Why ICHBA Split the Litter

The Smith Street 11

I’ve had several readers ask why we decided to split the Smith Street 11, Dawn’s second litter, taking five off the property and leaving six behind. Great question. For those of you just tuning in, Dawn is a feral dog that we’ve been trying to catch for six months, who (since we’ve been tracking her) has had 19 puppies in a Springfield, TN ghetto.

Basically, we know that our best chance of catching Dawn is when she’s nursing, so we left six pups from the current litter in a shed on Smith Street as “bait.” We left the smaller ones behind because the vet says they’ll benefit a lot more from their mother’s milk than the greedier fat ones.

We decided to take the healthiest pups away from their litter because once they start exploring, keeping track of 11 unfenced puppies in a seedy neighborhood would be a chore and the likelihood of all surviving, let alone being spayed or neutered would be slim to none.

As always, thanks for reading and thanks for caring so much about Dawn, a feral dog and her 19 homeless puppies. I’ll keep you updated.