Marcus, a skittish and small 8-year-old Shih Tzu mix, ran out of an open door in New Haven on April 19. Five days later, Marcus was reunited with his owner but looked very different: He had been dyed purple.

Melanie Heltke, a volunteer with Connecticut Dog Gone Recovery Volunteers, said whoever took the dog may have been planning on keeping it, so they dyed the dog's fur to change its appearance. The organization helps owners throughout the state find their missing dogs.

"I never would have thought it was the same dog," she said of Marcus.

Marcus is one of three cases of missing dogs in the past month that returned with altered appearances, according to Patti Hawkins, a board member and administrator with the organization.

"It's been a trend lately," said Hawkins, who has been with the organization since its start in 2013. "It's just another hurdle that we have to get over to help bring these dogs home."

New Haven Police Officer Christian Bruckhart said the department was not aware of the incident with Marcus.

Hawkins said the organization wants to inform dog owners that if their pet has gone missing, their furry friend could have been altered.

Many cases of missing dogs are resolved when someone finds the dog. But if someone describes a dog and the owner doesn't think it's their dog due to different markings, Hawkins said to go check — just in case.

"It could be your dog," she said. "You really have to go in person to see the dog."

One of the other dogs to be returned with altered an appearances this month was Mocho, a black-and-cream 3-year-old French bulldog who went missing from the Hartford area on March 13. She was reunited with her owner on Monday with her tan markings dyed black.

Donna Russo, a volunteer who worked on Mocho's case, noted that French bulldogs are valuable. The breed, on average, costs between $1,500 to $3,000, according to MarketWatch.com. It has also been dubbed the most popular dog breed in 2022 and 2023 by the American Kennel Club.

Russo said it was possible someone wanted to breed the dog, but "they found out that it was spayed, so it was no value to them, and that's why they released it."

Another dog, a 5-year-old Shih Tzu mix with fluffy hair, went missing out of Bridgeport on April 17. She was returned to her family — shorn — on April 22.

"That one didn't even look like the dog," said Heltke, who has volunteered with the organization for at least four years. "It was shaved right down."

The first case that volunteers remembered of a missing dog returning with a different appearance occurred in New London in 2021. It was a white dog that went missing and had been dyed red, according to Russo, who has been a volunteer with the organization since 2020.

Russo said she isn't surprised by the latest uptick in the cases.

"People steal dogs, or find dogs and keep them," she said. "This would be a good way of altering their appearance so they wouldn't be recognized."

"It doesn't surprise me, unfortunately," she added.

But Hawkins isn't sure why people are doing this. She pondered whether it was because someone found the dog and wanted to keep it, or if they were trying to sell the dog and wanted it to look different. She also said dogs sometimes are taken to be used as bait in dog-fighting.

"It's terrible," she said. "Stolen dogs are such a problem right now."

Jennifer Wallace, chief animal control officer for Bridgeport, said she has sometimes seen dogs shaven to avoid recognition, but it's not a frequent occurrence. Sometimes people who find dogs will try to keep them and cut their hair or dye it, but police and Animal Control are not always made aware of these incidents, she said.

Connecticut Dog Gone Recovery Volunteers is advising dog owners of some preventative measures to protect their canine family members. A big one is supervising your dog, even if it's outside in a fenced-in yard.

"If your dog is outside, you need to be with it," Heltke said, noting that fenced-in yards won't protect a dog from thieves or from digging under a fence and running away.

The biggest reason dogs went missing in 2023 was due to being left outside and unattended, Hawkins said. This accounted for about one in five of the Dog Gone Recovery network's 962 cases in 2023.

Of those 962 cases, 830 of the dogs were found, she said.

A microchip also may help identify a dog that is found, but it only works if it's scanned, typically by an animal control officer or a veterinarian. However, microchips do not track the location; they only contain information so the dog can be returned to its owner.

Hawkins recommended GPS collars, which do track a dog's movements.

"If the dog does escape, at least you can track it on your phone," she said.

Connecticut Dog Gone Recovery Volunteers has about 40 volunteers across the state. Some are assigned territories in which they communicate with owners of missing dogs and help coordinate public campaigns and other search efforts.

Heltke said she wished the trend of altering a dog's appearance would stop.

"Are they harming the dog doing this? I don't know because I don't know what they're using," she said. "I think it's horrible."

If you encounter a stray or lost dog, call your local animal control officer. If they are not available, make a call to your local police department's non-emergency number.