Three puppies are now recovering from the cold after being rescued off a Utah mountaintop by a few snowmobilers.
Holt and Kat Perry, the snowmobilers who rescued the puppies, say it was “just dumb luck” when they found the freezing puppies who were living out of a sheep’s carcass, KSTU reported.
The couple was snowmobiling on a Weber County mountaintop when they discovered the puppies and a mother dog five miles away from the nearest road on Saturday.
“I’m not going to leave any animal on the mountain to starve, especially, it was obvious she had pups,” Kat Perry said.
The couple successfully rescued three puppies but failed to rescue the mother dog despite their efforts.
Weber County Search and Rescue happened to be in the area to assist in bringing the puppies off the mountain. The mother was too accustomed to the wild to trust her rescuers.
“We didn’t have a leash, we didn’t have a rope or anything so we decided the best thing was [to] get these guys out first and then go back in and try to get her,” Holt said.
Investigators think the mother had been protecting a flock of sheep over the summer. But when the rancher went to collect the sheep, the mother dog went to have a litter.
“The pups were cold, shivering and wet and just a little ball of ice,” Perry said.
The couple is considering adopting one of the puppies, which they have named Polar, while volunteers search for the mother. The remaining puppies will be put up for adoption through a Montana-based rescue group.