The Society for the Protection of Animals has launched a public appeal for information after a spate of dog carcass discoveries.

In the last 50 days four dead animals — one of which had been decapitated — have been found at different locations across the island.

SPCA Inspector Chris Coleman told The Royal Gazette it was impossible to know at this stage whether the discoveries were linked. “The most important thing at the moment is to get as much information as we can about each of these discoveries,” she said.

“We wanted to put out the appeal to try and figure out what was going on.”

On January 23 a small decomposing dog carcass was fished out of the harbour near The Foot of the Lane, in Hamilton.

A month later in the third week of February a decomposing, pug-sized dog carcass was washed up on the south shore at the Pompano Beach Club, Southampton.

“Looking down from above staff had seen what looked like an odd-shaped object washed up on the beach,” hotel manager Tim O’Neill said.

“Our maintenance guy was the one that went down and discovered that it was in fact a dog.

“There were no distinguishing marks at all, no collar or tags to identify it, and it was obvious that the animal had been dead for some time.

“We assumed that it had jumped off a ship or something like that, but we really had no idea where the dog had originally come from. It is always a sad sight to see a dead pet.”

On Sunday the SPCA retrieved the decomposing carcass of a young dog from Devonshire Dock on North Shore Road after receiving a call from a member of the public.

The young dog was fished out of the sea and found to have been decapitated.

Yesterday the SPCA was called out again to retrieve a decomposing dog carcass from the woods at Spittal Pond.

The dog, which appeared to be an adult, was dressed in a striped woollen dog sweater and was laid on a white blanket.

Ms Coleman said: “The earlier two cases in January and February only came to light after the most recent discovery through information we received and then followed up on.

“The first three cases may appear to be more similar, while the fourth is an older dog found in different circumstances.

“If anyone has any information they can contact me via e-mail inspector@spca.bm or call 236-7333. All calls will be dealt with in strict confidence.”