‘Peanut Butter,’ a dog abandoned on NYC highway on Christmas Eve, now a social media star
Peanut Butter was a dog nobody seemed to want.
Found chained by the neck to a tree on the side of the Brooklyn-Queens Expressway on Christmas Eve, with nothing more than a tiny blue blanket to ward off the 38-degree chill, the gray and white pit bull now has a social media following and gifts piling up at her foster mom’s door.
“There’s something about Peanut Butter,” said Heather Guas, who has been nursing the once-starving, neglected pup back to health. “She has just elicited such love from people. . . . It’s become this community thing. I open the front door and there’s stuff for her.”
Peanut Butter was an emaciated 44 pounds when a Good Samaritan spotted her alongside the busy highway and stopped to call police.
She was brought to the Brooklyn Animal Care Center where volunteers at Borough Bred in Brooklyn posted footage of her plight, notching nearly 37,000 views.
Among the readers was Guas, a teacher and mom of three in central NJ who has fostered 60 dogs and 30 cats over the years.
“I must have watched that video 30 times,” she recalled.
With help from Saleena McLaughlin and her group Pibbles and More Animal Rescue, or PMAR, Gaus retrieved Peanut Butter from the shelter and agreed to care for her until a permanent home is found.
“She was too underweight. She was too sick to be spayed,” recalled Guas, who spent sleepless nights laying on the floor next to the adorably floppy eared dog while she adjusted to her new surroundings.
“PMAR agreed to let me foster Peanut Butter at a time when they should not have said yes. They didn’t even hesitate,” she wrote on Facebook in January. “I truly believe she is healing so quickly because of all the love flowing her way.”
McLaughlin didn’t hesitate to help Peanut Butter, even though volunteers are so scarce and donations so low, they’re the “worst we’ve ever seen.”
“If there’s somebody willing to open their home to an animal then I’m willing to do whatever I need to do to make that happen,” said McLaughlin.
Now 66 pounds, Peanut Butter is believed to be 3-4 years old.
She’s learning to walk on a leash and marveling at the little things — like spring flowers, Guas said.
“The day she met the daffodils cracked me up,” she told The Post. “She snuck up on them. She ever so slowly leaned into sniff it and I was like, ‘You don’t know flowers.'”
Guas’ social media posts — about Peanut Butter frolicking in the snow or being mesmerized by a passing Saint Bernard — have
to ask about Peanut Butter’s progress.
She posted this week: “
. Donations are low. But so many people care about this little (well she used to be) blue pit bull. . . . She has her own village and it’s helping the people behind her.”
Peanut Butter’s success comes as city animal shelters are near capacity, and foster homes are scarce.
Guas said Peanut Butter is still looking for her furever home.
“She’s healing right in front of me,” she mused. “She’s growing in leaps and bounds. What can she do next?”
