Five-year-old Neapolitan Mastiff Ella arrived at Battersea’s Old Windsor centre from an animal partner who originally found her roaming the streets as a stray. When receiving her initial health checks, Battersea staff saw that her ears had been needlessly cut as part of a cruel and illegal ear cropping procedure.
This purely aesthetic procedure is detrimental to the dog and compromises its welfare by causing the dog unnecessary pain and suffering. Unfortunately, Ella is one of many dogs with an ear mutilation the charity has seen arriving at its centres. Whilst it is illegal to crop a dog’s ears in the UK under the Animal Welfare Act 2006, it is sadly still legal to import these dogs from overseas countries, many of which do not have a ban on this barbaric practice. Similarly, this legal loophole is used by unscrupulous breeders to crop dog ears in the UK and claim it was done abroad. Unethical breeders are taking advantage of the law to keep supplying demand at the expense of these suffering dogs.
Despite her change in environment and her slightly worried side with people she does not know, Ella has shown herself to be a very gentle soul. The expert staff at Battersea were able to use her love of food and toys to create a personalised training plan for her, to help with Staff working closely with Ella have found her to be very endearing and she has made “quite an impression” with her carers due to her “absolutely delightful character”. However, despite her lovely personality, Ella found the kennel environment quite stressful, and after a careful assessment from the charity’s staff, she was sent to stay with a foster carer, to allow her to rest and continue her training in a relaxing home environment.
