An 18-month-old Willis boy who was attacked by a pitbull Tuesday outside his home suffered some facial paralysis, authorities said.

"I spoke with the mother just seconds ago," Capt. Tim Holifield, Montgomery County's animal control officer, said Wednesday morning. The mother, Priscilla Rodriguez, was with her son at Memorial Hermann - Texas Medical Center, he said.

Based upon his conversation with the mother, Holifield said he understood the toddler to be in stable but guarded condition.

Rodriguez didn't leave her child unattended outside for any time period, contrary to information in some news reports, Holifield said.

This is the second pitbull attack in Montgomery County in three days. In the first incident on Jan. 19 near Conroe, a four-year-old boy died after being mauled by a pitbull.

Meanwhile the black-and-white dog that attacked Rodriguez's son remains in quarantine for 10 days to determine if he has rabies, which Holifield said is an unlikely scenario.

"Montgomery County has never had a confirmed case of rabies in a domestic animal in the 52 years they've been recording that data," he said. "However we have seen it in wildlife - foxes and skunks. We even had a horse that contracted rabies last year, which is very unusual. We are always mindful of that."

Once the 10-day quarantine period is over, officials will either humanely euthanize the animal with the owner's permission or go to court to seek an order to have the dog put down.

The latest incident happened early Tuesday afternoon while Rodriguez was playing with her son outside their home in the 100 block of Straughter Street at Rogers Road.

The dog was chained in the yard. Holifield said it belongs to someone incarcerated since July in the Montgomery County Jail.

After taking the boy for a ride in his wagon and pushing him on a swing, Holifield said his understanding was that Rodriguez then started playing ball with the youngster.

The dog somehow freed itself and attacked the child. Rodriguez was also injured in her efforts to get the dog off the boy.

It's unclear why the dog attacked the boy, he said. "It's possible the ball could have caused the dog to get excited," he said. "Regardless of the provocation, there's nothing that would justify this severe an attack."

Holifield noted that the dog's ears were closely cropped.

"I'm very curious why somebody would close-crop a dog's ears," he said. "I'm not going to claim to be an expert in dog fighting, but there are schools of thought to suggest one reason would be (that) they use the dog in fighting."