Hunting with dogs - Hunting Act 2004

Horror after cat caught in trap

A Greysteel woman has spoke of her horror after her pet cat had to have its leg amputated after it got caught in an iron trap.

Amanda Cooper said her two-year-old cat, Tom, got caught in the trap in the Briar Hill area of the town last week and was so badly injured that it needed to have its leg amputated by a vet.

Mrs Cooper said she is now worried that a child could get caught in any similar traps which may still be in the area.

Explaining what happened to her cat, the Greysteel woman said: “The cat had been missing for a few days and as I was coming back to my house on Friday I saw him lying on the grass. I called to him but he wouldn’t come and when I got closer I saw the trap on his leg. I was completely shocked and horrified. It was a large metal trap with pointed jaws. He looked to be in a lot of pain and I couldn’t get the trap off his leg so I took him to the vet,” she said.

Mrs Cooper said she could not believe that someone would place a trap in a built up residential area. “This trap was not left out in the country; it was right in the middle of a housing estate. It was on a bit of waste ground where houses are being built, right up against a fence. The only kind of animals that would be around that area are domestic pets,” she said.

The Greysteel woman said if a child discovered the trap they could have been seriously injured. “This was a vicious looking trap and if child had put their hand near it they could have lost their fingers. This was placed in a housing estate where there are lots of children and any one of them could have found it. I dread to think what would have happened if a child had discovered it,” she said.

The woman appealed for whoever placed the trap to think about the consequences of their actions. “I would like to think that whoever left this trap was not intending to trap a cat but I can’t think what they were trying to catch. I found it in a residential area where there are no wild animals that I know of.

“I would ask whoever did this to think what they have done. This trap has cost my cat its leg and it could have cost a child their fingers. I just hope this was the only one and that there are no more traps laying out there,” she said.

Source: Derry Journal