We solemnly swear that this is not an April Fools joke: 60 adoptable chihuahuas are on their way to the D.C. area. They’ll arrive in Loudoun County, and the D.C. Humane Rescue Alliance will take in 35 of them.

The pups are coming from a Mississippi breeder experiencing overcrowding after housing his chihuahuas together and allowing them to roam freely. Things apparently got frisky fast, resulting in over 250 chihuahuas roaming his property. The dog breeder opted to mass surrender all of the dogs to a no-kill shelter in Mississippi (they’ve taken in 140 of the tiny pets so far, and are expecting possibly 150 more.)

The dogs soon to be up for adoption in and around the District range from 6 months to 7 years old.

Large surrenders and animal overpopulation has caused issues for shelters in the South experiencing low adoption rates.

“As spay/neuter programs continue to work in the Northeast, we have fewer overpopulation issues. In the South, the overpopulation issue is much more challenging. There are a lot of reasons for that,” Stephanie Shain, chief operating officer at the Humane Rescue Alliance, told DCist. “If you have fewer people coming to adopt and a lot of animals breeding, it puts the shelters there in a really difficult position. We love to help out with that because we know the shelters are doing all they can to help animals in their area.”

The HRA’s Oglethorpe location recently called for extra bedding, sheets, and blankets as they also prepared to take in 30 dogs from a partner shelter in Alabama, the Greater Birmingham Humane Society, over the weekend. Dogs from both rescues will available for adoption once they’ve had a medical work-up and been spayed or neutered, likely this week.

In related news, there’s plenty of time left to train and register for the sixth annual Running of the Chihuahuas next month.