A hunchback dog who found internet fame after being rescued from the street has found a loving new home.
A HUNCHBACK dog who found internet fame after being rescued from the street has found a loving new home. Four-year-old Quasimodo is believed to be one of just 15 dogs worldwide living with short-spine syndrome. The rare condition has left him with virtually no neck but his new family say he is enjoying a new lease of life at his home in Secondhand Hounds in Eden Prairie, Minnesota, USA – and even earned nearly 100,000 likes on his Facebook page.
Quasi The Hunchback Hound
Transcripts of the video:
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RACHEL: He is a true German shepherd, just shortened.
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COMM: 4-year-old German shepherd Quasimodo
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is believed to be one of just 15 dogs worldwide living with short spine syndrome.
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COMM: And his unusual looks have made him
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a social media star.
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RACHEL: It’s crazy how viral it went. I
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mean we had no idea. I teased it on our Facebook page a few weeks ago, and it got a nice amount
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of likes but nothing like out of control, and then as soon as we made a Facebook page
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for him, which is ‘Quasi The Great’; he stoles everybody’s hearts, you know. So
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I have been working really hard at making sure that we are posting about him and really
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showing his personality, showcasing who he is because to be honest he represents a much
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bigger group. Quasi was actually found running as a stray in Kentucky and they couldn’t
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catch him, it actually took them 5 days to catch him and they had to use a live trap.
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Quasi was really fearful and scared of people at first. The first day I met him he was so
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scared and shy and I thought, “I wonder if this dog really does enjoy life,” and
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as soon as I got him home I realised how much he does enjoy life. He is goofy, he is playful,
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he loves girl dogs, he thinks he is Casanova, not Quasimodo. I think anybody that sees him
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kind of falls in love with him.
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COMM: Quasimodo is now being cared for at
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Second Hand Hounds in Minnesota.
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RACHEL: Second Hand Hounds was founded in
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2009. I was fully pregnant with my daughter and I always joked that hormones made me do
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it. We save thousands of animals a year. We are almost at 10,000 since 2009.
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SARA: Quasi has what’s called short spine
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syndrome. Basically what that means is that the vertebra in his back are compressed and
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he is actually missing a couple of them. Right now we are not really sure what he will need
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in the future. We are having him see our specialist again to kind of make sure that nothing else
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needs to be done. Right now he is just on pain meds. He is doing great, he is mobile.
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RACHEL: He loves to nibble, he is very mouthy.
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He loves to herd, if he sees something running he wants to chase.
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COMM: Quasi does have to do some things differently
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because of his condition.
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RACHEL: Because of his neck, it’s really
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hard for him to bend down to eat his food, so elevated food bowls or me holding it like
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this is typically what we do.
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COMM: The team have sent a vial of Quasi’s
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blood to geneticists at the University of California to help discover what causes his
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rare condition. And while they have already received 1,200 applications to re-home him,
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Rachel and her family are in no rush to part with their unusual dog.
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RACHEL: He is a sweet dog. It’s going to
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be hard to let him go. Right now we are just trying to find out more about his personality
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so we can make a perfect match for him. But I urge everybody that has been inquiring about
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him to go to their local shelter and find a dog that’s a great match for them because
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Quasimodo is one of millions in the shelters in the US and worldwide who need a home.