It’s never what you worry about.

Ellen Lutz learned that firsthand in December, when her 7-month-old golden retriever, Striker, ambled into her home office and licked her paper shredder.

To her horror, the machine latched onto his tongue, and began to grind.

“He was screaming, and he was fighting for his life,” says Lutz, adding that in his panic, the 67-pound puppy did even more damage to his mutilated tongue. She immediately disconnected the shredder, and took Striker to a nearby emergency hospital.

“I was covered in blood from head to toe,” the Aqueboque, N.Y., woman remembers.

A story this horrific is hard-pressed to end well: Striker’s injury was so severe – basically, most of his tongue was gone – that he was euthanized.

“I’ve been in emergency medicine for 10 years, and this is the first time I have seen or heard of this,” says veterinarian Gal Vatash of the East End Veterinary Emergency and Specialty Center in Riverhead, who treated Striker in December. “But I’m surprised it doesn’t occur more often. Most of us have paper shredders at home, and dogs are always sticking their noses in all kinds of places.”

Indeed, Striker is not alone. The Consumer Product Safety Commission has recorded five dog mutilations involving shredders, and what is not known is how many cases go unreported.

In February of last year, a young boxer puppy named Cross from Socastee, S.C., caught his tongue on a home shredder, mangling an inch of it into what his owner, Sandra Clarke, called “hamburger meat.”

In 2005, in South Spokane, Wash., a 7-month-old mix named Alice Lane licked a paper shredder, which in turn ground up all of her tongue. Like Striker, the dog had to be euthanized because of the extent of her injury.

Some simple precautions can ensure that accidents such as Striker’s do not happen. Among them:

l Unplug shredders when not in use.

l Store shredders out of reach of animals (and, of course, children, especially those under 5, who can also be victims of shredder accidents). Make sure that the shredder is located in a place that is “pounce proof”: Acrobatic kitties that jump atop shredders can also do terrible damage to themselves.

l To avoid attracting animals, never put food wrappers through shredders.

l Do not leave shredders on the “automatic” setting.

l When buying a shredder, look for one with a protective bar over the opening.

To ensure that Striker’s death was not in vain, Lutz has embarked on an awareness campaign to alert owners to the perils of unattended paper shredders. She will e-mail fliers to anyone who requests her. (Contact strikerluv@yahoo .com.)