By Dottie Evans

Rachel Martino has –– literally and in the nicest possible way –– gone to the dogs.

Instead of asking the 18 friends who came to her birthday party April 6 to bring all the usual presents a little 8-year-old girl might love, she asked for useful gifts to be taken to the Dog Pound.

So when Rachel finished her unwrapping, she was delighted to find just what she asked for –– rawhide chew bones, leashes, tug toys, tennis balls, biscuits, and bags and bags of kibble.

It seemed CDs, craft kits, clothes, and books were simply not on this birthday girl’s list.

“I like animals and I just thought this was a good idea,” said Rachel, who officially turned 8 years old on Monday, April 14.

Rachel is the daughter of Ellen and Ron Martino of Mountain Manor Road in Sandy Hook. The Martinos moved into Sandy Hook in November 2002, and Rachel is a second grader at the Maimonides Academy in Danbury.

Although Rachel does not have a dog of her own, her cousins, Anne and Pieter Martino of Newtown, have a Wheaton terrier named “Ginger” and Rachel likes to visit them often.

On Saturday a week after her party, she and her father drove down South Main Street to the Newtown pound headquarters located off Ethan Allen Road. At 10 am, they walked in the door bearing a shopping bag full of gifts and large bags of dogfood.

Poundkeeper Pat Anzellotti greeted Rachel and her dad and said she was very grateful for the donations, though she was sorry there were no dogs on hand to accept them in person, as it were.

“We have adopted out all our dogs for right now, which is good news. But it’s pretty quiet around here today,” Mrs Anzellotti said.

Usually, the arrival of strangers would have provoked a frenzy of excited barking from the back of building where the cages are. After showing Mrs Anzellotti what she had brought, Rachel and her dad got a tour of the dogs’ living quarters, all clean and empty, awaiting more clients.

“It looks cozy,” Rachel pronounced after returning from the tour.

Then she and her dad climbed back in their car and drove off through the rain. They were headed for two more dog pounds in Bethel and in Danbury, to distribute more gifts.