The Village Shop are proud to announce the arrival of their new “dog finding” service after a notable success on Thursday afternoon…

Whilst visiting family in St Andrews Close, Freddie – (a rather stylish Shih-Tzu) decided to take a tour of the village and slipped away unnoticed from the family gathering.

On noticing Freddie’s absence, a search party set out in the direction of Lynch Lane and into Toft’s Field which boasts one of the finest collection of cowpats in the village. These cowpats are of course irresistible to canines (*) who like to roll on top of them and proudly return to their owners to share the aromas of the countryside. The search of the field was hampered by the fact that Freddie stands about 1ft tall whilst the grass in this extensive field stands a more that 2ft (that’s 60cm for our younger viewers).

As it turned out Freddie had sauntered round a footpath and wandered into the elegantly manicured gardens at the Bernstein household, where he was busy making friends with Carol and Sidney. Concerned that Freddie had clearly strayed from elsewhere in the village, Carol telephoned the village shop and spoke to Jayne – our “Chief Canine Coordinator” – who immediately sent out an alert on the village Facebook page.

By happy co-incidence the village shop chairman was also in Toft’s field with his Labrador, and after a brief phone call to the shop, Freddie and his owners were swiftly reunited.

It was however a close-run thing, as Freddie was so friendly, that Sidney (a renowned local architect) had already half completed a design for a bespoke dog kennel, whilst Carol was on the verge of placing a bulk order for dogfood from the Village Shop.

But all’s well that ends well and the village shop, which is based on the site of the old village Pound, was pleased to help maintain the centuries old tradition of re-uniting lost animals with their owners!

(*) just my Labrador apparently – Shih-Tzus have more refined!