CALAIS – Zoe has known real trauma in her young life.

Her hind leg was mangled last month by what appeared to be a bottle rocket.

But the injury has not damaged her spirit, Robyn Cobb, who works for the local veterinarian, said Tuesday. Cobb also runs PAWS, a no-kill animal shelter.

On Tuesday, Zoe, who had her leg amputated at the hip, was romping around the Calais Veterinary Clinic – and occasionally falling over. Undaunted, she would scramble up onto her remaining legs and run some more.

“I just can’t get over how friendly she is,” Cobb said. “The day we got her she was purring.”

Brenda McCormack, who works at the Irving Mainway, found Zoe between the trashcan and a pay phone at the Princeton convenience store a few days before July 1.

“There were these group of kids and they had firecrackers, bottle rockets, whatever you want to call them. I heard them going off and going off, and then I found this kitten,” she said. “Her hair was still singed where the firecracker or bottle rockets [hurt her].”

When McCormack picked Zoe up, she nestled in her arms and purred.

“I couldn’t leave her lay there,” she said. “For all that she has been through, she has been a happy cat.”

She decided to call her Zoe.

McCormack took the kitty home and called her friend Crystal Howard. Worried about her injuries, the women “scraped” $60 together and took Zoe to the veterinary clinic in Calais.

McCormack also called authorities, and the incident has been referred to the state’s Animal Welfare Program for investigation.

X-rays showed the bones in Zoe’s leg had been shattered.

Veterinarian Dr. William Dewar amputated Zoe’s leg at the hip. In addition to the damaged leg, Zoe also suffered a collapsed rectum. Dewar did surgery on that, but more surgery is needed.

Now Zoe is headed for a good home. She has been adopted by a Marshfield couple and will spend the rest of her life on an island off the Maine coast.

Cobb said that although McCormack and Howard did raise some money, the medical costs were more and the clinic was able to dip into a fund they had there.

It was ironic, Cobb noted, that McCormack had named the young cat Zoe unaware that the clinic had a fund with the same name.

Patricia and Morgan Landau of Newburyport, Mass., who own property in Eastport, started the Zoe Fund several years ago after the couple found an abandoned cat on a road in Washington County. They rescued her and named her Zoe.

Aware of the work done by PAWS, the couple last month decided to set up the fund in Zoe’s honor.

“She has been such a joy in our lives,” Patricia Landau said during a telephone interview Tuesday.

Patricia Landau explained the need for the fund and why it was set up in cooperation with the clinic.

“It really was set up primarily to assist in deferring costs for anyone interested in adopting a pet from PAWS,” Landau said.

In addition to the fund, the couple also plans to erect a shed next to PAWS where animal food will be kept.

“We [want] to present this as a package where we would say, ‘Well, if you would consider providing a good home for an animal at PAWS we have a fund to defer [medical] costs and a supply of food,'” Landau said.

Cobb said that after McCormack brought Zoe (the most recent) into the clinic, she contacted Landau about using some of the money from the fund to offset some of Zoe’s medical bills.

Landau agreed. “It certainly went to a good cause,” she said.

Now that the fund has been started, Landau said, donations would be appreciated and can be sent to the Zoe Fund in care of the Calais Veterinary Clinic, 436 North St., Calais 04619.

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