Cat impaled by arrow now on a lap in Phoenix

Kate Hopeman went to Pima Animal Care Center looking for a kitten or a cat.

Then she saw Lucky, who had been shaved for a recent surgery.

“She was the saddest thing in there,” Hopeman said. Yet, when she put her hand in Lucky’s cage, the cat started purring and rubbing her face against it.

“I fell in love,” Hopeman said.

Hopeman later read that the cat had been shot by an arrow. It took at least a month before someone spotted the impaled cat running around and managed to catch her and bring her to PACC.

The cat had worn down her front teeth trying to remove the arrow herself and needed dental work. She got the help she needed around Christmas last year.

Back to homepage

Subscriber Login

Keep reading with a digital access subscription.

Subscribe now

Karen Hollish, PACC’s development director, estimates that nearly 75 percent of shelter animals require some sort of medical care during their stay.

“I got her in March,” said Hopeman, who renamed her Lucky. A volunteer had fostered the cat after her surgery until she could be adopted.

“She’s great. She’s absolutely great. You would never know anything happened to her,” said Hopeman. “She’s totally happy. She totally likes being around people. She’s just the sweetest cat. She’s a total lap cat; she wants to be wherever you are.”

Hopeman lives in Phoenix and adopted a younger (formerly feral) cat at a shelter up there for Lucky. “He’s a little crazy guy. She loves him to death and she mothers him to death. She really likes the company,” she said.

This will be their first Christmas together. Lucky already has all of the toy mice a cat could want. “She’s not a big player,” Hopeman said, “But she does like those mice to carry around.”

“Special-needs animals can be some of the most loving and grateful animals you’ll ever know,” she said.