Buford Rescues Toddler Lost on ‘Dunton Ranch’

Buford Dunton is a modern-day Lassie after rescuing a missing toddler who got lost in the Arizona desert this week.

Oh, yeah, and Buford is a dog.

Two-year-old Boden Allen was reported missing on Monday (April 14). He’d wandered away from his house in the remote town of Seligman, Ariz. — a town which has less than 1,000 residents, and a lot of space between them.

A quickly-organized search didn’t turn up anything useful, and there were reports of mountain lions being spotted in the area. But nothing was going to happen to little Boden — not on Buford’s watch.

Rancher Scotty Dunton was met with a shocking but heartwarming scene on Tuesday morning when he went down his driveway.

“My dog was sitting down there with the little kid,” Dunton recounts (quote via Arizona’s Family). “Just brought him up from the horse pasture and brought him over to the gate and was just hanging out with him.”

Dunton Ranch is a whopping seven miles from Boden’s family home. The rancher was able to give the little boy some food and water while they waited for authorities, and the toddler told him Buford had found him.

Buford is an Anatolian Pyrenees whose job it is to guard the land and keep coyotes away. He found Boden and led him to safety.

“It’s what he does. He loves kids, so I can imagine he wouldn’t leave him when he found him,” the rancher explains. “It was a relief that he was alive. I was ecstatic that he was OK and that my dog found him.”

Don’t worry — the dog got a handsome reward for his heroic efforts.

“Oh, he’s getting steak dinner tonight, my wife already said,” Dunton reveals. “He did a great job.”