LIVING in West Yorkshire, my family are familiar with Wakefield's Newmillerdam woods. My mother's much-loved dog Raoul has trekked around the lake many a time.

Fellow walkers are keen to comment on his unusual looks. His impressive black curly coat and charming face attract many coos of delight. At 16 months old, he is still young, and answers to no-one but my mother.

Last weekend my partner and I took Raoul for a stroll around the lake. Two hours later our Easter Sunday had taken a traumatic turn. After an afternoon spent playing fetch, sniffing his fellow canines and having a swim, Raoul had to go back on his lead.

But he was having far too much fun for that, and for another exasperating half-hour he played "catch me if you can". Our last resort was to ignore him.

Raoul decided two could play at that game. He blanked us, and loped off out of the park. When we gave chase, he ran on to the road, into the side of an oncoming car. In a heart-stopping moment he let out a short yelp before sprinting along the busy A-road and back into the woods. A disappearing black dot would be the last we'd see of Raoul for over 24 hours.

The whole family spent a worried five hours trawling the area, quizzing locals and hand writing missing posters. Meanwhile, one person manned the home phone, the number Raoul had on his collar. But night came and there was no sign of him. We had noticed posters for a missing border collie, Freddie, who had vanished nine days earlier. At the bottom of the poster was a logo for DogLost.co.uk. We noted it down, keen to do anything that might reunite my mother with her darling pet.

Contacting Dog Lost was the best thing we could possibly have done. The Doncaster-based website is a free service staffed by volunteers and dependent on a kind-hearted, dog-loving community who register with the site to help dog owners in their hour of need. Dog Lost's founders had lost their own dog a few years ago. He'd been dog-napped and they relied on the kindness of fellow dog owners to help find him and get him back six weeks later. Since then, they've reunited over 6,000 dogs and owners.

No sooner had we come off the phone with the people at Dog Lost, than they'd notified every site member and vet within 30 miles of Raoul's last known location, and had even emailed them "missing" posters to distribute. We drove back out to the woods as it fell dark, hoping he might return to where he'd left us. Nothing. By the time we'd returned there were numerous messages from concerned well-wishers, offering to help us with the search first thing the next morning and promising to cover the city in posters. Things were suddenly looking up.

After a fitful night's sleep, we headed out the next morning armed with hundreds of flyers. We were getting news of occasional sightings from people who had seen Raoul on the website or posters. Raoul was on the move.

By 2pm, I had reached Sandal Castle. The Visitor Centre knew the dog in the poster immediately, and pointed to a black shape in a distant field. He'd been hiding there since 10am. While search teams had been all over Newmillerdam, he'd been sitting over a mile away all morning.

He was in no mood for a calm return, and bolted off before we could get near him. It's difficult
to keep up with a four-legged creature when you only have two.

We rallied all the helpers from Dog Lost. A user called "Geeky Girl" had posters and flyers by the hundred and was with us in minutes. Her partner was circling the area in the car. Another user, "Briarlow", was also on her way. Dog Lost had mobilised dozens of helpers, including a woman who drove over from Manchester.

After an hour scouring the castle area, the fields and the vast lake nearby, we heard that someone had seen the dog sprinting across a park about half a mile away, across another
A-road and into a cricket field. Geeky Girl's partner appeared and drove us there.

Raoul was nowhere to be seen. It was 4pm, and another day of searching was looking likely. Then word came that Raoul was on a nearby farm, and two young boys were looking after him. Four of our team crammed back into the car, leaving me behind.

I got home to find Raoul happy to be back. He seemed fine – apart from ravenous hunger, desperate thirst and a limp. The next hour brought many calls from members of Dog Lost asking how Raoul was. By 6pm helpers had offered to take down all our posters.

At 9pm, Raoul and his owners were tucked up in bed, exhausted from a long day's hiking, stress and lack of sleep. We'll be helping Dog Lost once we've recovered our energy. There's still Freddie the Border Collie to find, for starters...

Visit www.doglost.co.uk for more information.