Lost spaniel is found after two weeks in the wild

A relieved dog owner says his faith in humanity has "sky-rocketed" after hundreds of people braved freezing temperatures to try to find his lost spaniel.

Matt Grimshaw said Nelly, an 11-year-old cavalier King Charles spaniel, vanished during a walk at Cleeve Hill in Gloucestershire on New Year's Eve.

He spent the first day scouring the hilltop and woodlands for Nelly – racking up 66,000 steps before heading home in the early hours the next morning.

Hundreds of volunteers joined the desperate search over the next two weeks before an emaciated Nelly was finally found by pheasant hunt beaters, trapped in barbed wire.

In the first few days, Grimshaw and his family posted appeals online which quickly spread across social media.

"Day two and three, the snow came and it got very cold so it was a real worry," he explained. "It was hell, really."

Charities, colleagues, and acquaintances he had not spoken to in years came forward to help – providing sniffer dogs, drones and thermal imaging cameras.

"For them to keep travelling out, it made me believe they know something I don't about dog survival. It gave me actual hope she might still be around," he said.

"Even if we hadn't got her back, obviously our lives would be miserable, but our faith in humanity has sky-rocketed. It really has."

Grimshaw was at work on 14 January when he received a call from a woman on an unknown number.

"I recognised Nelly's bark in the background. I choked up, I couldn't quite believe it," he recalled.

"She told me they were doing a pheasant shoot through the woods in Cheltenham Abbot and one of the beaters had spotted a black and white spaniel.

"She was looking very matted and very skinny, but ultimately vocal and chirpy, and OK, surprisingly. It was absolute joy, elation."

It is presumed Nelly survived on a scavenged diet of leftover food scraps, rabbit droppings and perhaps a dead pheasant.

After being rescued, the spaniel was rushed to the vet where she received antibiotics for frostbitten paws.

She has since regained weight and is back to her normal self.

She now wears a GPS tracker and is confined to a lead on walks after "11 years of running free".

"The whole time in the back of my mind, there was this element of guilt because she was lost under my watch," Grimshaw said.

"I felt a huge relief that we'd got her home and it was never going to sit on me that I was the one that lost her.

"She almost seems perkier now than she was when she left."

Follow BBC Gloucestershire on Facebook, X and Instagram. Send your story ideas to us on email or via WhatsApp on 0800 313 4630.