Street dogs from Peru find a home in Mt Barker

Two young street dogs have been saved from a lifetime of malnutrition and neglect after Aleisha Finaughty and her husband Bryan took it upon themselves to adopt Peru’s strays.

Last year, when the couple were living and working in the city of Arequipa, they took it upon themselves to rescue Andy and Scabby Dog.

“There are so many street dogs in Peru that there are no homes for them,” Mrs Finaughty said.

“If we had left them there, they would have been back on the street, and we just fell in love with them.”

The Finaughtys adopted Andy in May last year after his mother had a litter of puppies in the communal backyard of an ex-pat living in Peru. “I said to the lady ‘if you can’t find anyone else to take her I’ll be a last resort’,” Mrs Finaughty said.

“We don’t know the fate of his brothers and sisters ... I think the others were moved onto the street.”

Mrs Finaughty said Scabby Dog chose them after they came across her one morning, only to find her in the same place eight hours later.

“One morning walking to work we found a small black dog feeding in the rubbish,” she said.

“She was pulling bags open to get a feed of potato skins.”

It has taken six months of organising and a four-month process to get the dogs from Peru to South Africa, to Dubai to Melbourne and then to Perth before finally to Mrs Finaughty’s parents farm in Mt Barker late last month.