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<\/p>\nAuthorities are investigating allegations three pet dogs died after being baited at a popular walking spot in the Murray River town of Echuca in northern Victoria.<\/p>\n
Yvette Height said her two beloved dogs and a dog belonging to her brother died suddenly on Monday just hours after her husband walked them on a grassy area near the Echuca Harness Racing Club.<\/p>\n
“We’ve been walking our dogs in this area on and off for the last 20-plus years \u2026 and never had any problem before so we’re just absolutely devastated at what’s happened,” she told ABC Central Victoria Breakast.<\/p>\n
She said her husband saw the dogs with something in their mouths while they were playing but wasn’t concerned until her daughter found them in a “critically ill” condition in their backyard just hours later.<\/p>\n
“Seizures, vomiting, diarrhoea. Just very horrendous \u2026 absolutely traumatic for the both of them,” she said.<\/p>\n
Ms Height said the dogs were rushed to a nearby vet clinic but it was “too late”.<\/p>\n
“My dogs died on the vet floor within about 15 minutes \u2026 they didn’t have a chance.<\/p>\n
“[They were] very happy, healthy and just gorgeous dogs that would never hurt a flea. Completely innocent in all of this.”<\/p>\n
Yvette’s sister, Michelle Height, said the family was in shock.<\/p>\n
“It was just terrible, it was a real tragedy.<\/p>\n
“The dogs were a real centre of our family.”<\/p>\n
Buddy, a two-year-old Bordoodle died on Monday within hours of being taken for a walk at Echuca. (Supplied: Michelle Height)<\/p>\n
Michelle Height said the family didn’t have autopsies done to determine the cause of the dogs’ deaths.<\/p>\n
“The vet said by the symptoms and how quickly they died it could’ve been fox bait or another poison only farmers are meant to use,” she said.\u00a0<\/p>\n
She said five other pet owners had reached out to the family reporting ill dogs after walking at the trotting club, in response to social media posts warning others.<\/p>\n
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<\/p>\n
Labradors Daisy and Loki playing with a stick before they died. (Supplied: Michelle Height)<\/p>\n
Yvette Height said she contacted police, but was told they would not be looking into the matter and referred the family to the RSPCA, which is investigating.<\/p>\n
“This matter is an active investigation and no further information is available at this time,” the RSPCA said in a statement.<\/p>\n
“Short of someone seeing the person laying the bait, we will never get justice for our dogs. But it would be nice if the police could try,” Ms Height said.<\/p>\n
Club cordons off area<\/p>\n
Echuca Harness Racing Club president Shane Gloury said the club was concerned the deaths were the result of a “deliberate and malicious act”.<\/p>\n
“No-one associated with the race club has been putting any type of poison or any similar type of substance in that area,” he said.<\/p>\n
“It is a fairly popular area for walking pets and it comes as a real shock and concern that potentially this type of thing could happen.”<\/p>\n
Michelle Height said her family also believed a person deliberately placed bait for dogs.\u00a0<\/p>\n
“Maybe occasionally a dog might’ve barked but our dogs didn’t bark.<\/p>\n
“We’ve got no idea [why].<\/p>\n
“I think we’ll just never let any more dogs off the lead \u2026 it just doesn’t feel safe anymore.”<\/p>\n
The club has since cordoned off the eastern part of the raceway where the substance was seen and put up warning signs as a precaution.<\/p>\n
Campaspe Shire Council director Jo Bradshaw said the council was “aware of allegations relating to the baiting of animals”.<\/p>\n
“While council is not the lead investigating authority for this matter, it takes these allegations seriously and acknowledges the importance of ensuring animal welfare and community confidence,” she said.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Authorities are investigating allegations three pet dogs died after being baited at a popular walking spot in the…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":33948,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[6384,22,21,29944,12842,4860,2759,29945,4838,228,29943,6392],"class_list":["post-33947","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-australia","tag-animal-cruelty","tag-au","tag-austrlia","tag-bait","tag-club","tag-dead","tag-dogs","tag-harness","tag-investigation","tag-pets","tag-poisoned","tag-rspca"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/33947","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=33947"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/33947\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/33948"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=33947"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=33947"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=33947"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}