A worried cat owner is warning other cat-lovers to be on their guard after her pet suffered serious injury, which she believes was caused by a snare.
Beverley Didsbury’s eight year old cat Shadow had to have a leg amputated because his leg was so badly injured. He returned home limping and distressed last Thursday after being missing for several days from his home in Middleton-on-the-Wolds.
It was not the first time that Shadow had been in the wars. Last winter Beverley says he escaped serious injury after he was shot at, severing a tumour on his face.
She says Shadow does not usually wander far from home, and after he went missing last week she had searched around the village for him.
When he eventually returned, she said his back ankle had raised wheal marks around it, which suggested he had been caught in a snare.
She took the cat to the vet, who explained the injury would not heal, as it had severed tendons and ligaments.
“The vet offered us the option of having it pinned and plated, but the leg would never be able to be bent and he suggested amputation,” she said.
Beverley says that a cat belonging to a friend who also lives in the village was shot earlier this year, and a number of other cats in the area have gone missing. She is warning other cat owners to take extra care with their own pets.
In the meantime, she says Shadow is getting used to living with only three legs.
“The vet said he will have pretty much the same quality of life as before as far as being active, but he won’t be catching mice or chasing rabbits like he used to. This cat has more than nine lives!” she said.
Vet David Smith, of Driffield’s Aldgate veterinary pracice, who treated Shadow, said the injury could have been caused by a snare, but it was impossible to be sure.
“The injury is commensurate with the leg being pulled from something, but exactly what it is impossible to say,” he said.
