LEBANON, Tenn. (WTVF) — A horse targeted and shot on its own property.
Thankfully, the animal will survive but the owner says he's shaken up.
They are asking the public for help to catch the people who pulled the trigger.
"We were able to successfully pull almost 30 Pellets out of him. And we have those in a container," said CJ Hutsenpiller. "But there were some that fell on the ground, but they counted somewhere around between 40 and 50 pellets in his side, and it starts from his, basically his neck all the way down to his tail."
It was Saturday mid afternoon when CJ Hutsenpiller thought his wife's barrel racing horse, Ironman was suffering from bites from horse flies.
But by the next day the wounds across his body didn't heal.
Hutsenpiller says he inspected the wounds on ironman and a pellet fell out -- He checked again and more pellets.
He knew immediately his horse was shot.
"If you have it in you to take a firearm, and pointed at an animal that doesn't expect that from you, that, you know, in my opinion, lends more to your character and what you're capable of," Hutsenpiller said. "If you're willing to do that to a defenseless animal, I can only imagine what you do to a human. If you decided that was something that you wanted to do. So very disturbing for me."
After calling law enforcement and the veterinarian more than 30 pellets were successfully removed from the horse.
The veterinarian told Hutsenpiller he believes Ironman has more than 40 wounds across his body.
They all believe the horse was shot with a shotgun using a birdshot round.
"The concern of the Department of Ag was this concentration here will tell you that they were aiming that way which if you were deer hunting that's a that's a kill shot area, meaning that somebody was aiming to do this not that they he was just standing at the wrong place when they when they were shooting."
The Department of Agriculture Criminal Investigation Division is looking into the shooting.
An cash reward has been put together by the owners and the public for any information that could lead to a prosecution.
