A man who allowed his 15-week-old dog’s ears to be ‘cropped’ has been banned from owning any animals for two years.
Ramadan Murtati, 20, let his bulldog Bully undergo the illegal and unnecessary surgical procedure that saw his ear flaps severed off.
But when Murtati brought his pup to the vet for a vaccination in Leicester, the vet was stunned to see a shaken Bully’s ears swollen and red.
After ringing the RSPCA, inspectors from the animal welfare charity found Bully went under the knife without proper care and received no medication after.
An RSPCA inspector said the pup was way too young to have been forced to have the snip, meaning he could have further health complications down the line.
The surgery is generally done on puppies between six and 12 weeks and sees part of or all the ear flap removed, often leaving the dog ‘traumatised’, the RSPCA says.
RSPCA inspector Herchy Boal said: ‘I could see instantly that the puppy’ ears had been recently cropped.
‘They appeared sore and red but were not actively bleeding.
‘He was friendly and on taking a closer look I could see that his ears were starting to heal and granulate, but were still sore. Both ears flaps had been cut, with exposure of the cartilage surfaces.’
An expert vet said there was ‘no evidence of any conventional surgical technique, sutures, or dressing covering the ears’.
‘In my professional opinion, the patient was subjected unnecessarily to a procedure, that regardless of the medical care provided, always implicated discomfort and potential pain during and after the procedure,’ the vet said.
‘The degree of pain will have been depending on the degree and depth of the anaesthesia and analgesia that was provided when the procedure took place.’
Murtati, from Walthamstow in London, was banned from owning any animal for the next two years at Leicester Magistrates’ Court on October 19.
He pleaded guilty to the charge of permitting or failing to take steps to prevent the ears of Bully from being cropped.
He was also fined £120 and ordered to pay £150 in costs and a £34 victim surcharge.
Ear cropping is illegal in England and Wales under Section 5 of the Animal Welfare Act 2006 but is legal in some parts of the world.
Often, owners believe ear cropping can prevent ear infections and certain injuries when this is untrue or they do so for cosmetic reasons.
Some owners feel flattening a dog’s ears makes them look less threatening when the procedure can instead make them more anxious and nervous.
There is no evidence that cropping a dog’s ears is beneficial unless it is for medical reasons.
But the procedure is on the ride – and fast. There’s been a 621% increase in the number of reports of ear cropping to the RSPCA in the last six years.
From 2015 to 2020, the charity had a total of 279 reports of the practice made to its emergency hotline.
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