Beautiful Bobby Is Maimed for Life by a Leghold Trap That Not Only Was Intended for a Coyote but also Illegally Set Within the City Limits of St. George

Bobby

"I think right now I've got five cats that have lost their limbs to coyote traps. It's a big problem."
-- Kris Neal of One More Chance

With his gorgeous blue eyes and long, luscious white fur with its traces of brown, Bobby is, to say the least, an impressive-looking and handsome tom. Regrettably, as songwriter Don McLean once said of Vincent van Gogh, "this world was never meant for one as beautiful as" him.

That is because the principal occupation of those revolting cretins who strut around on two legs with their dirty schnozes poked high in the air is to make mincemeat out of this world's noblest and most beautiful souls. For Bobby, his brush with the palpable evil that nowadays gushes from seemingly every nook and cranny came in late April when he got his left rear leg entangled in an unforgiving leghold trap.

That occurred at 1000 Bluff Street in St. George, one-hundred-ninety kilometers northeast of Las Vegas in the Mojave Desert at the junction of Utah, Arizona, and Nevada. Discovered by Washington City Animal Welfare Services, he was transported to the Washington Animal Shelter, which is operated by the St. George Police.

He later was collected by Kris Neal of One More Chance, which is located in the Red Rock section of St. George. After that, he was handed off to the Washington Family Veterinary Clinic in St. George where on April 21st his damaged left rear appendage was, sadly, amputated.

As simply god-awful as all of that was, it thankfully proved not to have been the end of the line for him. "It's a back leg, which is a real plus for the cat," Neal opined to the St. George News on April 25th. (See "Cats Getting Caught in Coyote Traps Becoming a Common Problem.") "They do fairly well losing a back leg not so much on a front leg."

For example, a cat named Opie lost his right rear leg when he was run down by a hit-and-run motorist. Notwithstanding that terrible tragedy, he bounced back to have a productive life keeping the inmates company at the Turney Center Industrial Prison and Farm in Only, Tennessee. (See Cat Defender post of November 2, 2006 entitled "A Three-Legged, Bobtailed Cat Named Opie Melts the Hearts of the Hardened Criminals at a Rural Tennessee Prison.")

A cat named Tripod likewise lost his right rear appendage in a leghold trap. That did not, however, deter him from going on to become the office cat at The Caledonian Record in St. Johnsbury, Vermont.

Deplorably, all of his perseverance and abiding loyalty ultimately proved to have been insufficient in order to have stilled the journalists' killing hands once he had grown old. Perfidy, not loyalty, always has been man's strong suit. (See Cat Defender post of February 9, 2006 entitled "A Newspaper Cat Named Tripod Is Killed Off by the Journalists That He Befriended in Vermont.")

Earlier in 2005, Hopalong Cassidy of Ellison in British Columbia also lost one of his rear legs in a leghold trap. (See Cat Defender post of August 18, 2005 entitled "A Brave Orange Tabby Cat Dubbed Hopalong Cassidy Loses a Limb to a Leghold Trap in British Columbia.")

More recently in 2010, a beautiful Russian Blue named Big Bob, who belonged to one of IndyFeral's managed colonies in Indianapolis, also like Opie lost a rear leg to a hit-and-run motorist. (See Cat Defender post of January 5, 2011 entitled "Gunned Down by an Assassin and Then Mowed Down by a Hit-and-Run Driver, Big Bob Loses a Leg but Survives and Now Is Looking for a Home.")

Even though it may be more difficult for cats to adjust to losing a front leg as opposed to a rear one, most of them somehow figure out a way of adapting. For instance, another cat named Tripod who earlier had lost his left front leg nevertheless recovered and went on to serve as the mascot of City Hall in Natchez, Mississippi, between 1979 and 1983.

In doing so, he evidently made quite an impression upon the politicians and bureaucrats in that he is still fondly remembered to this very day by those who were fortunate enough to have known him. (See Cat Defender post of November 28, 2008 entitled "Natchez Politicians Pause to Remember Tripod on the Twenty-Fifth Anniversary of His Death.")

One of the most revolting practices of fishermen is that of using kittens and cats as bait, especially in order to snag alligators. Not surprisingly, it therefore was precisely the trussing up with fishing tackle of the left front leg of a four-week-old black and white kitten named Sinbad from Lake Worth, Florida, back in 2010 that ended up costing him that appendage. (See Cat Defender post of August 5, 2010 entitled "Sinbad Loses a Leg in a Foiled Plot to Use Him and His Littermate, Sailor, as Alligator Bait in Florida.")

On August 10, 2007, a nameless black male kitten in Decatur, Alabama, also lost a front appendage to a leghold trap but it is not known how that he fared afterwards. (See Cat Defender post of September 4, 2007 entitled "A Kitten Named Moppel Is Rescued Unharmed from a Leghold Trap in Sachsen but a Nameless One in Decatur Is Not Nearly So Fortunate.")

Cats, such as Trace from Monmouth, Illinois, even have been known to soldier on bravely after having lost both of their rear legs. In her case, her rear appendages were chewed up beyond repair by a motorist's engine. (See Cat Defender post of November 17, 2010 entitled "Penniless and Suffering from Two Broken Legs, It Looked Like It Was Curtains for Trace Until Geoffrey Weech Rode to Her Rescue on His White Horse.")

Bobby's Bloody and Badly Mangled Left Rear Leg

Perhaps even more amazing, a ginger and white tom named Simon from Auckland has been robbed of both of the appendages on his left side. Thanks to the love and care lavished on him by his devoted owners, Robert and Madeline McCarthy, he at last check was not only still alive but enjoying life as well as could be expected under the circumstances. (See Cat Defender post of March 17, 2017 entitled "Already Sans an Appendage, Simon Loses a Second One to a Killer Dog but His Devoted Owners Elect to Allow Him to Live and He Rewards Them Handsomely by Making a Remarkable Adjustment.")

The award for being the ultimate survivor has to go, however, to a legless female named Callie Mae who resides at the Theodore Veterinary Hospital in the Alabamian town of the same name. Chased up a tree by vicious dogs on the loose, she became entangled in electrical wires and broke all four of her legs when she plunged to the ground. (See WRKG-TV of Mobile, August 9, 2010, YouTube video entitled "Legless Cat Ready to Start Another Life.")

All the anecdotal evidence therefore augured well for Bobby's eventual recovery and that, mercifully, has proven to have been the case. After having been forced to spend a few weeks in the hospital in order to allow his injuries to heal as well as for him to adjust to getting around on three legs, he eventually was adopted and is said to be doing well in his new home.

It would appear, however, that his days of roaming the perilous streets of St. George are now a thing of the past. "The cat will resume life as normal but it will probably need to be an indoor cat when we find the cat a new home," Neal predicted.

It has not been revealed, however, if he has been able to adjust to the loss of his freedom. Some cats are able to do fairly well cooped up indoors whereas for others such a dénouement amounts to nothing less than a lifetime jail sentence.

As far as it is known, Bobby was neither wearing a collar nor microchipped. Even more disturbing, apparently his original owner did not even bother to come forward in order to either reclaim him or to even so much as to inquire about his condition.

Since his photograph was featured prominently in the St. George News, that individual surely must have learned almost immediately of his desperate plight. While not necessarily a small town, St. George is not all that large of a place either with its ninety-five-thousand residents and bad news travels fast even in a medium-sized community.

Given that St. George is comprised of seventy per cent Mormons, that possibly could have factored into the equation in that, generally speaking, they never have been known as great lovers of cats. Au contraire, members of their sect have been known to commit some of the most diabolical crimes on record against the species. (See Cat Defender posts of August 8, 2012, November 12, 2011, and February 7, 2012 entitled, respectively, "Polygamists Condemn Thomas to a Long and Excruciatingly Painful Death by Burying Him Up to His Tiny Neck Inside a Steel Post Filled with Wet Concrete," "The Multiple Attempts Made Upon Andrea's Life Graphically Demonstrate the Urgent Need for an Immediate Ban on the Killing of All Shelter Animals," and "Long-Suffering Andrea Secures a Permanent Home after Incredibly Surviving Quadruple Attempts Made on Her Life by an Unrepentant Utah Shelter.")

Nevertheless, there are a few Mormons who are willing to occasionally go out of their way in order to save the lives of kittens and cats in extremis. (See KSTU-TV of Salt Lake City, December 2, 2015, "Utah Family Resuscitates Kitten Found Frozen in the Snow; Rescue Caught on Camera.")

Hopefully, Bobby has been victimized by his last leghold trap. The same, however, most definitely cannot be said for the other cats that reside in and around St. George, all throughout Utah, and across the United States. "I think right now I've got five cats that have lost their limbs to coyote traps," Neal averred to the St. George News. "It's a big problem."

The indiscriminate use of leghold traps is such a huge and ongoing problem that Neal and One More Chance have successfully petitioned St. George to ban their use within the city. Notwithstanding that legal edict, their use in St. George remains common. Moreover, these crippling devices are often placed within five feet of sidewalks.

All of them have serial numbers and they are supposed to be registered with the Utah Division of Wildlife Resources (DWR), which is itself an integral part of the Department of Natural Resources. Many owners do not register their traps, however, and even those that do are required by law to only check them once every forty-eight hours.

It has not been revealed in the press if the trap that robbed Bobby of his leg was registered. Consequently, it is not known if any arrest ever was made in this disturbing case. It is not even known what, if any, penalties apply in such instances.

Instead of being outlawed outright, these horrible devices persist in the environment despite studies that have shown that non-target animals, such as cats, account for as much as sixty-seven per cent of their victims. (See the American Veterinary Medical Association, April 30, 2008, "Welfare Implications of Leghold Trap Use in Conservation and Research.")

Regardless of whether their victims are either intended or unintended animals, they all suffer hideously and for prolonged periods of time. For example, in an effort to extricate themselves some animals resort to chewing off their own limbs and in the process end up breaking their own teeth and bones.

Secondly, since these torture devices are checked so infrequently some of the animals that become ensnared in them eventually succumb to dehydration, hypothermia, and hyperthermia as well as to blood loss. Even those animals that somehow are able to hold on long enough in order to look their gaolers in the eye are rewarded only by being either bludgeoned, choked, or stomped to death. Shooting them would decrease the value of their pelts. (See Lady Freethinker of Los Angeles, July 3, 2020, "End Barbaric Fur Trapping in the United States.")

Coyotes Also Suffer Egregiously in Leghold Traps

With the notable exception of California, where they have been banned, leghold traps persist across the United States and that is destined to remain the case until, perhaps, either a child or an adult falls prey to one of them. "A stray cat being caught in one or somebody's pet that wanders off the walking path, they're pretty easy to overlook," Neal pointed out to the St. George News. "That's historically what have been caught in them. We haven't had a human incident so far."

The masterminds behind this diabolical business are, first and foremost, cat-hating wildlife biologists and ornithologists who fervently believe that the only good cats are those that are either dead or have been maimed. In order to facilitate their perverse objectives, they expel coyotes and other wildlife from their natural habitats by selling the land on which they live to developers, farmers, mineral extraction companies, and other rotten capitalists. (See Cat Defender post of August 28, 2006, October 2, 2006, and August 28, 2007 entitled, respectively, "A Marauding Pack of Vicious Raccoons Rips Ten House Cats to Shreds and Terrorizes Residents in Olympia but Wildlife Officials Refuse to Intervene," "Coyotes, Cheered on by Wildlife Officials, Join Raccoons in Killing Cats and Dogs in Washington State," and "TNR Programs, Domestic Cats, Dogs, and Humans Are Imperiled by Wildlife Proponents' Use and Abuse of Coyotes and Fishers," plus KOMO-TV of Seattle, July 15, 2020, "Coyotes Blamed for Series of Kennewick Cat Killings, Mutilations.")

Wildlife biologists also make a pretty penny abusing coyotes during the process of conducting their sometimes fatal identification and control experiments. (See Cat Defender post of April 17, 2006 entitled "Hal the Central Park Coyote Is Suffocated to Death by Wildlife Biologists Attempting to Tag Him.")

As a result of the underhanded and dishonest machinations of wildlife biologists and ornithologists, coyotes have become permanent fixtures of the urban and suburban landscapes of both the United States and Canada where they are allowed to freely prey upon cats. (See Cat Defender posts of December 4, 2007, September 15, 2011, and September 17, 2011 entitled, respectively, "A Grieving Widow Risks Her Life in Order to Save Cosmo from the Jaws of a Hungry Coyote in Thousand Oaks," "Ravenous Coyotes, Cat-Haters, and Old Man Winter All Want Her Dead, Buried, and Gone but Brave Little Half Mask Is Defying All the Odds," and "Coyotes, Swimming from Connecticut, Are Blamed for Killing Twenty Cats on Remote and Exclusive Fishers Island.")

Secondly, fur trappers are slaughtering coyotes in droves while simultaneously laughing all the way to the bank. (See The Guardian of London, March 19, 2019, "Coyote Fur Is a Booming Fashion Trend. But Is It Ethical?" and CNBC, February 28, 2019, "Coyote Fur Is in Big Demand Thanks to Popular Parkas.")

Thirdly, the DWR pays hunters US$50 for every coyote that they kill. These bounties are authorized under Utah's hilariously misnomered Mule Deer Protection Act which went into effect in July of 2012. It is almost superfluous to point out that the deer are only being protected so as to allow hunters, as opposed to coyotes, to kill them.

Not surprisingly, killing coyotes has become big business in Utah. For example, between July 1, 2017 and June 30, 2018, Utahans gunned down ten-thousand-four-hundred-sixty-two of them for their bounties. They trapped another three-thousand-three-hundred-thirty-five of them for their fur.

In addition to all of that carnage, the United States Department of Agriculture's Wildlife Services systematically eradicated another three-thousand-twenty-four coyotes for fun in Utah alone. Nationally, the agency admits to slaughtering in excess of seventy-five-thousand of them each year. (See Cat Defender post of September 15, 2005 entitled "The USDA's Wildlife Services Exterminates Millions of Wild Animals Each Year at the Behest of Capitalists.")

As if all of that senseless bloodletting were not repulsive enough in its own right, contests to determine which hunters can kill the most coyotes, bobcats, and foxes are held annually in at least forty-five states. (See The Washington Post, May 17, 2019, "Coyote-Killing Contests Face Growing Outrage, State Bans" and the Humane Society of the United States in Washington, an undated article entitled "Gruesome Wildlife Killing Contests Exposed.") 

The picture that emerges of this sorry business is not a very pretty one to behold. Revered by the Navajos as "God's dog," coyotes have been reduced to little more than objects of naked exploitation and unspeakable abuse.

They are valued by trappers only for their pelts, by hunters for the bounties that their corpses fetch, by wildlife biologists and ornithologists for all the cats that they either kill or maim, and by Wildlife Services as being easy extermination targets. Mule deer, on the other hand, exist only to be shot by hunters.

Cats, which always have been regarded as fair game for every kind of abuse and exploitation, are nowadays being maimed right and left by leghold traps in St. George and elsewhere. Yet, despite all the horrific damage and interminable suffering inflicted upon innocent ones such as Bobby, the DWR and its political overlords not only stubbornly refuse to outlaw leghold traps but to even properly regulate their use.

It thus seems perfectly clear that politicians and bureaucrats in Utah care absolutely nothing at all about either the safety and well-being of cats, the feelings and interests of their aggrieved owners, and wildlife in general. The making of a fast and easy buck is all that concerns them no matter how many animals are slaughtered and maimed in the process.

With such a perverse mindset holding sway throughout the land, it is anything but surprising that the coronavirus has brought the nation to its knees and placed its continued survival in jeopardy. With the notable exception of a handful of local officials, the political class in this country could care less how many citizens die. Even more alarmingly, that is just fine with the masses who are far too selfish to care about either anyone or anything other than themselves.

In addition to Bobby's horrific suffering and the loss of a limb, One More Chance has been saddled with Washington Family Veterinary Clinic's whopping bill. Anyone who therefore would be willing to financially assist it in settling it as well as to care for all the other cats that have been maimed by leghold traps is strongly encouraged to contact Kris Neal at either (415) 619-4712 or to visit her rescue group's web site at www.onemorechance.com.

Leghold traps are quite obviously a very big problem in St. George and One More Chance accordingly needs and deserves all the support that it can get from the public in order to attend to those cats that have been maimed by them. In the final analysis, however, an ounce of prevention always has been worth considerably more than a pound of cure and with that being the case the only lasting solution to this problem would be an outright, across-the-board ban on the manufacture, sale, and use of leghold traps.

Photos: Kris Neal of One More Chance (Bobby) and Lady Freethinker (coyote).