"[Cat] owners should keep them at home or be prepared to accept the consequences." J. F. Standfield, Syndicate Shooting
Snare Carnage 2009
Just two weeks after the end of the game bird shooting season and already NASC is being contacted by pet owners who have either had their pet injured or killed by snares.
2nd February 2009 - Cat Survives Snare Ordeal - Newcastle Upon Tyne
"My cat arrived home with the snare around her neck. I feel that the cats wouldn't travel more than half a mile radius from my home as when I call them, they come quite quickly. It alarms me to think that it could be closer to home than originally thought."
"The top left is what I thought was a snare. Its made from Barbed wire and there were two together which the RSPCA said weren't snares. The photos of the key...is a snare!! Betty had that tight around her neck. I put the Yale key there so that people can tell the size of it and how tight it got. As you can see, the left side of the snare snapped later after the vet examined it. The top right side of the snare is where betty had snapped it off but was still caught up in it. The wire is old and rusty and didn't free off. I had so much trouble. Wire cutters wouldn't cut through. The bend is where the mechanism had tightened to. The final photo is of Betty. I now have two cats missing, and just had an awful feeling they may have followed betty to the area where she played and got her self into trouble."
7th February 2009 - Cat Killed by Snare in Norwich
An elderly couple found their lovely ginger cat dead in a fox snare close to a shooting estate today. Understandably both are very upset and angry about what has happened.
10th February 2009 - Cat Badly Injured by Snare - Isle of Anglesey
After a couples cat went missing they conducted a lengthy search for her but were unable to find her. In the evening they took their dogs for a walk and
thought they saw something moving rather clumsily along the lane in front but it quickly disappeared in the darkness. At 9pm the cat came in through the cat flap with a rabbit wire snare embedded in her. She was in absolute agony and screaming, eventually they managed to calm her sufficiently to make sure that the snare was able to come away from her body using wire cutters to cut through the snare and then gently remove the snare from her; it has obviously been very traumatic for her and at the moment they do not know if there is any lasting damage.
12th February 2009 - Cat has 50 stitches as a result of snares - Isle of Skye
"Our cat had been missing for 10 days, we were heartbroken and just when we were about to give up hope of ever seeing her again, she came back. After a few minutes of her arrival we noticed we noticed something very disturbing - she had a piece of wire wrapped right around her body, it had cut into her skin and she was in desperate pain. We immediately took her to the vets where she was given 50 stitches; the wire had cut through her flesh. At that time, four other cats in my neighbourhood had gone missing and I am now convinced they were victims of snares. They are barbaric devices."
18th February 2009 - Rabbit Snare Kills Cat in Suffolk
"I think you should be aware that the use of rabbit snares seems to be
increasing. My neighbour"s cat has just been killed by one of these barbaric
traps. The poor thing, just 17 months old, tried to run home with the stake
still attatched and the noose around its neck, but when trying to get
through a hedge the stake got caught and the animal was strangled to death,
leaving the family, devastated. My own cat was snared some months ago, but
was able to get home, so that I could remove the thing from around her neck."
"I live in Suffolk, in a small farming community and strongly feel,
these farmers need to be taken to task with regard to the use of these
snares."
"Once cats begin to hunt for game, their presence cannot be tolerated, and it is desirable that they be kept down. Great judiciousness, however, should be exercised by the gamekeeper, and when a domestic cat is trapped it ought quickly to be put out of sight and its fate kept secret." The Keeper's Book
Posted: 19.02.2009
