Bert the pit bull was shot and bashed with an ax in Missouri, but he is ‘SuperBert’

His head wound was gruesome, a deep canyon right between his eyes where the blade of an ax nearly sliced into his brain. His attacker chopped open his shoulder.

Someone shot him in the mouth, too.

The bloodied pit bull was found a few days ago “walking around with critical injuries to multiple parts of its body,” near Bertrand, Missouri, reports KFVS in Cape Girardeau.

A friend called Rochelle Steffen, founder of Mac’s Mission, a dog rescue group in Cape Girardeau, and said “I got a dog for you. He’s in a lot of trouble,” Steffen told KFVS.

She didn’t know just how much trouble until X-rays revealed the dog “had been shot within the last couple of months, which destroyed a whole part of his jaw,” she told the TV station. “Then somebody took a dead aim on his face with an ax and then he got whacked in the shoulder.

“I’m pretty certain this dog is Superman in dog form.”

Steffen told McClatchy Newspapers that her group named the wounded dog “Bert” because he was found near Bertrand. But she’s also nicknamed him “SuperBert” on the group’s Facebook page. Hundreds of people have responded to his tale with donations and awe over the joy on Bert’s face - what’s left of it.

People want his attacker to meet justice - “like a brick wall doing 90 .. .on a motorcycle,” suggested one woman.

“I didn’t know about him being shot!?! Poor little guy! Like the axe chops weren’t bad enough. I’m so sorry that SO MANY humans suck!!” wrote another Bert supporter.

Bert was cranky on Saturday, “but you would be too if you had been chopped in the head and shoulder with an ax and shot in the mouth,” read an update on Mac’s Mission Facebook page. “He will get anesthetized to get his wounds redressed. We are Bert Strong here!!!”

He was still standing on Sunday.

“... Bert, the pitbull who had literally the worst evil things done to him and he is still standing even having his skull busted like an egg. Shot in the face, hit in the head with an axe.... still standing. We will find who did this,” a Facebook post read.

On Monday, Steffen told McClatchy that vets are working to figure out a way to close Bert’s gaping wounds. “There is nothing to close them with they are so severe so it is tricky,” she said, via Facebook message.

The group is searching for new home for Bert, she told McClatchy, and a few people have been encouraged to apply, if they are serious.