A LLANON woman has thanked people for their kindness after she raised £2,500 to give a blind rescue dog the chance of regaining his sight.

Businesswoman Lucy Morgan-Agate rehomed schnauzer Bertie — also called Bert or Berts — after he was rescued by Alpet Poundies Rescue, in Llandysul, who found him in a “terrible state”.

After seeing an advert on social media looking for a new home for Bertie, who vets believe is between seven and nine years old, Lucy took him in and rehabilitated him.

“When they found him, his eyes were all manky, he had no fur and he was covered in scabs and sores, and I just thought ‘oh my God, look at this poor dog’,” Lucy told the Cambrian News this week.

“What upset me was that when I first brought him home, people would give me dirty looks when I walked him because people thought I had done that to him. I had to tell them he was a rescue dog.

“I messaged Linda from the rescue place and said ‘please can I foster him?’ She said yes and I brought him home. I spent hours rubbing coconut oil into his skin.”

But despite Bertie’s hair growing back and his sores healing, he was left blind, and vets could not say with certainty whether he was born blind or whether it was through neglect.

“So I started raising money for Bertie to have an operation on his eyes in the hope of giving him his eyesight back,” said Lucy.

“I raised £1,170 through discos and other fund-raising activities, and then a charity called DBARC - the Diana Brimblecombe Animal Rescue Centre — saw my fund-raising page and said they would give me the rest of the money, which was around £1,330."

And vets have told Lucy that Bertie, who was taken to Bristol for his operation last week, has an 80 per cent chance of regaining sight in each eye.

See this week’s south editions for the full story, in shops now or online by clicking the Digital Editions tab at the top of the page