Laura Hart-Special to the Sun

Could it be that someone in the Kern River Valley community was so upset that his purebred dog was impregnated by a mongrel that he actually took the newborn pups in a box and left them at the Dumpster behind the VFW in Lake Isabella?

That's what Kern County Animal Control Director Denise Haynes said is likely to have happened to seven puppies on a frigid day two weeks ago. It happenws that Kevin Kyt, a service technician with Atchison Propane, was out in the area when he heard some rustling around the area where he was working. At first he walked away but then his curiosity got the best of him.

He pulled back a drape over a box only to discover seven very young pups, squealing and hungry.

“They were so hungry they were trying to nurse off of each other,” Kyt said.

With nighttime temperatures dipping below freezing, it would not have been long before the puppies would have succumbed to the frigid cold.

Kyt called into the Atchinson office with the news of his unusual find. Kyt then went by the local animal shelter in South Lake, but they were closed at the time.

While April Bechtel, who works at the Atchinson office, made calls trying to find aid for the abandoned puppies, Kyt still had to work. Keeping the puppies in the box in his truck, he made his rounds.

Ever since the puppies were rescued, they have been around town in the hands of several different people.

Bechtel initially contacted Harry Naughton of Onyx, who picked up the young dogs and gave them to his landlady to hand-feed.

Sandy Anthony, Naughton's landlady and neighbor, kept the puppies in her bathroom, warmed up in a blanket. She fed them bottle feeding formula and goat's milk until she realized the job was just too much for her.

“It takes two and a half hours to feed seven puppies and then rub cotton over their rears to make sure they don't back up. It was just too much for me,” Anthony said.

So, she called every place she could think of that might be of some assistance feeding and caring for the puppies. She said finally after many calls and no success (she did not want to turn them over to Animal Control) she received a call back from the Kern Valley Veterinary Clinic in South Lake.

Clinic employee Ashley Rico heard the story about the dogs' plight and decided she could help. Although she is five months pregnant herself, Rico took in the seven little discarded doggies and has been caring for them ever since with help from family and friends.

“I hope whoever did this to them has a big guilt trip,” Rico said.

She plans on keeping at least two of the dogs. Although the final destination of these little tailwaggers is still unknown, it will be much better than the way things started out for them next to the Dumpster two weeks ago.