A NEWPORT veterinary nurse says a dog left tied to an electricity pylon on a mountainside would have died if she had not stumbled across her.

Student veterinary nurse Joanne Cook, 23, and her boyfriend, Wayne Standley, 24, were walking on Mynydd Maen at noon on Sunday when they discovered the animal almost an hour's walk from the road.

Her lead had been wrapped round a pylon so she was prevented from lying down, and her hips were visible through her coat from lack of food. The dog wore a brown collar with a black and white lead, but had no name tag.

Ms Cook suspects the mixed-breed dog had been tied up there earlier that morning, as she would have been unlikely to survive the night.

Ms Cook said: "We found her in a very exposed area between Crumlin and Cwmbran, with nothing but pylons on the landscape. If she had been out overnight, the low temperatures would have most probably killed her."

The dog was being nursed back to health at Newport's Summerhill Veterinary Centre yesterday, and will be moved to the kennels for rehoming.