On July 19th, members of Best Friends Animal Society’s Los Angeles Brigade made the long drive out to Bassett Hound Rescue (www.bassetrescuenetwork.org) in Acton CA to help plant 25 donated pepper trees. It was a super hot day, and a lot of hard work, but this dedicated group knew that by helping to plant these trees, they would be providing much needed shade to the 100+ dogs who call BHR their temporary home.

It was a pretty fun day for the volunteers despite the heat. They arrived around 8:30 am and met with Ha, from Rescuer’s Helper, who had coordinated getting all the donations and volunteers for the day. There were detailed instructions on what to do, as well as a general (and continual) reminder of the snakes and spiders that were afoot.

Dawn, the owner and manager of BHR, gave the volunteers a nice tour of the facility and talked about the special care that Bassets usually need, as well as the hard-luck cases that have come her way. Two of the dogs were using “wheels” because of really bad rear legs. Besides Best Friends, there were the normal cadre of volunteers who come by to help walk and keep the site neat and to give the dogs play time.

As the volunteers were planting the last 5 trees, they heard a call from the main house. One of the recently acquired dogs, Ind-e, had just had a stroke and passed on. They cut off some tufts of hair and placed them in the tree hole being worked on out in the 3rd pen. It was a sad moment as they had been watching that particular dog since the volunteers had arrived that morning.

All in all, it was a very successful day for the Best Friends Brigade, as the temperatures in that area can get over 100 during the summer/fall days and there is a fierce wind that starts blowing around noon. The newly planted trees will provide shade to the dogs and act as a wind-breaker to stop the dust storms from sending dry dirt and sand into the dog’s eyes. The BHR group was very happy with the volunteers’ hard work and dedication!

Photo and story by Jameson Yu, Brigade volunteer