Lewis

Vets find 17 gun pellets in stray dog's head after savage attack

Damian McCarney

Having located 17 gunshot pellets in his head, and a growth in its brain, veterinary surgeons felt they had no other option but to put down a Belturbet stray which melted the hearts of tens of thousands of pet-lovers online.
The Llewellin Setter was found roaming stray around Belturbet by the pound at the end of July. When no-one claimed the dog, given the name ‘Lewis’, he was rescued by Carole Mansfield of Lily’s Dog Rescue in Shercock. Carole had agreed to foster the dog and nurse it back to full health before passing him on to the small UK-based charity Black Retriever X Rescue, run by Jemima Harrison, who re-houses unwanted, Irish gun dogs.
Concerned by Lewis’ tendency to walk in circles, his ill health and lack of appetite, Carole brought him to the vet. The vet diagnosed it as having an acute ear infection, as it presented with the typical symptoms.
However, as the weeks progressed and Lewis failed to recover Jemima organised a Facebook appeal, which saw a huge response, quickly raising the money to fund his treatment with a specialist in UCD.
This morning, a CT-scan revealed it had been blitzed by pellets.
“They did not seem to have entered the skull, so I suspect that it might have been a shotgun, or it might have been an air rifle, so I’m trying to get confirmation of that now,” say Jemima, who is a TV producer best known for a BBC documentary called ‘Pedigree Dogs Exposed’.
UCD has agreed to conduct a post-mortem, free of charge, to establish more of the facts around Lewis’ death.
“They also found a mass in his brain, which could have been caused by one of the pellets, which might have got through and caused a problem, or it might have just been a separate mass.”
One possibility Jemima is considering is that the owner knew the dog had an ailment and botched their attempt to put it down.
“My feeling is around there, if someone was going to do that they would use a shotgun... and at close range a shotgun would have taken its head off. So, my gut feeling is that it wasn’t that. The alternative is that it could have been a hunting accident of some kind - who knows - or kids taking pot-shots at him with an air rifle, which is also possible.”
Although he was not in good health and had to be hand-fed, Lewis hadn’t given them the impression it had suffered such a horrific gun attack.
“He did not seem to be in obvious pain and by the time we got him, there were no signs of obvious injuries, so the chances are he’s been wandering about like that for some time - poor boy.”
In Britain, Llewellin Setters are called English Setters, and Jemima is confident that she would have found a home for him.
“I have a passion for re-housing Irish dogs through various collections, and I have re-homed something like five hundred dogs, mainly from Ireland, in the last seven years. And almost all of them are as stunning and as beautiful as Lewis. Your cast-offs are wanted here and I can find them absolutely amazing homes - that’s what I work to do.
“I had maybe 15 applications for this dog, including some from people who would have taken him as he was - even with an obvious brain injury but, even then, we thought it wasn’t kind and the vet thought euthanasia was the kindest option for him, given the extent of the shot, and his brain was distorted in his skull.
“Rather ironically, it is an endangered breed here in its own native UK because the numbers are very small and yet you’ve got quite a few of them in Ireland - and in this boy’s case wasn’t worth anything.”
Lewis’ story has only been posted on Jemima’s Facebook site for a matter of hours and yet it has already attained over 26,000 views worldwide.
“His story has touched people - and not only people in the UK. I’ve had messages from Switzerland and America today about your local dog,” said Jemima.
Jemima is appealing for anyone with information on how Lewis suffered the injuries to contact her at jem@blackretrieverx.co.uk
“If anybody knows anything about this story, where the dog came from, what happened to him and when - if anybody has any information to please contact either Cavan SPCA or me. Hopefully, we’ll be able to help stop another dog from suffering in the same way.”