Wacku was an extremely loyal dog. So loyal that he put his life on the line to protect his owner. The 7-year-old dog was attacked by a drunk man in 2012.
He was guarding his owner’s tricycle at the time in a remote town in the Philippines.
The drunk man was wielding a machete and hacked off half of Wacku’s snout. The Filipino street dog survived but was left disfigured with half of a face.
Thankfully, Wacku was rescued by a local animal welfare charity. His story helped to get laws in the Philippines changed so that sentences and fines for animal abuse were increased.
Unfortunately, poor Wacku would spend the next five years in a shelter.
That’s until one day Road Dogs and Rescue in the U.S. heard about his story and went all the way to the Philippines to get him and bring him back to the U.S.
It wasn’t long before a woman from Eugene, Oregon decided to adopt Wacku.
His new owner, Liesl Wilhardt, was heartbroken by his story.
“When I saw a video of Wacku online I just fell in love with him,” Wilhardt, the director of the non-profit Luvable Dog Rescue, said according to Fox News. “It wasn’t just how shocking his features are but he seems so intelligent and social and I just thought, ‘What a survivor.'”
Just because Wacku doesn’t look like other dogs, doesn’t mean he doesn’t act like other dogs. He’s still able to swallow, eat, smell, and give lots of kisses.
Though Wilhardt admits that things do get a little messy in the process.
“He has lost half his face and it’s crazy at first, but he acts so normal and happy and once people get to know who he is on the inside they forget about it,” Wilhardt said. “He seems to recognize almost right away when people are good and is incredibly affectionate.”
Wacku now lives in a home where he has the run of 55 acres of land.
He shares that home with Wilhardt’s other dog a corgi pit bull mix named Picasso.
Picasso has a twisted jaw and looks almost as peculiar as Wacku.
“I had this gut feeling that he would be really happy with me and my dogs. I thought it would take weeks for him to get comfortable and adapt but he is amazing – it took him 24 hours. We introduced him to my other dogs and he was great. I feel blessed to be part of his life,” Wilhardt said.
Now, Picasso and Wacku are the best of friends.
“Picasso and Wacku are exceptionally calm, tolerant and social dogs and they don’t notice each other’s physical differences. The cool thing about dogs is that looks don’t matter. If it smells like a dog, it’s a dog,” Wilhardt explains. “When people see him they are literally stopped dead in their tracks. They stare and are kind of horrified.”
But this doesn’t have any reflection on Waku’s personality at all.
“It doesn’t hold him back,” Wilhardt says. “He climbs into my lap and licks and kisses me, which is a really weird feeling when he has no upper face.”
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