Man Mowing Abandoned Property for Free Makes Heartbreaking Discovery That Stops Him in His Tracks

NEED TO KNOW

• SB Mowing creator Spencer Bosley found a dead dog inside a trash bag while cleaning up an abandoned, overgrown property in Wichita, Kan.

• Bosley said the discovery left him thinking about what could have prevented the situation

• He has since launched a fundraiser with a $100,000 goal for Wichita Animal Action League, which provides pet food, veterinary care and other resources to families

Spencer Bosley has spent years cleaning up severely overgrown properties for free. But one recent job left the lawn care creator thinking about what more he could do to help.

The Wichita, Kan., man behind the hugely popular SB Mowing social media accounts was clearing an abandoned, overgrown property with a friend when they made a disturbing discovery: a dead dog had been placed inside a plastic trash bag and left in the driveway, he wrote on a GoFundMe campaign he created on Friday, Aug. 28.

"I've been mowing overgrown lawns for five years and I've never had anything like that happen," Bosley wrote.

Animal control responded to the property, checked the dog for a microchip and took the animal away, Bosley said. But after the crew left, he couldn't shake what he had seen. "I couldn't stop thinking about how that dog should have never been in that situation in the first place," he wrote.

Bosley decided to call Christy Fischer, executive director of Wichita Animal Action League (WAAL), a nonprofit he said he has worked closely with over the past several years. Their conversation turned his troubling discovery into a new mission: raising $100,000 to support the organization's efforts to help pets and their owners before they reach a crisis.

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The Wichita Animal Action League provides services including pet food banks, access to veterinary care and spay and neuter programs, Fischer told CBS affiliate KWCH . "[The money] is going to be used for community outreach programs," she said, citing the organization's pet food banks and veterinary and spay-neuter programs. She said the programs are also designed "to prevent or mitigate crisis from occurring in owned pets later on down the road."

According to Bosley's fundraiser, the organization distributes approximately 250,000 lbs. of free pet food each year to Wichita families. It also operates mobile veterinary clinics in communities with limited access to care and helps owners obtain vaccines, medical treatment and other supplies.

For Bosley, one aspect of the organization's approach particularly resonated with him: helping the people on the other end of the leash, too. "They don't just help the animal. They help the family," he wrote, explaining that WAAL aims to offer its services without judgment to people who may be struggling to care for their pets.

"When a paycheck doesn't stretch far enough or an unexpected bill shows up, that's exactly when a pet is most at risk of being surrendered, neglected, or worse," he continued. "WAAL steps in before it gets to that point."

Bosley is starting the campaign with a $1,000 donation of his own. The board of his nonprofit, SB Mow It Forward, has also agreed to match the first $5,000 donated by supporters, he said.

Using an online audience to help someone in need isn't entirely new territory for Bosley.

According to his website , Bosley started mowing neighbors' lawns in Wichita at age 11 using his father's equipment and eventually grew the childhood side job into a landscaping business. After graduating from Kansas State University with a degree in computer science, he worked as a mobile app developer before deciding to try something different online.

Inspired by lawn care creators who cleaned up properties for people at no cost, Bosley began finding severely overgrown yards and offering to tackle them for free. His then-girlfriend, now wife, encouraged him to make shorter versions of his videos for TikTok, where he says his first post amassed 6 million views within days.

Bosley says his lawn care and pressure-washing content has since grown to about 40 million followers across platforms, allowing him to make a career out of helping people while documenting the transformations.

Now he's hoping that audience can help him make a different kind of transformation in his hometown. "Even five or ten dollars goes a long way here," Bosley wrote of the fundraiser. "If you can give, thank you. If you can't, sharing this helps just as much."

"Thank you all for watching," he added, "and thank you for caring about this one."

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