Dr. Michael White’s day begins very early—he wakes up before the crack of dawn to get ready for a long day at the Harris County Animal Shelter in Houston, Texas.
As he gets ready to save the lives of countless shelter animals, at around 5:30 a.m., White flips on the local news channel to see what is going on in the rest of the city. What he saw on May 30 came as a bit of a surprise to him.
White’s shelter recently made headlines when the media caught wind that the shelter was far over capacity when the 150-animal facility received over 200 dogs and cats on Memorial Day weekend.
The news crew tried their best to take care of the pup while they waited for shelter staff to arrive.
“We tried unchaining her for a little bit, she’s a bit of a runner though so I’m trying to hold her right here,” Janelle Bludau, the correspondent on the scene, said to the camera.
“I was watching the local news and I saw Janelle [Bludau], the reporter, outside our facility at the gate out by the road,” White told The Dodo. “She was talking about this dog she found, who had been chained to our front gate when she came to the shelter that morning.”
“I decided I wasn’t going to leave her there any longer, and I took her home,” White explained. “I didn’t want her to stay up there in that condition. I hate for animals to give birth in a shelter situation.”
White named the pup Janelle, after the reporter who found her, and she fit in exceptionally well with his two other foster dogs.
“She’s extremely affectionate toward people,” White said. “She would love to be a lap dog, and will climb into your lap, but she weighs 65 to 70 pounds.”
But Janelle’s behavior changed dramatically on June 12, and at around 8:50 p.m., Janelle’s first contractions started. White’s hopes of a daytime birth were unanswered, and so he and his wife strapped in for a long night.
“My wife and I stayed up with her all night assisting in each delivery,” White explained. “At 3:36 a.m., [puppy] number 10 was born, and we thought that was it, but number 11 was born at 6:05 a.m. It was a long night for me, my wife and Janelle.”
White’s fur-baby family grew exponentially that night, and he is pleased with how caring Janelle is for her 11 adorable babies.“She’s constantly keeping the pen nice and clean,” White added. “I couldn’t have asked for a better mother. She’s doing an excellent job with them.”
Best of luck to Janelle and the White family, but it doesn’t seem they need it, because luck has, apparently, been on their side for quite some time already.
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