‘Tears of relief’ as injured Derry dog found

The dog, who is yet unnamed, was attacked in the dead of the night in the early hours of Tuesday, February 22 and was pictured later that day in a garden near Glengalliagh. The person who took the photo approached the dog to capture them but he ran off scared and was missing for a day.

Photos of the dog were posted on social media by animal rescue organisation Pet FBI Rescue.

Lisa Patton, who is one of the managers of Pet FBI said, “We know a bit about what happened to the dog but not everything. A member of the public messaged us yesterday morning to say that he was in her garden but when she tried to get him he ran off. We put an appeal on our page for anyone who sees us to call us. We knew he was going to be petrified.

“After our appeal went up, someone messaged to say that they witnessed an attack at around 3.30 in the morning on the front green by Bloomfield Park. There was around four or five hounds who were accompanied by their owner. The owner apparently attempted numerous times to stop the attack but he couldn’t control his own dogs. We got some CCTV footage, that we haven’t made public, that shows the tail end of the attack - you can see the lab and the dogs attacking him and you can see the lab running away but you can’t get a clear look at the owner on the video.

“The witness said that his wife woke up at 3 in the morning after hearing the noise. They saw the attack out the window but they were too scared to go out, which is understandable. He did the right thing because no one knows that the dogs wouldn’t turn on him or what the owner was like, so he was best to stay away.

“When we got the picture yesterday morning, because the dog was covered in blood, it looked horrendous.

“We were contacted today by a member of the public and thankfully myself and another volunteer, Daniel, were in the area. He was around the meadows area in someone’s garden, which was filled with brambles. So myself and Daniel managed to go up both sides and corner him to put a lead on him and were able to get him out of the brambles then. We got him to the vets then but he’s not microchipped so we don’t know who owns him. The blood has been washed off with the rain but he has quite a few puncture wounds on his back legs and his neck. Both is back legs are swollen and he is limping quite badly. He’s in the vet now getting pain relief and x-rays so I’m waiting with baited breath to hear something back soon.”

The Labrador still hasn’t been claimed by anyone despite being missing for a number of days and Pet FBI’s post on social media reaching over 5,000 people. Unfortunately, Lisa is used to dealing with stray dogs now.

“We do see it quite often that dogs aren’t claimed, a dog was dumped in that area just a week or two ago. To be honest, the cost of vet bills are on the rise now so people might not be able to afford to treat their pets. It could be as simple as that. That’s something that we understand because we relay on the public to help us pay our vet bills. The bills are extortionate at the minute.

“That being said, we don’t know if this dog was dumped or if he was a stray, we know nothing about him right now. He is okay, he’s not aggressive at all. We were expecting him to snap at us because he was in pain but he was fine with us touching him and putting him in the car so that’s good.

“He will be in the vets now until he gets his treatment. We have a foster home ready for him so he can recover there and we can see whether or not the attack has had any lasting affects on him, especially with other dogs. This could have made him extremely fearful of other dogs so we need to check that. Once he’s ready and able, we will get him neutered and vaccinated and rehomed but it will probably be a longer road for him than others because he’s so nervous. We need to build his trust back up.”

There was outrage on social media under around this case as the dog was attacked by hunting dogs. Owning hunting dogs is still legal in the north but Lisa wants this to change, “To be honest, with the ban on hunting bill not going through, we were very angry already and for this to happen then, it’s just unbelievable. We get hunting dogs in for rescue all the time that are so badly scarred. They have scars on their faces and wounds that haven’t been treated and it’s heartbreaking to see the state they come in. This happens a lot more often than people know too. Someone messaged us today to say they didn’t know we had hunting dogs in Derry but people have no idea how many there actually are.

“We don’t have a name for this pup yet but we will once we get to know him.

“It’s absolutely amazing that we found him. There was people drove from Belfast to Derry yesterday to search for this dog and we had more people from as far as Belfast and Carickfergus contact us today to say they would like to come search. I was worried about bringing people from those areas because there is snow forecasted and I was feared they would be stuck. At the same time, I wanted to get him before the snow because who knows whether or not he would have survived the cold temperatures tonight but I didn’t want to put people at risk either. Thankfully we got him this morning and we didn’t need that.

“I have never been so glad to get that phone call that he was found.”