AR-News: (US NM) Moms and Pups OK After Rescues

[Animalara2003 at aol.com]

By Kathy Louise Schuit
Mountain View Telegraph
    Two unusual extrications saved more than a dozen lives in Torrance County 
last week.
    Animal lives, that is.
    County firefighters and animal control officers participated in the 
rescues that now have 11 puppies and their starving mothers on the road to better 
days.
    Animal Control officer Joe Kaberline single-handedly rescued one puppy 
and its mother from where they were trapped under an abandoned mobile home, said 
Pauline Dube, a board member for the Estancia Valley Regional Animal Shelter.
    To reach the trapped animals, Kaberline had to drag himself into the 
narrow space beneath the trailer— a position that left him face to face with an 
unknown, protective mother dog, Dube said.
    A neighbor of the abandoned property had called Dube to report that six 
puppies and their mother appeared to be living under the trailer and starving 
to death.
    Following Dube's instructions, the woman was able to collect five of the 
puppies. But one puppy stuck close to its mother, who refused to come out from 
under her home.
    Upon hearing that the mother dog remained underneath the mobile home, 
Dube said she called Kaberline to the rescue.
    Besides starvation, Dube said, the sudden loss of the five nursing 
puppies left the mother dog additionally at risk of suffering from painful mastitis— 
inflammation of the breast, teat or udder caused when young animals suddenly 
stop nursing. If untreated, the condition could be fatal.





full story:

http://www.mountainviewtelegraph.com/153270mtnview03-04-04.htm 
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