An Oregonian cat was shot with an arrow Tuesday and its owner believes it managed to pull the weapon out on his own.
The police department in Keizer, Oregon, received a call Tuesday regarding a cat who was walking around the neighborhood with an arrow through him, according to KPTV. The department called several neighbors, one of whom was Taleaha, who realized that her indoor-outdoor cat “Milo” was nowhere to be found, the outlet continued.
“I was outside for about five minutes getting him to try and come and he wasn’t coming so I scanned my backyard really good and saw his pink nose,” she told reporters. Milo seemed fine to start. “There was no arrow in him, so we were a little bit, you know, relieved?” (RELATED: Terrifying Shark Washes Ashore In Florida)
“He went to crouch down and crawl then his back end just fell over so I knew something was wrong,” she continued. After taking Milo inside, Taleaha found an entry and exit wound on his stomach and rushed him to the veterinarian’s office.
“Oh we all lost it. [The vets] were extremely worried there was going to be internal bleeding and that it could’ve hit an organ or a lung or anything like that, but it missed them all with the imaging they took, and it missed his spine. He’s lucky. They said they’ve never seen anything like it,” she reported.
Taleaha retraced Milo’s paw prints and found the arrow under a boat trailer in her yard, leading her to believe that he pulled the weapon out himself, KPTV noted. Keizer police took the arrow as evidence.
Milo suffered nerve damage from the attack, and Taleaha hopes the responsible parties will be caught, the report continued.
“I think it’s disgusting. I feel like if you can do it to an animal, you can turn around and do it to a human.”
Milo is not the only beloved animal to survive such a brutal and thoughtless attack. In 2020, a beloved whitetail deer named “Carrot” was shot through the head with an arrow and survived the ordeal with nominal damage.
Taleaha has started a GoFundMe to support Milo’s medical bills. Donations can be made here.