Dog missing for two months found on mountain by hikers | US News

A Bernese mountain dog that went missing on a trail two months ago was found and reunited with her owner in time for Thanksgiving.

Two hikers found the dog named Nova injured on a mountain trail in Meyers Ranch Park in Colorado with no owner in sight.

‘They tried to make friends with the dog, but it was injured and scared,’ stated the Jefferson County Sheriff’s Office on Facebook on Tuesday.

The dog bit one of the hikers trying to carry her down the mountain.

‘Despite that, they knew the pup needed help and they called us,’ stated the sheriff’s office, which got the Jeffco Open Space Rangers and Jeffco Animal Control to respond to the dog bite incident.

One of the hikers stayed with the dog while the other descended the mountain to find medical help and to lead rescuers back to them.

One of the responding rangers remembered seeing a poster for a lost dog more than a month ago and an animal control official contacted the owner to meet at the trailhead.

Rangers and animal control officers hiked up and brought Nova down safely. She had a broken leg and is now ‘resting comfortably at home’ as she awaits a possible surgery, stated the sheriff’s office.

‘With Thanksgiving right around the corner, we want to share this story of thanksgiving for the acts of kindness shown to a lost pet,’ the sheriff’s office wrote of the rescue from November 19.

The office also quoted Wild Heart Wildlife Foundation founder and CEO Paul Oxton as saying: ‘Of all the special things we choose to do for our planet, let one of them to be of service to animals.’

Nova is 14 months old and a service dog that was training to help her owner move around safely, the Greeley Tribune reported.

Her owner, Robynne Simons-Sealy, said Nova slipped out of her harness and ran away in a Safeway store parking lot. Community members spotted Nova a few times but she was too afraid to get close to them.

‘She survived two snow storms and below-freezing weather,’ Simons-Sealy told the newspaper. ‘I was in tears every time it snowed.’

Animal control officer Kylie Rupe put Nova on a tarp which was used to take her down the mountain. The bitten hiker did not need stitches.

Nova was injured and hungry but still approached her owner with utter excitement.

‘When I walked up to the car it was like I was just another human being, and then she realized and she went crazy,’ Simons-Sealy said.

‘It was so beautiful and so heartwarming and the most wonderful sound of her realizing, “I’m safe, I’m okay.”‘

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