That's something you don't see every day. 38 dogs treading water, I mean, not dramatic rescues.[FoxNews] Two anglers and their fishing guide heard barking from a distance while fishing in Mississippi's Grenada Lake.
The dogs were a part of an annual fox run that takes place in the area, Gist said he learned after the encounter.
Chrestman noticed a deer in the water and the group of dogs were attempting to chase the animal.
"We went on fishing for about 10 or 15 more minutes, and Jordan [Chrestman] said, 'Hey guys, if you don't mind, we really need to go check on those dogs because they're way out there in that water,'" Gist said.
Gist and Carlisle had Chrestman lead them over to the pups.
Once the boat arrived on the scene, the three men were left stunned.
"We're just flabbergasted because it's dogs everywhere, and they're all going in different directions because they can no longer see the bank on either side," Gist said.
"And they're all hunting dogs — we can clearly see that because they have expensive GPS radio collars on them."
Without hesitation, the men took the dogs onto the boat so they wouldn't drown.
"We just immediately started calling dogs on the boat, you know, grabbed their collar and put them in the [bass] boat," Gist said.
The three fishermen grabbed as many dogs as they could and fit them on the boat before running out of room.
Chrestman managed to gather 25 to 27 dogs, making sure none of the pups attempted to jump back into the water.
Once the men returned the dogs to the bank, they found the owners in a panic and calling out for help, Gist said.
After rescuing the second group of dogs, one man on land told Gist and the others that he had the GPS tracker for the dogs and asked if he could join the rescue.
The tracker led the other men to an additional group of three to four dogs who were estimated to be further than a mile from the bank, according to Gist.
"They were on the verge of drowning, because now they have been treading water for an hour," Gist said.
"We got back over to the ramp with that last bunch of dogs… [and] we were having to drag them out of the boat because they didn't want to get out of our boat. They were scared they were going back to the water. It was terrible."