Animal welfare, OPP investigate after dogs removed from Haldimand County property

This story contains some shocking images and video footage, which may be found disturbing.

Officials removed several dogs from a Haldimand County property.

Animal Welfare and Ontario Provincial Police are trying to determine exactly what happened there and how many dogs were involved, whether it was 20, 30 or more.

But people who were trying to help the dogs were shocked by what they found.

Tucked away in buildings on the property near Nanticoke, were numerous dogs.

A resident of the area, Rhonda Rogers, described what they saw, “we have found deceased dogs on the property and at least 15-20 dogs alive in crates in horrible, horrible conditions.”

People helping the dogs say several were found inside the house, the basement, and the outbuildings.

“Deceased animals on the property, animals in crates with no food, no water, no bedding — they’re locked in rooms, they’re locked in trailers,” said Rogers. “Some are missing teeth from, you can tell, they’ve been chewing at the crates for a long period of time.”

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“Saturday morning, and we did a live video of all the sheds here, I mean, they were full of dogs,” said Wolfgang Keinitz, who owns the house. “I was counting about three or four in the barn —
I didn’t even go in the house, I heard lots of dogs in the house.”

Kienitz says he’s been trying for months to evict the woman who rents the house, because she was keeping too many dogs.

He says some dogs were removed over the weekend after an order from animal control.

“It’s a terrible mess, it’s very heartbreaking, it really is.” said Kienitz. “When I came here the first time, I could hear the dogs crying for help — terrible, really, really terrible that people can do this here.”

It’s not clear how many dogs were caught up in this.

All of them left behind seem to be large animals, with many seeming very friendly.

Volunteers have been bringing food, but along with live dogs, there are fears that the widespread debris contains the bodies of dead animals.

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The worst discovery was made in the barn of a dead dog.

“I don’t know what happened to it,” said Rogers.

Haldimand County Mayor Shelley Ann Bentley says it seems a woman with good intentions was trying to provide a rescue for dogs, but things got out of control.

She says the woman has been turned down for a kennel licence before, and it’s up to the Provincial Animal Welfare Services (PAWS) to step in.

“They will be able to lay charges if they see fit and able to take control of those animals and hopefully get them into a proper state, and take care of them,” said Bentley. “It’s very upsetting. It’s very upsetting to see the conditions that they were in.”

Ontario’s PAWS had investigators on the scene Monday, backed up by the OPP.

An official with the solicitor general’s office in Toronto said it would take a while before they can come to any conclusions, with local people concerned about what happens to the dogs next.

“Animal Welfare Services is actively inspecting the property and has removed 11 dogs from the property at this time,” a spokesperson for the Ontario Ministry of the Solicitor General said in a statement. “The dogs will receive veterinary care before being placed in an appropriate setting. Given this is an ongoing inspection, no further information can be provided at this time.”

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