Media playback is unsupported on your device Media caption Tara the cat rescued four-year-old Jeremy from the attack by the dog

The dog that attacked a four-year-old boy in the US, only to be scared off by a cat, has reportedly been put down.

Scrappy, an eight-month-old Labrador-Chow mix, was destroyed at an animal shelter in Bakersfield, California, according to website TMZ.

It was assessed for 10 days after it bit and dragged neighbour Jeremy Triantafilo around by its teeth.

Cat Tara pounced and chased it away in an unlikely turn of events shown on CCTV footage that became a viral hit.

Jeremy - who needed stitches after the attack - praised his cat. "She's a hero," he said.

After the attack, his mother Erica told NBC the dog would be put to sleep if it wasn't possible to rehabilitate it.

Last week, the cat "threw" the first pitch at a minor baseball game, when Bakersfield Blaze took on Lancaster Jayhawks.