Sookie the dog escapes snare to rejoin Shellbrook, Sask., family on Christmas Eve

Shannon Hamilton figured that Sookie was a goner.

The two-year-old great Pyrenees vanished from her Shellbrook, Sask., acreage on Dec. 21. Sookie always wandered the countryside with her brother Nanook. But on that day, Nanook came home alone.

After a couple of days, Hamilton resigned herself to the notion she had lost her dog to coyotes.

But then, on Christmas Eve, she heard a thump from her deck.

"She managed to return home with a snare around her front paw. Her foot was frozen solid below the snare and she had tried to chew it off," Hamilton said.

She took Sookie to the Western College of Veterinary Medicine in Saskatoon. The frozen part of Sookie's leg was amputated and she was measured for a prosthesis.

Hamilton has started a GoFundMe page called "A new chance for Sookie" to help offset the surgery, custom prosthesis and rehab costs. It has a $5,000 goal.

She also contacted conservation officers in Shellbrook to find out where the snare came from. She said they tracked it to a trapping site where bones had been dumped for bait.

"It was clear where Sookie had been trapped and that she had been there for several days. The site was within a mile from our home," she said.

"Legally, trapping must be a minimum of one-mile radius and the trappers are to notify any occupied residence within that radius. We were not notified."

She said that the case is now under investigation.