A conservation worker was exploring a pipe inside a casing complex in Wichita, Kansas when he noticed something wasn’t right.
When he entered an apartment door, he was greeted by a foul odor and observed a tiny plastic dog jalopy in the corner of the room. There were two 7-month-old puppies inside.
Despite the fact that the puppies were clearly in pain, he found it weird that they weren’t making any sounds.
“There were feces and urine just flowing out the front of the kennel,” Wichita Action League administrative director Sarah Coffman told The Dodo. ” He also saw that the puppies couldn’t open their jaws, so he flashed a flashlight in the jalopy and discovered that they had wire wrapped around their muzzles, and their tips were severely swollen and red.”
The conservation employee asked a friend who fosters animals for the Wichita Beast Action League, unsure what to do and unintentionally leaving the two scared puppies alone. “She phoned us and said, ‘I don’t understand what to tell him,'” Coffman explained. ” I said, ‘Tell him to stay right there.’ ‘I’m on my way, and I’m bringing the cavalry.’
Coffman entered the property with pet control officials at her side, took the puppies, and rushed them to the doctor.
Coffman was taken aback when she discovered what was being used to hush the young dogs.
“Because it was so tight, we first assumed it was a line wrapped around their tips,” Coffman explained. “When we finally got them in the vet’s office and were able to hold them steady and examine them, we found they were little rubber bands like you’d use in your hair, no larger around than my thumb.”
Both animals had 2 rubber bands tied around their tips, which the vet suspected had been there for 12 to 24 hours. While Coffman and the two animal control officers there fought back gashes, the vet grabbed the bands with forceps and snipped them.
“We were assisting them and doing the proper thing,” Coffman recalled, “but the way they yelled when those bands finally came off and the blood came pouring back to their nose was really extremely devastating.”
If the bands had been left on for several hours longer, the puppies could have experienced significant towel damage, loss of smell, or perhaps worse. “We truly caught them in the nick of time,” Coffman continued.
The pit bull mix siblings, now named Westley and Debbie, look and smell considerably better after a long bath. Although their tips are still a little sore, both are expected to recover completely — and are happily recovering in a foster family.
“They’re such a great example of how adaptable kids are because I obviously wouldn’t be as happy if it happened to me,” Coffman said. “But they’re having a terrific time playing and snuggling with their foster.”
While Westley has proven to be the more daring of the two, his relaxed family is no pushover. Coffman explained, “She’ll tell him precisely what she thinks and put him in his place if she thinks he needs it.” “It’s incredibly amusing to see the tiny one beat up on the bigger one when he’s misbehaving.”
Soon, the puppies will be ready for their new homes, and procedures have previously begun to submerge by. But, while Westley and Debbie are relieved to be able to forget their past — their saviors haven’t been able to do so as easily.
“Last night, all I could think about was, ‘What if that pipe hadn’t burst?’ Would they have sprouted in time? ‘Would they have survived?’ ” Coffman explained. “You wouldn’t think you’d be grateful for a pipe sinking a flat, but it literally saved two lives.”
“It makes you go home and tighten your grip on your dogs a little tighter,” Coffman added.
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