Dog sneaks out of kennel at night to comfort crying foster puppies

ST. ALBERT, Canada -- At a Canadian pet motel and foster care center, a dog broke out of his kennel to comfort and cuddle with two new, frightened, foster puppies on their first night, ABC News reports.

Maggie, the maternal dog, actually had a litter of her own who were all adopted out of the humane society a little while before she found a loving home. "We think that's why she got so attached to the puppies," Alex Aldred, who works at Barker's Pet Motel and Grooming, where the heartwarming events unfolded, told ABC News.

"We've never really seen it before, where a dog sneaks out to some puppies and is so excited to see them."

"We left work and then we were watching the surveillance cameras while we were out and we saw Maggie was sitting in front of the puppies' kennels," Aldred told ABC. Aldred said his mother, Sandy, went back to check on Maggie after seeing through the video that she had gotten out of her kennel.

"She kind of directed Sandy to the puppies' kennel so Sandy let her in and she was being really affectionate," Aldred explains, "Sandy stayed in their for about 15 minutes and then said, 'Well it looks like they need each other,' and then let Maggie stay the night in their kennel."

Maggie stayed beside the puppies the whole evening long, and Aldred added that it seemed that the mother dog needed the puppy love as much as the frightened puppies needed her.

"When we came back in the morning they were all still cuddled up together."

Deanna Thompson, who works at the Alberta Animal Rescue Crew Society (AARCS), the organization that rescued the puppies, told ABC News, of the pets, "They're between nine and ten weeks old," and, "A little bit playful but shy."

Thompson said she was not surprised by this act of maternal love that took place. "It's innate in a lot of female dogs, especially if they've had a litter in the past. It's just in their nature. We've seen it in a lot of dogs even with male dogs, when they hear other puppies crying they want to console them and make sure they're feeling safe."

AARCS organizes over 2,000 adoptions per year, and Thompson added that the young pups have yet to find a loving home.