A small orange cat that appeared to have been thrown from a car window and was turned over to the Drumheller and Area Humane Society, has died.
 When the Society received the animal earlier this week, it earnestly began a fundraising campaign to help pay for treatment for the cat’s injuries.
The cat was found injured on the side of the road by near Rockyford. The man who found the cat brought it to the Drumheller Veterinary Clinic only to find the surgery for the cat was upwards of $600.
    The Humane Society was notified and humane society volunteers raised approximately $200 through a bottle drive, Megan Shearer and Meaghan Peters. Shearer was also selling homemade dog treats for the animal’s surgery.
    As The Mail was conducting interviews for this story, we were informed the cat had passed away during surgery.
    “His leg was very damaged, and so the vet amputated his leg. His arm didn’t look like there was any hope for it but they wrapped it up in the mean time and it wasn’t showing any signs of movement. The surgery went well on Saturday, July 30,” says volunteer Deb Busse.
    The cat was receiving surgery again for his arm on Thursday, August 4.
    “We put him on the table, and amputated his arm. He started to wake up so they took him towards the kennel room and he passed away. What I assume is that he had some internal bleeding in his lung or heart that we didn’t know about and it caused the organ to stop,” says Dr. Lehmann of Valley Veterinary Clinic.
    The volunteers at the Humane Society are deeply saddened by the animal’s passing.
    “It just breaks my heart that people do these things. You can drop cats off at the Humane Society instead of trying to get rid of an animal in that kind of way,” says volunteer Kelsey Travis.
    The Humane Society accepts any kind of animal and cares for them. They are often left with bills from injured animals that are surrendered. The society reports an increase in abandoned animals in Drumheller.
    “I don’t understand how anyone could do that to an animal. It seems kind of crazy. I don’t think anyone really wants to give up their animal and they are ashamed to surrender them,” said Shearer. “Even them coming in and saying, ‘I don’t want this animal anymore,’ they feel ashamed to speak to someone else about it. They think that we are going to judge them in some kind of way. And it is not like that. We are really caring and want the best thing for the animal. That is really why we are all there. I really hope people will realize that.”