Help the little hairy dog and his friends get home

BIG FAN: Four-year-old Kayla Harborne (and Jackie Clarke), has been visiting the Hairy Maclary statues since she found them at Creative Tauranga several months ago.

Kayla Harborne reads "Schnitzel Von Krumm with a very low tum" with excitement bursting from her little vocal cords.

The 4-year-old was walking past Creative Tauranga several months ago when she noticed the Hairy Maclary bronze statues inside and every time she comes back to Tauranga she goes to the gallery to visit her friends.

The statues, a part of the Hairy Maclary project, is the brain child of Creative Tauranga and is a story-book scene of permanent bronze sculptures of Hairy Maclary and his friends, which will be placed on Tauranga's waterfront.

However, almost $90,000 is still needed to get the pack of pooches to their new home.

A short video was filmed yesterday at Creative Tauranga with New Zealand entertainer Jackie Clarke, a real-life Hercules Morse and Hairy Maclary and Dame Lynley Dodd fan Kayla Harborne, which will be used to raise awareness of the project through social media.

Kayla has done her part in getting the dogs to their new home by donating her pocket money everytime she visits the dogs.

Kayla's mother Amiee Harborne said her little girl would have given almost $60 now.

Ms Harborne said she had been reading the stories to Kayla since she was a baby and the bubbly girl knew most of the words.

"Not 100 per cent perfectly but very close to it," she said.

Kayla's visits to Creative Tauranga were ones of love where she sits on top of Bottomley Potts to pat him and try to feed him while she is there, she said.

New Zealand entertainer Jackie Clarke said she felt the Hairy Maclary stories were like a rite of passage for all children as part of their childhood.

"He's such a giant in children's literature. No story book character comes close and he is just so charming."

Tracey Rudduck-Gudsell, Creative Tauranga Charitable Trust chief executive, said they asked Jackie Clarke to do the short film because she was a character in the original stage production of Hairy Maclary.

A dig date of November 4 is planned to get the dogs on the waterfront and just before Christmas they will be gifted to Tauranga city, she said.

To make a donation to see Hairy and his friends put into their final home head to Creative Tauranga, visit the Hairy McMaclary Give A Little website or text HAIRY to 306 to make an instant $3 donation to the project from September 15 to October 15.