Family made ‘horrific’ decision to put down pet after dog attack

Unfortunately, after a whirlwind weekend, it wasn’t enough to save the 10-year-old Jack Russell Maltese poodle, who died after being attacked by a dog in Tatura.

Mr Borzini was taking Eva and their other dog Zelda for a walk with a friend and his son to grab a coffee in Tatura on a Friday at about 9.30am.

They walked past a house they’d walked past multiple times before, where a dog that Mr Borzini said looked like a Staffy was being kept in the front yard.

The fence it was behind was about waist height, and had chicken wire reinforcing it, Mr Borzini said.

However, there was a gap where its head could fit through.

“The dog bit Eva by the throat and face,” Mr Borzini said.

“I came in and grabbed Eva and managed to pull her off somehow.

“It was a pretty tight grip.”

There was a puncture in Eva’s throat, and she was coughing up blood.

Mr Borzini quickly took her home, then to a vet in Mooroopna where she spent the day.

After a call from the vet in the afternoon, it looked like Eva was improving.

But she took a turn for the worse later that night, and Mr Borzini and Ms England decided to pick up Eva, and left for Melbourne at about 1am.

“We thought she might not make it through to the morning,” he said.

“We wanted to do the best we could and give her a chance.”

After the stressful task of calling 24-hour emergency vets in Melbourne, they eventually found one in Kensington and took her there at about 4am.

The vet then talked them through their options at about 3pm.

“There was too much fluid in her lungs ... (the bite) punctured her airway,” Mr Borzini said.

“There was no chance for surgery because there was so much swelling.”

They then had to make the difficult decision.

“She was choking ... her lungs were filling with fluid so she was drowning,” Ms England said.

“We decided it was humane to put her down because she was unlikely to recover.”

Ms England said she had later approached the dog’s owner, who said she was sorry, and the fence had been reinforced with chicken wire and zip ties.

“When you’ve had a trauma, you naturally want to blame someone, and you want something to change, (but) there’s no-one really to blame,” she said.

Ms England said she and Mr Borzini didn’t want the attack to scare people into not taking their dogs for a walk.

“You don’t appreciate what can happen until it does,” she said.

“Just one bite is all it took.

“We just want everyone to do their part so that everyone’s safe and can enjoy the community.”

Mr Borzini said he and Ms England reported the incident to Greater Shepparton City Council.

Council said it was not able to comment on the incident, and an investigation would determine whether legal action would take place.