A FAMILY’S pet cat had its front leg amputated after sustaining an horrific injury in an illegally set gin-trap.
Eight-year-old Bam-Bam, who belongs to the Hibdige family, went missing from her home in Sopwith Close, King’s Somborne on New Year’s Day.
Keith Hibdige and his family feared for her safety but they were staggered when Bam-Bam was spotted by 11-year-old son Alex outside the gate on Friday lunchtime.
With a rusting gin-trap still attached to the right fore-leg she had managed to drag herself several hundred yards back home from nearby fields.
Mr Hibdige, who is a night truck driver for Andover-based Corporate Freight Logistics, was in bed at the time, but his wife, Dawn, woke him because she was unable to free Bam-Bam.
“I managed to pull the jaws of the trap open and free the leg,” said Mr Hibdige, aged 45. “There was a lot blood around the wound but it had dried up. The paw was the size of a golf ball and she was in extreme pain and shock.”
His wife took the cat to vets at Winchester. They treated the wound and bandaged it in the hope of saving the leg.
But on Monday Bam-Bam returned to the vets. Gangrene had set in, so the decision was taken to remove the leg right up to and including the shoulder bone. Bam-Bam returned home on Tuesday and is now attempting to adapt to life with just three legs.
“It’s not illegal to own gin-traps but it has been illegal for about 20 years to set them,” Mr Hibdige said. “I’m pretty sure it had been set because it would’ve been too rusty to work if it had been left lying around for years.
“One of the reasons I contacted the Andover Advertiser was to make sure that if it was deliberately set, whoever did it thinks twice before doing it again.” And Mrs Hibdige pointed out that such a trap could cause considerable injury to children who play in the area.
Source: Southern Daily Echo