By Carrie Allan

September 8, 5:35 p.m.

Picture an Afghan hound. The graceful, lean form, the long expressive face, the slim curve of the tail. The silky blonde fur that covers the body, and hangs long and soft from the ears, almost comically glamorous—as though Farrah Fawcett had taken canine form. And don't forget the way the dog moves, a loose, rolling gait that makes a frolicking Afghan a delight to behold.

Picture all of that. And then take it all away.

The animal who came in last night to the disaster response staging area in Hattiesburg, Mississippi was, technically, an Afghan. But he no longer had any of the qualities that make these animals so beautiful. Of the 36 dogs, 20 cats, and one iguana rescued yesterday, it was this dog who required the most care from the staff on site.
 
Surrendered to the disaster response teams by an owner in Mississippi, the male dog showed signs of long-term starvation, beyond the effects of the rough days since Katrina roared through. He was horribly matted and filthy, and once the veterinary team began carefully and gently shaving away the matted clumps of fur, his naked skin was revealed: It was papery and crusted with infection. His feet were also matted, his nails grown into long, thorny hooks, and his front feet were so infected beneath the matting that each toe was raw, pink, and weeping. He was so thin he could barely stand, and his ribs—every one of them visible—heaved slowly as veterinarians examined and began to treat him. 

It was obviously the first TLC the dog had gotten in a long time. He stood trembling, his pitiful hipbones protruding and his tail tucked between his legs protectively, looking over his shoulder at the team as they put each of his infected feet into a bowl of Betadyne-saline solution and started cleaning his skin with cotton balls soaked in an antibiotic rinse. "There, how's that feel, buddy? You're at the spa," veterinarian Judy Baum told the dog.

The team got an IV drip into the dog to get some fluids into him. The dog didn't flinch or whimper at the needle. He just stood gazing at Rick Chaboudy, a responder from the Humane Society of North Pinellas, as Chaboudy offered the dog fingersful of Nutri-cal. "It's a good sign that he's eating. A lot of times when a dog is this far gone, he won't even want to eat," Chaboudy said grimly.

The staff agreed that the dog was in for round-the-clock veterinary monitoring and a long rehab period. But they hope that more care and medical treatment will get the dog looking like an Afghan again. His rescue may turn out to be one silver lining of Katrina's storm clouds.

"Probably if it wasn't for the hurricane, this guy would have just died in a backyard," Chaboudy says.

Carrie Allan is the associate editor of Animal Sheltering Magazine at The HSUS.