FERMANAGH woman has appealed for dog owners to make sure their pets are on a lead at all times after her boyfriend was badly injured after being attacked by a dog at Necarne at the weekend.
Local Facebook user Lauren Emma posted the warning online after the terrifying incident at the Irvinestown estate on Saturday morning, a walk she and her boyfriend take every weekend.
“We were walking around our normal loop when a dog came up behind Cooper, sniffed him once, barked and then bit him on the back and his back legs,” she said.
“The dog continues to go for Cooper, getting his neck before my boyfriend got in the middle. The dog bit my boyfriend on three fingers, causing severe bleeding and cut right to the bone.
“This dog was not provoked in any shape or form, it came up behind us.
The owners were nowhere to be seen until they came over the brow of a hill after the incident. The dog wasn’t on a lead.”
Lauren stressed in her post that she was not trying to start a witch hunt for the dog’s owners, and was sharing her story to alert others to the dangers of unsupervised dogs.
“The reason for my post is to spread awareness that this can happen to any child, person or dog,” she said. “Our main reasoning is we do not want this to happen again. This could have been prevented if the dog was on a lead.”
Afterwards Lauren and her boyfriend rushed to the SWAH emergency department to deal with his injury. She said he was now stitched up but they were still waiting to see if there would be any lasting damage. As for Cooper, Lauren said the timid pooch was understandably shook up.
“I myself would never feel comfortable walking alone with Cooper again in Necarne for fear of this happening again,” she said, appealing to dog owners to keep their pets on leads at all times, whether they are trained or not, big or small.”
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