Puppy dumping is growing concern in Socorro County

Marika Renee Driver was fishing with her kids in San Acacia on June 1 when she thought she heard small barks.

“Then my kids started yelling puppies,” Driver said.

Her kids found a litter of six puppies that appeared to be part Chihuahua. Next to them was an empty orange bowl. She said the area where they were left had a drop-off that prevented the puppies from accessing water from the river.

“It took them quite a while to warm up to the boys, and then they loaded them up. They were so thirsty,” Driver said.

Once she got them home, she posted them on Facebook, looking for homes, and received a lot of engagement.

“There was also a lot of anger from people who wanted to know why someone would choose to abandon them and not find homes,” Driver said.

Driver quickly found homes for all the puppies except for one, “it took less than a week to find homes… they could have easily found homes”.

Two days later, Ashlee Romero was making similar posts on Facebook, looking for homes for two small white puppies that her mom spotted by the mailbox at the Miranda Trailer Park in Socorro.

“I want to say they were a few weeks old, but I did find wonderful homes for them. I was just glad that I could help them for the time that I did until I found them a home. It was absolutely heartbreaking,” Romero said.

Lupe Tarango, animal shelter and dispatch director, said puppy dumping is a constant issue because many people aren’t interested in sterilizing their dogs. “ We’re constantly getting puppies left and right.”

“The biggest problem we’re having right now is people just don’t want to spay and neuter their animals. When the accident happens, and they have puppies, they’re in a tizzy, and they’ll bring us the puppies, but on the flip side of that, they refuse to spay and neuter their animal,” Tarango said. He acknowledges that times are tough for people, but he said there are services out there to help pay for sterilization, including APAS, who gives out $200 vouchers.

Tarango said although they are at full capacity, he prefers that people bring unwanted litters to the shelter instead of dumping them. “We’ll take them even if we struggled to figure out what to do with them. We’ll always take them,” Tarango said, “People seem to have a misconception that if they dump puppies at the shelter, or if they take them to the shelter, that they’re going to get in trouble. That’s not the fact.”

He said that dumping puppies at a park or by the river can get you cited for abandonment. It also makes their job harder if they have to go pick up puppies if someone calls them in. Although it’s not ideal for them, at least they know the puppies will be in a safe place.