Residents in a rural Hidalgo County neighborhood say the amount of stray dogs popping up there is becoming too much to handle.

“What we do is we feed them,” Betty Ramirez said. “We come here every day at about 5:30, and they come to us, and they're extremely hungry."

When Ramirez and Stephanie Molina first started feeding the dogs near 8 Mile Line and Bryan Road, they were only nine strays.

Ramirez said that number has now increased to 16 dogs. She fears people may be abandoning the dogs in the area.

“We feel sorry for them, we feel like they belong somewhere like they were once loved and people just decided 'we don't want them anymore' for whatever reason — and they just disposed of them," Ramirez said.

Ramirez took in most of the dogs and regularly feeds them. She said a neighbor called the county to pick up the dogs, but was told all the shelters in the area were full.

“The county can't pick them up, the frustration lies there,” Ramirez said. “What do we do with them, how do we help them."

Channel 5 News reached out to Hidalgo County Animal Control regarding the issue, but the department hasn’t responded as of Friday evening.

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