Animal welfare experts fear they may never be able to determine how it met its death.

The origins of the stricken animal are unknown, but greyhounds which are registered to race have tattoos inside their ears.

It is thought they may have been cut off to stop the animal being traced.

The dog was discovered by the side of a country lane, between Trimdon Village and Kelloe.

The woman who discovered the dog and took the grim pictures, does not want to be named as she fears there could be reprisals if the dog is linked to anyone in the local area.

She said: "It looked like it was only about four, and must have been a beautiful brindle dog at one time.

"I burst into tears when I saw it, and was then physically sick.

"It looked like it had starved to death, and both its ears had been cut off."

A spokesman for the RSPCA said an inspector visited the scene and has removed the body.

She said: "Unfortunately, as the body is so decomposed, it's impossible for us to establish whether or not this dog suffered before its death.

"There does appear to be some trauma to the dog's chest and its ears are missing, but we have no way of knowing whether these things happened before or after the animal died.

"Obviously it is quite an unpleasant thing to come across and, although the responsibility for the removal of the body lies with the local authority, the inspector went back to remove the animal."

Terry Rushmer, a former inspector with the Retired Greyhound Trust, an organisation which rescues dogs which can no longer race, said she was shocked.

At her home in Hartlepool she said: "It is solutely disgusting.

"People who do this should be jailed and banned from keeping animals for life.

"This is the sort of thing we have fought against for decades.

"Removing the ears is sickening, but was probably done to stop the tattoos being identified."

The Mail has cropped the photo of the dog's condition because it was too distressing to show.