A unique 6-month-old puppy got the surprise of a lifetime when she was adopted from the Wisconsin Humane Society. Bella is a dog with five legs, and her new owner Melissa, who did not want to share her last name for privacy reasons, wore a sweatshirt that read "Adopt the Special Ones" when she went to pick up Bella from the shelter on Friday May 3, 2024, to take her home to Milwaukee.
Bella was born with a rare congenital condition called dimelia. Angela Speed, the vice president of marketing and communications at the Wisconsin Humane Society, said veterinarians at the shelter noticed the puppy's wider-than-usual right hind leg and extra toes when she was surrendered to the shelter earlier in April.
"They wanted to X-ray her and were shocked to discover on her X-rays that she basically has a mirror image of the bone structure in that leg. And so she has two femurs, two tibias, two fibulas and instead of four to five toes, Bella has nine," Angela told Good Morning America.
Bella was the first five-legged dog to be brought into a WHS shelter, according to Angela. "There's only a few documented cases in veterinary literature of [dimelia] being found in dogs. It's more primarily seen in cattle. It's also a condition that humans can have as well," she said. "But in our 145 years of operation, this is definitely the first case of dimelia we've seen in a canine and it's really blown us all away."
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"We're hoping that Bella's story does shed a light on the fantastic animals who are available at animal shelters," Angela added. "Across the country, shelters have been experiencing really high dog intake but slower dog adoptions and we're feeling that same pressure right now so we're hoping that this inspires people to consider adopting a shelter dog."
