A Tauranga port worker has been fined $750 and sentenced to 75 hours community work after admitting he failed to adequately feed and care for his severely malnourished dog.
Phillip Warral Kahotea, 26, from Te Puke has also been disqualified from owning another dog for three years after he pleaded guilty to a charge of failing to ensure that the physical, health and behavioural needs of the animal were met in Tauranga District Court this morning.
The charges come following three visits to Kahotea's Te Puke property by an SPCA animal welfare inspector this year, where the officer found the malnourished hunterway tethered by a chin around its neck to a running wire, running alongside a shelter belt.
On the third visit on May 25 the hunterway dog was seized by the inspector, and when weighed it was only 14.8 kilograms. The dog had no body fat and its muscle were underdeveloped or wasted away.
Tauranga SPCA had received two prior welfare complaints, in July 2010 and August 2011, about the dog being chained full time to the running wire.
Kahotea admitted that the dog had only been off the chain a couple of times since he owned it, which was approximately two years.
Judge Peter Rollo told Kahotea he should be "ashamed of himself" and ordered him to pay vet expenses of $158.26 in full within 14 days.
Photos: Supplied