SPCA Finds Severely Matted Dog In New York Home, You Won’t Believe This Transformation [Video]

Buffalo Police were responding to a call when they noticed a “dead” dog in the home’s basement. The SPCA Serving Erie County was called to the scene to investigate the dog’s death. However, when Peace Officer Jessica Coughlin came to the scene she didn’t see a dog, but rather an unidentifiable matted ball of fur in a corner.

Coughlin says that she didn’t know what she was looking at. She just thought it was a ball of fur.

“I didn’t know what I was looking at. I thought it was simply a ball of fur. There was no movement. I couldn’t tell if it was an animal, and if so, what kind of animal it was. I couldn’t tell one end from the other, couldn’t tell if whatever the animal was was alive or dead.”

After examining the ball of fur, Coughlin realized that it was actually a severely matted dog that needed medical attention immediately. She brought the tiny matted dog to the shelter where it could be treated. The dog was so matted that it was unable to move and could barely breathe. At the shelter, workers began the arduous task of grooming the dog. In the video above you can see the absolutely amazing transformation that the dog, now named Dori, went through with the help of SPCA.

Dori’s mats were so severe that she had to be sedated for grooming. Groomers couldn’t tell her head from her tail and had to work carefully to determine what was dog and what was simply matted fur. Matted fur wasn’t Dori’s only problem. SPCA Veterinarian Dr. Helene Chevalier says that twine was found embedded into Dori’s left hind paw; the twine had worked itself through the soft tissue and was starting to work its way into the bone. The twine was starting to crush Dori’s toes, breaking one of them. Dori was underweight, and also suffers from ear infections and damaged eyes.

To fully understand how much matted fur was removed from the dog, Dori was weighed before and after the hair was removed. Dori weighed 11 pounds when she was admitted and only 7 pounds after the mats were removed. That means she was toting four pounds of heavy and painful mats prior to her grooming.

Robert and Shelly Brier, Dori’s owners, are being charged with one count each of animal cruelty and will be seen in court again on December 18.