Photo via Veterinary Pet Insurance Co.

So here’s this: An Ashburn, Va. woman thinks a Snowy Owl attacked — and even picked up! — her six-year-old Jack Russell terrier.

Tracy Sheppard told the Veterinary Pet Insurance Co. that Jack and their other dog Lola went to use the bathroom before going to bed. But, when called, only Lola returned.

“We called and called for Jack but he was nowhere in sight,” Sheppard said. “Finally, we saw him walking back from our neighbor’s yard. I noticed him walking tentatively and darting between trees but it was dark and I couldn’t see him very well. When he got back to the house, he was bleeding and really torn up with deep lacerations on his side and head and what looked to be bite marks.”

Indeed, Jack suffered a “deep laceration across the left side of his body, deep wounds on his head,” “bruising of his lungs and a skull fracture.” He has since made a full recovery.

So what happened to Jack?

The veterinarian concluded that Jack’s injuries were consistent with that of getting hit by a car, dropped from a window, or even thrown from a moving vehicle. Knowing that none of those situations occurred in the short time he was left unattended, the Sheppards were extremely puzzled. The following day, their neighbor called and said that she had recently seen a light-colored owl pick up a rabbit in her backyard and drop it. When the neighbor inspected the rabbit for injuries, she said it looked as if it had been cut open with surgical precision. The Sheppards were immediately certain that a similar incident occurred with Jack.

Indeed, the family later spotted an owl “perched on their neighbor’s roof with a ‘bird’s eye view’ of their backyard.”

Could a Snowy Owl attack a dog? Sure. But could it pick one up? Nope. An ornithologist told the Post it’s impossible.

“A female snowy owl weighs about five and a half pounds, and a bird is physically incapable of lifting more than about a third to half of its weight,” he said. “There is no way a snowy owl could lift a 15-pound dog off the ground.”

Of course, D.C.’s Snowy Owl, who is currently at an unnamed “specialized raptor care center,” would never do this to a dog. Not our owl.