Family offers reward for information on shot dog
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TweetA 1-year-old female lab named Bess is suffering from a life-threatening wound after being shot last week on Small Tract Road by an unknown person armed with a pellet gun.
“It’s a tragedy. Dogs are like kids,” owner Brad Adams said. “They’re your family.”
Adams said his family is offering “a substantial reward” for information on the person who shot the dog. It’s unknown if she’ll survive the ordeal, Adams said.
The day Bess was shot, Adams was cutting wood at his home near Bear Creek Camp on Wednesday, May 24 when Bess ran toward him, bleeding from the chest. Adams initially thought Bess ran into a stick. Haines Animal Rescue Kennel staff and volunteers Stacey Clark and Betsy Lyons provided basic medical care to the dog, but the wound was life-threatening. The expansion and contraction of the animal’s lungs caused air and blood to suck into Bess’s chest cavity.
Adams drove her to a vet in Whitehorse where an X-ray of the dog revealed a pellet lodged 12 inches into Bess’s chest. The pellet tore the sack, the pericardium around the dog’s heart, and couldn’t be removed.
“They cleaned the wound and put her under,” Adams said. “They made all kinds of holes to remove the blood and air, removing the blood from her chest cavity.”
The Whitehorse vet that cared for Bess was in town for Beerfest. He traveled to Adams’s home to check on the dog during his visit, Adams said.
“He checked her and said, ‘It’s not good, but I didn’t expect her to be alive when I got here,’” Adams said of the visit. “He said her sack healed, and her body can absorb the blood, but don’t count on it. He said she is young and she is strong. I don’t know. She is doing poorly.”
Adams said any information that can be provided to the family that can help identify the shooter will be kept confidential. He can be reached at 907-231-1770.
Haines Police are also investigating the shooting.
