A 2-year-old border collie named Tilly was found herding sheep on a farm in Idaho after being ejected from a car during a crash.
The owner of the dog, Linda Oswald, and her family (including Tilly) were driving down the Idaho State Highway 41 when their GMC Yukon collided with another car.
According to The Spokesman Review, the crash shattered the Yukon’s rear window and ejected Tilly through the opening. Luckily, he was unharmed but definitely spooked. He immediately took off across the prairie and disappeared.
State police troopers said the driver of the other vehicle was taken to a nearby hospital and treated and later released. Thankfully, no one else was injured in the crash, but police alerted people in the area to be on the lookout for the missing dog.
The Oswalds, as well as a handful of strangers who pulled over when they saw the crash, searched for Tilly for 10 hours around the area with no luck.
“People just kept going out,” Oswald said. “2:30 in the morning some people were out looking for him. We were sore and exhausted.”
At the end of a day of searching, the family put out a Facebook post with a picture of Tilly, which was shared more than 3,000 times.
We are offering a reward,” Oswald said in the post. “He is shy so please pm me or contact via FB if you see him.”
It turned out that Tilly was trying to herd sheep at a farm a mile and a half from the accident.
Travis and Zane Potter noticed something off about one of their shepherds – the dog had redder fur than their Australian shepherd named Hooey. The brothers then recognized it was Tilly from the Facebook post. The Potters’ grandmother, who lives in California, had seen the post and told them to look out for the dog.
The Potters contacted the police and handed Tilly off to a Kootenai County Sheriff’s Office deputy who was driving by nearly 48 hours after the accident.
The Oswalds were happily reunited with Tilly, but Tilly was still a little stressed.
“The first thing is he ran in and drank out of the toilet, which he’s never done,” Oswald said. “He was so thirsty.”
Or perhaps he still wanted to be on the farm shepherding.
“(Tilly) was not having it,” Oswald said. “I think he was a little upset, like, ‘Hey, you guys left me out on that prairie for 48 hours.’”
Oswald said the pandemic may have been the reason so many people were willing to help out.
“All of a sudden, I think people saw a time to really jump out and help, even if it was just a small thing like finding a dog,” Oswald said. “There’s a lot of kind people out there.”
