Following an investigation on a 10-acre property south of La Pine, owner Christina Cairns, 65, voluntarily surrendered her dogs to authorities. Cairns was cited and released by the Klamath County Sheriff’s Office, according to a sheriff’s office press release. The Deschutes County Sheriff’s Office Animal Control and the Humane Society of Central Oregon also assisted in the case.

The surrendered dogs include pit bulls, Neapolitan mastiffs, German shepherds, shepherd/pit bull mixes, shepherd/Rottweiler mixes and one cane corso. One dog was found deceased, and four dogs remain at large. Authorities are working to capture them with live traps.

Amber Kostoff, executive director of the Humane Society of Central Oregon, said the organization was told by the Deschutes County Sheriff’s Office Tuesday night that there were neglected dogs in need of care south of La Pine in Klamath County.

“We said yes, we’d be happy to help. We went in thinking it was going to be a situation where there were 20 to 30 dogs and when we got there it was clear that it was quite a bit more substantial than we had anticipated,” said Kostoff. “That first day, between our two agencies, we pulled 32 dogs.”

The next day, the teams pulled 30 or so more dogs from the property, said Kostoff. Ultimately, the humane society took in 18 dogs and the rest were taken in by Klamath County. The humane society is not expecting to take in additional dogs from this case. Most of the dogs are adults or seniors.

The humane society was already at full capacity for dogs, but was able to move other dogs around to make room for new arrivals. Some stray dogs were also reunited with their owners.

“That really took a lot of extra effort,” she said. “Obviously the 18 dogs that were incoming had varying health conditions and a lot of medical issues. We had some dogs that had some pretty severe lacerations that had come in, old wounds, abscesses, many are quite emaciated.”

The dogs are now being cared for in the shelter clinic. Some of the dogs have been fast-tracked for adoption, and when they are ready for adoption they will be noted on the humane society’s website. The humane society is looking for fosters, adopters and financial support to ensure the dogs are receiving the care they need. Those interested can visit hsco.org.

“These animals need continuing care, a lot of them have underlying medical issues that our veterinarians are working to diagnose and identify treatments and then we’re also here to continue to serve the community just for our regular day-to-day stuff,” said Kostoff. “As we’re receiving and processing these animals from Klamath County, strays are coming in through animal control, through Deschutes County and the city of Bend, calls are coming in, people lost their dogs, people need to surrender their animals, so we’re working hard to also make sure that we’re maintaining services to our existing community as well.”