A dog was tied to railings and dumped twice in one day in Dublin city centre yesterday, an animal rescue group has claimed.
The dog, an 8-month-old male boxer mix, was found tied to railings at 7am on Sunday morning "clearly stressed and scared". The person who found him called gardai and My Lovely Horse Rescue. However, two people came in the meantime, claiming the dog was theirs and taking it away.
Later the same day, the rescue organisation got another call warning them that the dog did not belong to the couple who took him. Co-founder of My Lovely Horse Rescue Martina Kenny told Dublin Live: "We tracked the dog all day. We were onto the guards as well, and the minute we tracked where the dog was, we literally went down at 10:30pm last night."
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He was tied to a railing again with the "owners" nowhere to be seen again.
They named the puppy Billy, after one of the four gardai who helped rescue it. Billy will be taken to a vet today to be neutered and vaccinated. According to Martina, "he needs to put some weight on" and then "he’ll be ready for his new home". Dozens of people took up to the comment section after Billy's story was shared on Twitter and some even offered to foster or adopt him.
While Billy's story will likely end up with a happy ending, this is not the case for many dogs currently in shelters. Ms Kenny said there is currently a serious animal crisis in Ireland with dogs being dumped every day. She said: "They're being tied to railings, they're being tied to poles. It's unreal. And especially the bull breeds because most of the bull breeds are not allowed in social housing."
She also said many of the bull breeds were used for breeding and breeders are not making the money they used to make. She added: “[People] are getting away with so much breeding. They get away with it. And nobody has stopped them.”
Ms Kenny has called for the establishment of a Garda Animal Welfare Unit to ensure there are fines and prosecutions for people mistreating animals. This is already implemented in the Netherlands where officers deal with cases of suspected animal abuse.
The animal rescue co-founder added: “Now we need to start in Dublin with a Garda Welfare Unit, and that unit could be three four guards that are dedicated to the animal welfare of Dublin City. And then they can help other guards in other areas. It means that if there's no guards to help in an area, these guards could come in help and do the reports and do the prosecutions because they want to."
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