppies and kittens coming in. “You just see how many animals are in need.” When one of her fosters is ready for adoption, she posts their photos and helps go through the applications. “I’m really picky with who gets them.”

A few years ago, when Deborah returned to work full time working in the public works department for the City of Cedar Hill, she thought her days of fostering were over. Puppies must go outside regularly for potty training, and tiny kittens need to be bottle fed several times a day. Her new boss, however, had a solution: Bring the kittens.

So every spring, Deborah arrives at the office with a pet taxi. The kittens stay behind her desk except when they need feeding or, as often happens, one of her coworkers wants a lap cat. When the kittens get old enough, she starts looking for homes. Currently her kittens Elvis and Priscilla (see photos!) are ready for new families.

Deborah estimates that she’s fostered hundreds of animals over the years, and many of the current owners stay in touch. “Sometimes I might be having a bad day, and then I get a text with a photo of one of my former fosters,” she said. “It just brightens everything.”

DeSoto Animal Control found Jane, a blue heeler mix, one day last November off East Little Creek Rd after she was hit by a car. Thanks to an x-ray machine donated by Tri- City Friends, the staff could tell that Jane’s front leg was badly injured. Still, she wagged her tail for anyone who came near. A veterinary crew from Operation Kindness – who were at the shelter helping with spays and neuters— soon amputated her leg.

On the sunny afternoon of December 31, Brenda Gonzalez stopped by her sister’s house in Cedar Hill. She was dropping off a few things before heading to their mother’s nearby to get ready for New Year’s celebration.

Tammy Miller, the director of Tri-City Animal Shelter, knows what happens when you underestimate the power of a storm. Twenty years ago, she spent weeks sleeping on an Army cot in south Louisiana, helping with injured and displaced animals from Hurricane Katrina. So last month, when city officials began alerting her to an upcoming ice storm, she left nothing to chance.

Grandpa Charlie, who was 78 pounds and somehow still scrawny, had been at the shelter for weeks. He had been picked up as a stray, and despite their best efforts, the staff at Tri-City Animal Shelter had not been able to get much weight on his bones. He was big. He was sad. Even worse, he was old.

Ashley Cole was away for the Thanksgiving holiday when she got a frantic call from her pet sitter on Black Friday: Her two dogs, Luna and Oso, had gone missing from her backyard in Duncanville. The pair had dug out from one corner of her fence.

You hear this a lot: "I could never work at the shelter because I would want to take them all home." But people do work at the shelter-- and it takes a special kind of heart. Every day, the staff of Tri-City Animal Shelter makes animals in their care feel loved and special, no matter how short or long in their stays.

And sometimes, they actually do take them home. For this special Thanksgiving issue of Tri City Tales, we celebrate all the dogs and cats who came into the lives of the employees, and never left.

Honey, as he was first named, arrived at the vet’s office on a riding lawnmower. He didn’t look like much, with a flea infestation so severe he had scratched off most of his hair. His eyes were red and swollen. He was listless.

When Deb Mullins retired from a longtime career at the Dallas Fire Department in 2020, she decided to spend some of her newfound free time volunteering at Tri-City Animal Shelter. Deb had adopted pets from the shelter since the 1990s, including a once-feral male cat named Charlie who now leads a life of comfort-- with the belly to show for it.

After catastrophic floods swept through Central Texas on July 4, dozens of dogs and cats needed immediate evacuation. Pets that had become separated from their owners were inundating already crowded shelters. To make room, the non-profit Wings of Rescue flew down to evacuate 200 dogs and cats who had been awaiting adoption before the tragedy.

Gayle Bailey first stopped by the animal shelter last April on a whim, on her way to a doctor’s appointment. Her husband Bob had passed away the year before, leaving an emptiness she could not get over. She had always loved cats— they had once had one—and her daughter and granddaughter thought that a new companion might help Gayle fill in the hole in her heart.

In mid-May, someone called animal control after finding a box of abandoned chicks in a parking lot. There were four of them, a fast-growing breed, likely feed store purchased. Based on the timing, the staff suspected the animals had been part of someone’s Easter basket surprise—now unwanted with the holiday passed…

Augustine Serna works for the Cedar Hill Parks and Recreation department, keeping the city’s public grounds trimmed and tidy. One day in April, he was cutting brush around the pond at Bradford Park when he saw a turtle, a red-eared slider, sunning himself at water’s edge. As Serna moved closer, he realized the animal was in distress, with a fishhook caught in its mouth.

Last November, DeSoto animal control officer Michelle Romualdo answered a call about a stray dog hanging around a DeSoto church. She arrived to find a black doodle mix cowering behind the building. As she slowly approached, the dog disappeared into a ravine next to Ten Mile Creek.

Like a lot of teenagers, Amaya Stephens wanted a new pet. Unlike a lot of teens, she settled on a bunny. Bunnies are soft, usually affectionate, and adorable beyond measure. Also—appealing to the younger crowd— all the Tik Tok bunny owner accounts.

It was Christmastime. Betsy Jones wanted her little boy, Crù, to have the gift he’d been begging for: a new pet. At first, he wanted a parrot, which, his mom told him, “Wasn’t happening.” 

He was spotted wandering on Maple Grove Drive in Cedar Hill, skittish and malnourished. The staff at Tri-City Animal Shelter had been trying to catch him for days. A street pig.

When James Hicks retired nine years ago, he never planned on a second career. After working decades in the grocery distribution business, he was ready for time off. He was in his late 70s by then. He spent his time doing retiree stuff: volunteering at his church, riding his bike and walking his German shepherd. 

Amber Haydin long had two cats, each one keeping the other company. When one of them died from old age, her remaining one, named Baby Girl, started to seem lonely. Haydin started thinking about getting a new companion.