THREE young children are devastated after a farmer shot their two six-month-old puppies in what the RSPCA has called a shocking case of animal cruelty.
The children watched in horror as the farmer tied the puppies to his motorbike and dragged them across a paddock. The children claim one of the pups was still alive.
Eleven-year-old Myrtle Creek girl Poppy Frances went to feed her two best friends, German Koolies Blue and DJ, on Thursday morning when they escaped.
Poppy, her mum Anita, sister Katie and brother Peter immediately got in the family car to retrieve the dogs, which were headed for their next-door neighbour's property in Kellys Road.
"We thought our neighbour, seeing us coming, would tell us off for letting the dogs out - but instead he shot them," Poppy said.
"He then tied them to the back of his motorbike and dragged them across his paddock."
Katie, 9, was absolutely horrified.
"I was screaming, saying 'I want my doggie'," she said.
"We were all crying and begging him to stop, he got to his gate and we noticed that Blue was still just alive, he was looking at his brother, but then the man took off again and threw them in a small creek," Poppy said.
Anita took the children home, before returning to her neighbour's property and asking for the bodies of the dogs, both of which had died.
"At first he wouldn't give them to me and I saw him take photos of them on his phone," Anita said.
"Then he literally chucked them in the back of my car."
RSPCA senior inspector Daniel Bode said that his organisation was investigating the incident.
"It is very serious," Mr Bode said.
"It is a shocking case of animal cruelty."
Poppy is still in shock that the puppies (whose mother was lost during the Black Saturday fires) she adopted from the RSPCA three months ago are not coming home.
"I know dogs are not allowed on other people's property, but they were there for only five minutes, they were not attacking his sheep, only barking," Poppy said.
"I just don't understand how anyone can do this. People get chances when they do the wrong thing.
"He could have given us a warning."
The Frances family understands the problems dogs can cause at farms in Deniliquin and Cobar, where they run sheep and cattle.
"We 100 per cent understand that dogs can be dangerous to livestock," Anita said.
Poppy said when dogs trespassed on their farmland, her family handled things differently.
"When other people's dogs get on our farm and chase or hurt our sheep, we ring them and tell them their dogs are causing problems," she said.
"If they ignore us, we ring the ranger.
"Mum and Dad say it is the neighbourly thing to do."
Unfortunately, this is not the first trauma the Frances family has faced with its pets.
"Our two other dogs - Heidie, a border collie, and Buster, a Jack Russell - went missing on March 21 this year," Poppy said.
"We heard shots about the time they disappeared."
Anita said that they didn't know what had happened to the dogs, and were still looking for them.
"There is a possibility they got scared by the shots and took off."
Anita said she was absolutely devastated for Poppy.
"For her it's just all about the dogs," Anita said, crying.
"She lives and breathes them. I'm really worried about her."
Poppy, who said her dogs were everything to her, was already suffering nightmares after her first two dogs disappeared.
"I know I can't do anything about it now - my best friends are dead," she said.
"But I am going to work so much harder at school from now on, so one day I can change the law so it is illegal to shoot dogs, if they haven't injured a sheep, without written warning and complaint from the landowner."
The next-door neighbour who shot the dogs has not returned calls from The Advertiser.
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