The unlikely friendship between a stray dog and a lonely doe came to an end this week, when officials from a local no-kill animal shelter set up a humane trap for the dog.
The two misfits had been inseparable for the past couple of months, roaming throughout Kansas City’s 43-acre Elmwood Cemetery, the Kansas City Star reports. The deer was born at the cemetery last year, but lost her mom to a car. Ella has since become a sort of mascot for the cemetery.
Volunteers had been leaving food and water out for the dog, which was scared of people. Cemetery officials and volunteers said that while the deer could survive the winter, there was concern that her companion the dog would not.
“Ella’s our mascot, and she apparently has got a friend in this dog, and she enjoys the company,” John Weilert, president of the Elmwood Cemetery Society, told the Star in an earlier report.
When people from Wayside Waifs shelter came to retrieve the trapped dog, Ella was right there as well. Cemetery officials said Ella stood by the animal control van as workers took the dog away, KCTV notes.
"It breaks my heart that they have to be separated, but they must," Elmwood trustee Bruce Mathews said in an email to friends of Elmwood, according to the Star.
However, he told KMBC that people could learn something from the pair's unlikely friendship.
"I have thought about all the Republicans and the Democrats who are in Washington who are supposed to be working for the common good, they can ... take a lesson from Ella and the dog," he told the station.
KMBC reports that Mathews hopes whoever adopts the dog will bring it back to visit with Ella. First, however, the pup must receive some care.
For more examples of interspecies animal friends, check out the video below:
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