He shooed away a frog and it turned into a freak gardening accident that almost cost him his leg

What was supposed to be a simple gardening chore turned into a terrifying near-tragedy for Algirdas Dobravalskis, a resident of the small Lithuanian town of Tverai. While trimming pond plants behind his home, he suddenly felt nauseous—and only when he looked down at his leg did he understand why.

Blood was gushing from a deep wound, and in that moment, a horrifying realization set in: he had accidentally stabbed himself with his own knife.

“I didn’t even feel the cut”: The moment everything went wrong

Dobravalskis had been cleaning up overgrown weeds in the pond for several days using a knife. But just as he was wrapping up, something unexpected happened.

“There was a frog swimming near me, and I tried to shoo it away with the same hand holding the knife,” he told Lithuanian news channel TV3. “Suddenly I felt strange. When I got out of the water, I saw blood pouring from my leg. I don’t even know exactly when I got stabbed.”

Though he didn’t feel immediate pain, the blade had pierced deep enough to slice into a major artery.

A daughter’s fast reaction and a race against time

Luckily, his daughter was nearby mowing the lawn. When she heard his screams, she rushed over—followed quickly by his wife and son-in-law. Together, they provided emergency first aid while waiting for paramedics to arrive.

When the ambulance got there, medics applied a tourniquet and rushed Dobravalskis to a hospital in the nearby city of Plungė.

A few more minutes and the would have been lost

What doctors discovered was alarming: the knife had punctured the main artery supplying blood to the lower leg. Immediate surgery was the only option.

“The wound itself wasn’t wide, but it went very deep,” said orthopedic trauma surgeon Saulius Dailidėnas, one of three specialists involved in the operation. “We had to make a large incision to locate the artery and repair it.”

Had there been any delay, the outcome could have been far worse. “If we’d lost any more time, amputation would’ve been the only choice,” Dailidėnas warned. According to the surgical team, that artery was the sole blood supply to the lower part of the leg—and without blood flow, the tissue would’ve quickly died.

“There’s no turning back once that happens,” added fellow surgeon Dariur Brazys.

From near amputation to gratitude—and a goal

After several days in the hospital, Dobravalskis is now recovering at home. Though still healing, he’s in high spirits—and incredibly thankful.

“I really think the doctors performed a miracle,” he said. “I could’ve bled out. But thanks to them, I still have both my legs.”

His goal now is simple: “I just want to fully recover and get back on my bike with my wife—like we used to do before all this.”