A young Yakima college student was quite surprised in mid-June when she heard faint whimpers coming from deep within a dumpster. After rooting around in the trash for a minute or two, she found the source of the plaintive cries: a dehydrated puppy.

She knew that she couldn’t keep the puppy, so she brought her to her father in Seattle, who took the puppy to a vet to get checked out. After the vet told him that the young puppy was likely to grow into a huge dog, the father realized that he couldn’t take her either, so he brought her to PAWS.

The puppy quickly won over the hearts of the PAWS staff. She proved to be a fearless puppy, enjoying playing with dogs that towered over her.

PAWS Director of Development Robbin Peterson fostered the puppy at her home for a few nights. Later, Phil and Andrea Williamson of North Bend began fostering her, and christened her "Jetta."

It quickly became apparent to the Williamsons that Jetta hadn’t emerged from that Yakima dumpster unscathed. Jetta was acting lethargic and seemed to have trouble urinating. What little urine that Jetta did produce was mixed with blood.

The Williamsons rushed Jetta to an emergency vet. After a night’s stay at the vet, the Williamsons learned the cause of Jetta’s problems. During her short malnourished life prior to entering the PAWS system she had developed a kidney stone. The vet seemed fairly certain that the stone would not have developed had she been properly cared for from birth.

The good news was that the stone was treatable through antibiotics that would strengthen her health and allow her body to pass the stone.

Jetta paid a recent visit to PAWS for a checkup with PAWS shelter vet Dr. Deepak Sharma. Dr. Sharma reports that Jetta is doing wonderfully.