posted January 11, 2015 08:18 AM            

A heart-wrenching scene unfolded this morning just before 8 a.m. at at the Oakhill cemetery. A teenage boy found a dog crying next to a tombstone protecting her dead puppy. Community members tried for hours to rescue the dog, but every attempt failed.

“I was taking pictures of the cemetery and I walked up and saw this dog and I thought it was part of the cemetery and at first I thought it was a cat,” said Hunter Cone.

Cone quickly realized it wasn’t a cat, but a dead puppy. As the mother sat on the grass, protecting her dead young, Cone reached out for help on Facebook.

Community members quickly showed up and the group tried for hours to lure the dog to safety.

“The first attempt was putting out food, sitting next to it, seeing if we could get close to the dog but it would not come near to us at all. And then we tried cornering it, maybe someone could jump on top of it – that didn’t work. It was too smart,” said Cone.

Animal Control didn’t have a spare officer to send out to the graveyard. Lisa Scarbrough, founder of Coastal Pet Rescue, said that’s the only proper way to handle a stray.

“Unfortunately the area that we’re in there’s lots of stray animals and it was very heartbreaking to see that this animal was out there not leaving the side of her sadly deceased puppy,” said Scarbrough. “As a mom of course that gets to me because I wouldn’t leave my son either, but as a rescue our hands are really tied.”

Scarbrough said the law prohibits her from stepping in. She adds it’s also against the law to take in a stray animal and not report it to the proper authorities at animal control.