Mother dog may have been forced to eat own puppy after being sealed in wall for 17 days in Chinese housing estate
Animals’ plight prompts outcry after security guard said he sealed them inside a cavity when the mother became aggressive towards residents
A mother dog that survived being sealed inside a cement block for more than two weeks in northern China is feared to have eaten her newborn puppy in a case that has prompted widespread fury.
The mother was rescued after 17 days being walled up on a housing estate in Hohhot, the capital of Inner Mongolia, last Friday after a group of volunteers received a tip-off that a dog may have been trapped inside, according to the video site Pear News.
The animals were reported to have been trapped by a security guard after the mother, a stray, became aggressive towards people who approached its newborn puppy.
The rescuers borrowed tools to break up the cement that had sealed the animals inside a cavity and found a deep hole stuffed with rags.
They eventually found the mother dog, which was dehydrated and close to death, but there was no trace of the puppy.
“She looked like had not drunk water for a long time,” a volunteer said in the video. “We gave her water and she drank many bowls.”
The volunteer speculated that the puppy had starved because the mother had been unable to feed it.