Our children, families, staff and volunteers have launched this public appeal to help Save Our Snowdog, Wild North East, which holds a special place in our hearts. He is particularly precious to us as we watched, and even helped, paint him.

The Snowdogs will be auctioned to raise much needed funds for the service and we hope that with the public's help, we can Save Our Snowdog and bring Wild North East back home.

Sarah, one of our Mums said:“My daughter has a life shortening condition and if the hospice was to keep their Snowdog I would always be able to look at it and it would bring back such happy memories.”Our Snowdog was decorated by wildlife artist Jina Gelder, who based her design on wildlife native to the North East. Jina added hedgehogs to represent our hedgehog house, flowers from our gardens and signposts to show the areas we cover. Butterflies were also included to signify short, but beautiful lives.

To us, Wild North East is more than a sculpture. He is part of our family.