Veterinarians in Florida are working to save the life of a young dog that was dropped off at an animal clinic with its mouth bound shut so tightly the binding had cut down to the bone.
The 1-year-old Yorkshire Terrier mix, named Pixie, had an elastic hair tie around her snout that cut a 3/4-inch-deep gash between her eyes and nose when she arrived at Paws 2 Help in West Palm Beach, clinic owner Eve Van Engel said late Sunday.
The wound was so gangrenous that the little 7-pound dog “smelled like horse manure” when she was dropped off, Van Engel said, and it’s unknown when the dog last ate.
If Pixie doesn’t develop sepsis, she should survive, Van Engel said, but she “is not out of danger.”
It’s unclear who bound the dog’s mouth shut.
Two women dropped the dog off at the clinic on Saturday, Van Engel said. They gave multiple conflicting accounts and couldn’t say exactly who bound the dog’s snout.
“The stories went on and on and over and over and changed,” Van Engel said. “Nothing added up.”
One woman said the dog had been passed around, unwanted, among family members, she said. Another one said it had been in her father’s care.
“The young one said, ‘Well, we think a neighbor kept complaining about the dog whining or crying or something, and so the neighbor came and put it on. It was all right when I walked it two days ago,’” Van Engel recalled.
Van Engel said she believes the hair tie was on the dog’s snout for much longer than two days.
As of Sunday, Van Engel said she was waiting on Palm Beach County Animal Care and Control to file an animal cruelty report.
Van Engel said staff has been trying to get Pixie to eat Gerber baby food, but may have to insert a feeding tube if that doesn’t work.
Her clinic is used to seeing animals with horrible injuries from accidents, but Pixie’s case was shocking, Van Engel said.
“This being so deliberate and so unnecessary, it upset everybody,” she said. “Two of the staff here yesterday were crying.”
The case is similar to a 2015 pit bull case in South Carolina where the owner had taped the dog’s mouth shut to stop her from barking. Photos of the dog sparked outrage, and on Friday, her owner was sentenced to five years in prison.
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