The Benchland, Montana ranch is set nearly eight miles off Highway 87. The road to the ranch itself is more than a quarter-mile long. Truly, the only way an investigator could get a glimpse of the scope of the entire ranch would be from the air, in a plane.

Investigators from the Judith Basin County Sheriff's Department, not to mention staffers in The HSUS's Northern Rockies Regional Office (NRRO), didn't have that luxury. So they had to guess the number of animals who may be living on the ranch, an alleged puppy mill right in the middle of Montana. They figured about 50.

Their calculations were a little off. By more than 50.

In all, 116 dogs and one horse were confiscated in Judith Basin County during a multi-site raid between June 10 and June 16. After a lengthy delay, three people were recently charged in connection with the raids: Jean and Bill Walker, owners of the Benchland ranch, face felony charges of aggravated animal cruelty; Jean Walker's daughter, Stacey Kelly of Hobson, has also been charged with felony animal cruelty as well as two misdemeanor counts of animal cruelty and two misdemeanor counts of child endangerment. The Walkers pled not guilty to the charges on Thursday, July 22, while Kelly has not yet entered a plea.

While the Walkers and Kelly await trial, The HSUS and volunteers with several area animal organizations, including the Pet Assistance League, the Humane Society of Cascade County, and Lewistown Animal Control, have been caring for the animals in a makeshift facility in Stanford. How the dogs wound up in the Stanford facility—known as "Cause for Paws"—and how the animal handling team adapted to the unexpected mother lode of pooches is a story of ingenuity, flexibility and plain hard work.

Law enforcement served the warrant on the Walkers early on June 10, but had to wait for the Animal Health Assessment Team to finish the Hobson seizure before proceeding with the Benchland ranch. Around 3 p.m., when authorities and the assessment team saw the vast number of dogs on the Benchland property—"There were dogs all over," said Suzi Hansen, program coordinator for NRRO—they knew they had a long day ahead of them.

To help make the animal cruelty case, the teams had to document and catalog each of the 97 pooches on the property—before they could take the animals to the temporary shelter in nearby Lewistown, just across the county line in Fergus County. (Incidentally, one of the newborn puppies from the Walkers' ranch would later die, while 13 other dogs were also confiscated from Kelly's Hobson home; another seven pooches were seized from a third suspect's property on June 16.)

The process took the team well into the night. To shed light on the documentation process in the pitch-black Central Montana night, authorities had to call in a fire truck to illuminate the scene. The teams didn't finish their business until 11:30 that evening. Then they still had to caravan to Lewistown, some 30 miles away from the Walkers' ranch.

Changing on the Fly

Plans had been made to shelter the dogs at Fergus County Fairgrounds, but those plans called for housing only 50 animals. Volunteers quickly had to scramble to secure supplies for twice that number of dogs, a group of pooches that included nearly 20 different breeds, from terriers to St. Bernards. In a small town in Montana, it's not that easy to find a vast number of pet supplies; you can't just walk into your local PETsMART and slap down a credit card. NRRO's Hansen had to improvise—and improvise fast.

She found a local retail store and began to comb the aisles for anything that could be used as food and water bowls. She bought planter troughs, herb containers, buckets, even oil pans to do the job. "You know, it all worked," Hansen said with a laugh.

The trip to the retail store even came with an unexpected fringe benefit. Several employees, taken by the plight of the animals, arrived at the fairgrounds the next day with the first donation: ten bags of dog food. They had pooled their own money to pay for it.

Once the supplies were in place and the fairgrounds readied—the stables themselves had to be secured to make sure the dogs wouldn't escape—the animal handling teams soon discovered another problem: They couldn't stay at the fairgrounds. Even before the dogs were all bedded down in the early morning hours of Friday, June 11, the teams learned that the Fergus County Fairgrounds would soon be hosting a convention. All the dogs would have to be relocated.

David Pauli, the director of NRRO, was soon doing what he does best: Searching for solutions for emergencies situations. Within days, Pauli, with the help of many others, had not only secured a new space (some Stanford lots owned by Judith Basin County), but also contacted officials in Toole County, who volunteered to purchase temporary buildings from leftover donations from the high-profile "Camp Collie" case.

The final piece of the sheltering puzzle also came from supplies first used at Camp Collie in Great Falls, Montana. Priefert kennels, placed in storage by The HSUS and the American Working Collie Association, were dusted off and packed off to Stanford for the latest batch of confiscated canines. Eight 10x10 Priefert panels were placed in one of the temporary structures for the larger breed of dogs, and another 12 10x10 panels were placed in the other structure for the smaller pooches. Several more panels were installed outside for even larger breeds.

Once the shelters were ready, volunteers once again had to transport the animals. But instead of a caravan of trailers, this time they used a large cattle truck. The clean, ventilated truck was so large, in fact, that teams could secure all the dog crates on the floor of the trailer. In some ways, transporting the animals was the easier part; the harder job was following all the protocols to make sure the animals—seen as evidence in the eyes of the county court—were not tampered with in any way.

Night and Day

The 100-plus dogs have been on site for several weeks now at the makeshift Stanford shelter, in the hands of well-trained volunteers who are under the direction of HSUS consultant Leslie Kremer, a sheltering expert from Lewistown. The animals' health has improved astronomically since they were confiscated. (The horse, incidentally, is being cared for in a foster home.)

Hansen, who was part of the Animal Health Assessment Team, said that when they first saw the dogs, a number of them were heavily matted, severely dehydrated, or lethargic. A few had to be treated immediately by a veterinarian. Volunteer teams had to ask permission from the court to groom about 12 dogs who were in the worst shape, their coats so long and matted that the animals couldn't walk, see or defecate. "There was one dog in particular," Hansen notes, "the only way you could tell which end was which was when he walked."

Time and routine veterinary attention have changed all that for these pooches. "It's night and day," says Pauli. "You wouldn't recognize these dogs as the same ones we picked up on June 10. They're healthier, and they're happier."

The animals will be kept at the Stanford shelters until the Walkers and Kelly have their trial. No date has been set for it yet. If convicted of the felony aggravated animal cruelty, the Walkers and Kelly could each face a $2,500 fine and two years' probation. Additionally, Kelly faces a $1,000 fine and a year in jail for each misdemeanor animal cruelty charges, as well as a $500 fine and six months in jail for the child endangerment charges.

Note: The HSUS has spent tens of thousands of dollars on sheltering these animals in Montana. If you'd like to help us in our animal protection causes, please click on the donation button to the right.