Police have seized a number of firearms at a rural Wellsford address, following the slaughter of 33 dogs on Monday.
Police say they executed a search warrant at the property on Friday afternoon. Their inquiries are continuing and all parties involved are co-operating.
No charges have been laid, but police have not ruled out the possibility.
The SPCA says it is still deciding what charges it will lay against two men who went onto Russell Hargreaves' property near Wellsford in Northland and shot dead 33 of his 39 dogs.
SPCA executive director Bob Kerridge says what staff saw was a turn-around of what they stood for and they were very emotional.
"Abuse to animals is totally contrary to how they feel," Kerridge says.
Russell Mendoza and another man allegedly used a .22 calibre rifle and shotgun to shoot the dogs on Monday night, blaming one or more of them for the mauling death of Mr Mendoza's fox terrier. The slaughter included 23 pups and 10 adult dogs.
Hargreaves described the dogs as his family and says he is in shock.
Mendoza refused to speak about the killings on Thursday, but a friend says he is preparing a statement with his lawyer.
Mendoza and his wife run Home & Garden Wellsford, which advertised pet care, but Hargreaves says there was no logic to that if he was an animal lover.
SPCA investigator Sascha Keltie says the death scene was "not unlike a massacre".
She says bullet entry and exit wounds on some of the dogs indicated they had not died instantly, and blood trails were consistent with an injured dog moving.
Six adult dog bodies were piled on top of one another as if they had been trying to protect themselves.
Kerridge says 10 dog bodies have been taken to the SPCA for investigation and until reports on their deaths are completed, charges will not be laid.
He also says Mendoza will be interviewed as part of the inquiry.
Kerridge says the animals had been well looked after and neither the police, the SPCA nor the Rodney District Council had received any complaints about Hargreaves' dogs.
"They were very, very healthy, very well cared for animals."
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