Some of the worst I have seen or hear of...

A local man who used to shoot his dog with a bb gun to toughen it up and make it mean. He just let the bb's heal inside the dog.


This past year was a horrible year for blowfly strikes. Several owners allowed their animals to suffer in this way until they died from it. Mainly sheep and poultry, but one family finally brought in a dog that had been battling it for a week, that they KNEW OF. They knew for a week he was infested with the larvae!!! I won't describe any more, but of course we (at the shelter/emergency vets where I was volunteering) quickly put the poor thing down. I have hardly ever been as angry in my life as I was at those people.

But you know what I think some of the worst animal cruelty is that I see over and over and over? Sweet, loving, painfully lonely dogs left tied up and ignored. Taking a social animal like a dog and dooming it to life unloved and alone is, IMHO, about as cruel as it gets.