Animals have strong maternal instincts, and they’ll often do everything in their power to keep their babies safe. One mama dog in northwestern Minnesota is the perfect example of this.
The dog thought of a clever way to keep her babies safe in the ice and snow.
When you’re out in the frozen wilderness with your pups, shelter means the difference between life and death. With nowhere to hide from the elements with her 3-week-old babies, the dog dug up a simple shelter in the snow and wrapped herself around her puppies to keep them warm.
It’s uncertain how the puppies would have fared in the freezing cold if they and their mom weren’t spotted by a family who drove them to Red Lake Rosie’s Rescue shelter.
The family found the mom and her babies in a wooded area near a lake and immediately jumped to the rescue.
When the family arrived at the shelter, the staffers couldn’t believe their eyes!
The mama dog and her puppies pulled out an amazing feat by surviving alone in extreme cold. Furthermore, the mama dog had stopped producing milk and could not feed her puppies. The staffers named the dog ‘Snowbelle’ and shared their story in a Facebook post.
“After a few days of warm shelter and good food Snowbelle started producing lots of milk for her babies,” the shelter wrote in their post.
Snowbelle (who was later renamed ‘Asha’) had spent a long time living by herself with no one to take care of her.
According to the founder of Pet Projects, Nancy Bruley, Asha was in ‘tough shape’ when she arrived.
“We don’t really know anything about her past,” she said. “She was very, very thin and in tough shape, so she had been scrounging on her own for a while.”
Bruley said that Asha didn’t even know how to walk on a leash when she came to live at Pet Projects, but she was always well-behaved inside the house.
“The mom was extremely shy when she came — not aggressive in any way — but timid,” Bruley said. “Kind of fearful if you went towards her, her head would go down. You could tell she was apprehensive of people.”
The brave mom ‘is much more confident’ now.
“She’s really blossomed,” Bruley said. “She walks well on the leash now and is much more confident. She jumps and puts her paws up on me. She’s definitely more outgoing than when she came in.”
There’s more good news too.
Asha and her puppies were nursed back to health in the shelter. All of the puppies found forever homes and were adopted out. Asha also found a forever home.
It’s now been two years since Asha and her puppies were saved.
One of the puppy’s paw-rents shared a photo of their puppy from the litter, Pepper. She’s all grown up!
“I still can’t thank you guys enough for rescuing them and the kind hearted people that brought them in. This is my Pepper from that litter. She’s my whole heart and soul. And she kept her white heart on her head that you see in these pictures!” Pepper’s mom, Samantha Schell, wrote on Facebook.
Someone else shared a photo of their dog from the litter, Odin!
It’s so wonderful to see Asha and her puppies doing so well after their tough beginnings. Asha is an incredible mom who did such a great job keeping her babies safe.
Check out a video about Asha below!
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