No desert oasis for Duroville’s dogs
A pair of dogs chase cars through the Duroville trailer park in Thermal, Calif. Residents say the aggressive dogs leave them too afraid to go English classes or the laundromat, their children confined to the porch for fear of being attacked. (Mark Boster / Los Angeles Times)
A pair of wild dogs fight over a can of food being offered by volunteers with the Animal Action League, a nonprofit group that is trapping and sterilizing scores of canines that roam the trailer park. (Mark Boster / Los Angeles Times)
Animal Action League volunteers Gwen Turner, left, and Deanna Pridemore carry a trap holding one of the many wild dogs captured in the squalid trailer park. Female pit bulls and other large breeds are their primary targets because they can deliver a dozen or more pups a year. (Mark Boster / Los Angeles Times)
84-year-old Jordin Keuckas, who founded the Animal Action League, has been spaying and neutering wild cats and dogs around the Salton Sea for 25 years. This is cold, hard, nasty work, but its worth its weight in gold, she said. (Mark Boster / Los Angeles Times)
Dr. Robert Mills spays one one of Duroville’s wild canines. Of the 22 dogs and six cats he operated on that day, most “have had litters in the past month.” (Mark Boster / Los Angeles Times)
These puppies are lucky enough to have an owner, but most of Duroville’s 800 canines do not. “Down in Mexico these animals fend for themselves, said Deanna Pridemore of the Animal Action League. People dont realize that up here, they cant fend for themselves, there is not enough space here for that.” (Mark Boster / Los Angeles Times)
