This real-life, canine version of Finding Nemo has an ending that’s every bit as heartwarming.

The miniature poodle named after the hero of the animated movie escaped through an open door on Dec. 29 while owners Helene Beaulieu and Jon Buysse of Waterloo, Ont., were visiting family in Manor Park over the holidays.

He was missing amid snow, freezing rain and frigid temperatures.

Beaulieu and Buysse, dropping plans to return home, spent days and nights distributing flyers, going door to door and searching.

They set up cameras hoping to catch a glimpse of their missing dog, followed tracks in the snow, and combed Rockcliffe backyards. They launched a Facebook page and consulted a dog behaviouralist.

“On the third day, we were despondent,” Beaulieu said Sunday. “It was -20C.”

Finally, after 10 long days, a Rockcliffe doctor, who lives more than a kilometre away from where Nemo went missing but who’d heard about the missing pooch called to say he’d heard whimpering from his backyard.

Buysse shone his flashlight into the darkness of the doctor’s backyard.

“He saw Nemo huddled in the corner of a fence,” Beaulieu said. “He was shaking and shivering and just put up his paws to be picked up.”

An emergency visit to the Alta Vista Animal Hospital found that the nearly eight-year-old pup was starving, dehydrated and hypothermic. He had lost four pounds, a third of his body weight, and had a scrape on his eye but was otherwise in amazingly good shape after a hospital stay for warming, IV fluids and observation.

A week later and at home in Waterloo with his feline friend, Gordon, who now outweighs him, Nemo can’t yet jump up on the furniture again but hasn’t lost of any of his enthusiasm for life.

“He’s like a child to us — I know that’s kind of a cliché,” Beaulieu explained. “Our children are both grown. We spend all our time with our dog.

“We’re THAT couple.”

And there’s just something special about Nemo, who was adopted from a rescue organization as a puppy because a breeder deemed him “unsaleable.”

He captured their heart immediately with his ears that flip inside-out, skipping gait and winning personality. Somehow, he’s always got a smile on his shaggy face.

“He has a certain je ne sais quoi about him,” Beaulieu said.

He came with the name Nemo, which seemed perfect right from the start.