Leading animal welfare organisation, Animal Aid, is desperately trying to save a litter of puppies cruelly dumped at Chirnside Park Primary School.

The six week old hound cross puppies were callously abandoned at the primary school, uncontained and without food or water, during school holidays. They were found by local resident, Belinda James, who immediately collected the litter and went to Animal Aid for help.

All the eight puppies were neglected, dehydrated and deteriorating at a rapid rate.

Two of the smaller puppies in particular, were very sick and weak, with one of them suffering from a nasty abscess on her face. Unfortunately, their condition was so severe; they passed away only one day after arriving at Animal Aid, despite vets desperately trying to save them.

One of the pups in the litter is almost three times the size of the others which would indicate that there was in fact another litter perhaps from the same father to a different mother as it has identical markings to some of the other pups, which makes this situation even more concerning.

According to Animal Aid General Manager, Nell Thompson, these heartbreaking situations are becoming all too frequent, with irresponsible pet owners simply not desexing their pets.

"The horrific nature of this situation is that these helpless puppies were not intended to be found as they were dumped at a school during the holidays, these pet owners simply had no regard for the health and safety of these puppies," she said.

"It was simply a callous act and easily could have been prevented by desexing their adult pets."

"From Animal Aid's perspective, we have our work cut out for us to help these pups make up the ground they have lost due to a poor diet and lack of proper care, we will need to build them up slowly."

"We don't expect that anyone will come forward to claim them, so as soon as they are thriving, they will be desexed, vaccinated, wormed, microchipped and ready to be adopted."

"Animal Aid's message is clear - Bringing new life into the world is a big responsibility. If you don't have the capacity or resources to guarantee the resulting puppies optimum health and a loving new home then you should do everything to avoid letting it happen in the first place -DESEX YOUR PETS!.