‘Wonder Dog’ : Terrier Returns to Simi Valley Home After 12-Day Trek From Van Nuys

A month ago, Dusty was just a fat, mixed-breed terrier who barked too much. Now she’s “The Wonder Dog”--a canine with a sixth sense who trekked from Van Nuys to her home in Simi Valley in 12 days.

David and Barbara Rees, who had tried to give away the noisy dog in the San Fernando Valley, believe that Dusty’s 25-mile journey calmed her down and now want to keep her.

Their pet knew better than to try to fight traffic on the Simi Valley Freeway, instead traveling through the scenic Santa Susana Mountains, they speculated.

“She was destined to find us,” Barbara Rees said. “It gives me goose bumps to even talk about it.”

Dusty used to play in the family’s back yard on Planetree Avenue with her mother, Sheba. But her excessive barking often woke the neighbors and David Rees, a 38-year-old accountant, decided to give Dusty to a colleague.

So Rees took Dusty with him to work in Van Nuys and later in the day attempted to put the dog in his co-worker’s car. But Dusty had other plans and broke from their grasp into traffic on Balboa Boulevard near Saticoy Street.

“I thought, ‘Well that’s the end of that. Thank God I got rid of the dog.’ It’s not the way I wanted to do it, but . . . ,” he said.

Nearly two weeks later, on April 5, as the couple watched television in their living room, their outdoor sensor light came on and they saw a dog’s shadow pass across the front lawn.

They at first didn’t believe their eyes. The dog looked like Dusty but couldn’t be. Only after examining the animal’s tags did they believe that their pet had come home.

“I was kind of amazed,” David Rees said.

Dusty was thin but otherwise unharmed, “like she had avoided all danger and just got back here,” Barbara Rees said.

Dusty was born in a hole in the ground two years ago, the only puppy in Sheba’s litter, the Reeses said. Barbara Rees said she had rarely played with the dog because Dusty was too rambunctious.

But since the amazing journey, Rees said she has often ventured outdoors to pet Dusty.

“I believe the dog has maybe got a sixth sense,” she said. “I’m not into the supernatural or anything like that. I just happen to have a dog who’s got some smarts in her.”

Peter Cyrog, a Hollywood veterinarian who has studied dog behavior, said he frequently has heard of dogs who have traveled long distances to find their masters. Some pets even have traveled across the country to find the humans they love, he said.

“No one knows what’s involved in this homing instinct,” he said.

Dogs lost in their neighborhood or within a few miles of home often retrace their steps by following the scents of nearby dogs, Cyrog said.

“But for a distance like 25 miles, there’s something else going on there,” he said.

Barking or no barking, Dusty will remain with the Reeses until she dies, David Rees vowed.

He said Dusty’s trek reminds him of the Walt Disney movie “The Incredible Journey,” where a cat and two dogs find their way home from 250 miles away.

“I think she’s earned her right to stay,” he said of the 2-year-old terrier. “Now, if we ever had to put her to sleep and she came back, then we’re talking ‘The Twilight Zone.’ ”