If you have spent any time scrolling through local social media groups in the High Desert, you know the heartbreak of seeing daily posts about lost or roaming dogs. For local resident Jamie Black, that heartbreak wasn’t just something to scroll past, it became a call to action.
When Black moved to the area a few years ago from Orange County, she was immediately struck by the very real difference in the number of missing dogs and their lack of identification tags to help get them home. “I was shocked at the number of dogs I was seeing just running loose,” Black continued, “I joined a couple local groups on Facebook, and it was a constant reminder that there’s an epidemic of lost/found dogs in our area and almost none of them have tags. Maybe a microchip, but not all people have the time to take them to get scanned. So, these dogs just roam until ultimately they’re hit by a car. In 3 years, I can no longer count the amount of deceased dogs I’ve had to call in. And that heartbreak lit a fire in me to make a change. “
The turning point came on a 90-degree day when a senior chihuahua wandered into Black’s courtyard. The dog had a collar, but no tags. After hours of coordinating, scanning an outdated microchip, and posting online, Black successfully reunited the chihuahua with her family. “I was elated she made it back safely, but it was a ton of work,” Black admits. “Can you imagine if she had a tag on that collar? One phone call. That’s all it would’ve taken.”
“I already had the idea, but tags were too pricey for me at the time,” Black explains. Determined to find an affordable way to help her neighbors protect their pets, serendipity stepped in during Memorial Day weekend at the Wrightwood yard sales. There, Black spotted a rusty, antique blue metal box. “Inside was hundreds of dog tags in different shapes and sizes. At first I walked away because the price was mainly for the cool antique box, but after a while I decided I had to go back and make an offer. She accepted, and I was so excited that I ordered the Cricut drill on the way home.”
To get the word out, Black made a post in the local Phelan Informed Facebook group offering free custom tags to anyone who needed one ahead of the Fourth of July, a holiday notoriously stressful for pets due to fireworks.
The response was overwhelming! Armed with a gifted Cricut machine, which she had previously only used for stickers, and a brand-new engraving bit, Black taught herself the process through trial and error. Setting up a workspace each morning for a couple of hours, she carefully taped the vintage tags to her machine’s mat, inputting the information into the software to engrave them one by one. Working her way through orders ranging from single tags to requests of up to ten, Black has engraved and handed out 95 free tags to local pet owners so far, keeping the design straightforward by focusing on the most critical piece of information: a primary contact phone number.
While Black insisted on offering the service entirely for free, grateful neighbors found their own ways to say thank you, offering homemade candles or insisting on handing over cash that ultimately covered the original cost of the yard sale box.
When asked how it feels to know she’s helped so many local pets, Black shared, “It’s the best! I like to think that one of these days, someone is going to find a dog wearing my tag and that dog will get back to its home quickly. A relief for both the owners and the person who found the dog and took the time to stop and help.”
An avid animal lover who shares her home with two dogs, Roxy, a local rescue adopted from We Rescue 4 Paws, Remy, and a talking 45-year-old Amazon parrot named Tiki, Black hopes her effort inspires a small shift in how the community approaches pet safety. “Mistakes happen and dogs get loose. They wander, and it can happen to anyone,” Black says. “So, consider the collar and tag a very simple solution to a very common problem!”
Though this initial push was timed specifically for summer safety, Black has only used about 10% of her treasure trove of yard sale tags. She plans to pop up with another round of free tags for the community before the end of the year, ensuring more local pets can make it back home with just a single phone call.
