RSPCA officials are appealing for help after a dog was thrown out of a car and abandoned at a beauty spot.

It happened at St Ives Park, near Harden, yesterday lunchtime.

A builder walking his dog saw a car with two men in it pull up in front of the story chair area and shove the dog out of a door before speeding away.

The man returned to the spot a couple of hours later to find a group of schoolchildren from Little Horton and their teacher trying to feed the black and brown cross-terrier with left-over sandwiches.

Teacher Mark Parry said: “The man told me what he’d seen so I rang the Council to see what we should do. The dog was running about and we tried to make a lead for it out of rope from our minibus and get him to come with us by offering him left-overs but he seemed scared and we couldn’t catch him.”

Other people including the Council’s woodland officers joined in the effort to catch the dog but without success.

But later that night as temperatures fell, Pat and Tracy Smith, of the RSPCA’s Craven and Upper Wharfedale RSPCA centre near Keighley, went to the park and managed to coax the terrier to safety. He is now in their care.

RSPCA spokesman Pam Laking said: “The poor little thing would have frozen to death if he’d been out all night. Abandoning him was a cruel and callous thing to do.

“We’re hoping the builder who saw what happened will get in touch to give us more information about what he saw. The dog is a bonny thing, about two years old with curly hair and seems to have been well-kept. There are signs that until recently he has had a collar on.

“One other possibility is that he or the car he was in could have been stolen. We need to know who he belongs to.”

Anyone with information should contact either Mrs Laking on 07949 229955 in confidence or ring the RSPCA cruelty line on 0300 1234999.