Littlefoot's Heroic Sacrifice Turns Out to Have Been in Vain as He Ultimately Loses His Left Rear Leg to a Fence in Rawlins

Littlefoot Survived but He Desperately Needs a Guardian and a Home

"He had chewed off his toes trying to free himself from the fence."
-- Margaret Quintrall of Pet Partners of Carbon County

Like desperate men, cats are sometimes forced into taking drastic measures in order to stay alive. For instance, when a young and handsome longhaired tuxedo named Littlefoot somehow got his left rear leg hopelessly entangled in a fence in a backyard in Rawlins, two-hundred-fifty kilometers northeast of Cheyenne, he was forced into resorting to the only expedient available to him.

"He had chewed off his toes trying to free himself from the fence," Margaret Quintrall of Pet Partners of Carbon County in Rawlins told the Cowboy State Daily of Lander, four-hundred-thirty-eight kilometers northwest of Cheyenne, on August 8th. (See "A Second Chance for Littlefoot, the Three-Legged Feral Rawlins Town Cat.")

Regrettably, his bravery, suffering, and sacrifice were for naught and he was not able to escape from his terrible predicament until he finally was rescued by an unidentified local realtor. Press reports have not specified the type of fence that he became entangled in but given that Rawlins is located a mixed ranching an farming area, the odds are that the culprit was a barbed-wire one although it also could have been one constructed out of razor-wire, sharp steel spikes, or some other dangerous material. 

The Good Samaritan rushed Littlefoot to the Rawlins Rochelle Animal Shelter but, after pleading penury, it fobbed off his care upon Pet Partners which did not hesitate to accept receipt of him. Although Americans are the richest people in the world and enjoy the highest standard of living ever recorded in history, they are an exceedingly greedy, stingy, and callous breed who, to hear them tell it, do not have even so much as a spare sou to their names.

Not only was Littlefoot's left rear leg badly cut and infected but he also was severely dehydrated and the latter strongly suggests that he had been dangling from that deadly fence for an extended period of time. In addition to the excruciating pain and the despair bought on by the utter hopelessness of his situation, he surely must have lost a considerable amount of blood.

Pet Partners' veterinarian first removed the dead skin from around his wound in an effort to have saved his leg but when it failed to heal the entire limb was removed. No explanation has been given as to why that expedient was deemed necessary and it is puzzling that the wound refused to heal given that Littlefoot appears to be not only a young but a healthy cat as well.

That in turn leads to speculation that neither the attending veterinarian nor Pet Partners were willing to have paid for his extended convalescence in order to have allowed his wound to have healed. The only other explanation that readily comes to mind is that he had gone for so long without treatment that the wound had become too infected in order for his leg to have been saved.

As things eventually turned out, his surgery set the charity back US$700 and although nothing good can be said for his losing of a limb, Littlefoot can take solace in knowing that he had the good fortune to have wound up at Pet Partners as opposed to Black Dog Animal Rescue in Cheyenne. Considering that the latter was far too cheap to have given a cat named Eddie a considerably less expensive blood transfusion, it never would have paid for his emergency operation in a million years.

In fact, Black Dog is so cheap and thinks so little of cats that it is doubtful that it would have parted with as much as seven cents of its hoard in order to have saved Littlefoot's life, let alone US$700. (See Cat Defender post of August 27, 2023 entitled "Too Stingy and Ailurophobic to Have Treated Him, Black Dog Animal Rescue Instead Murders Eddie in Cold Blood and Then Hightails It to Alice Gibbs of Newsweek in Order to Have Her Promote Its and PETA's Cat-Killing Cult.") 

Once that horrible ordeal was over and done with, Littlefoot's mood improved substantially. Even so, more than a year later he is still a bit skittish around people. He additionally is said to prefer the company of women as opposed to that of men and that, possibly, could imply that he has had bad experiences with the latter in the past.

Bridget Lost Most of Her Fur and Nearly Her Life to a Razor-Wire Fence

His age has not been specified but he surely is a young tom and even possibly could have still been a kitten when this terrible calamity befell him. Since it has been a year and nobody has called for him, he more than likely was either cruelly abandoned or born homeless.

The persistent cruelty that owners display toward their kittens and cats continues to consternate and that is even more so the case when it comes to cats such as Littlefoot who are young, attractive, and healthy. Therefore, with any kind of remotely good fortune they are fully capable of providing their owners with ten, twenty, or more years of faithful and rewarding companionship and no sensible person could ever ask for more out of this vale of tears where, as Elizabeth-Jane Farfrae concluded in Thomas Hardy's 1886 novel, The Mayor of Casterbridge, "happiness was but the occasional episode in a general drama of pain."

For the past year Littlefoot has been cared for by Joie Meredino of Pet Partners but the charity is now looking to place him in either a permanent home or with a long-term fosterer. It is not, however, just trying to get rid of him.

"I want to make sure he goes to a good home," Merendino told the Cowboy State Daily. "We've been through so much together and he's special to me."

In furtherance of that worthy objective, Pet Partners is planning on closely scrutinizing all potential adopters. "We will be looking at and speaking with each applicant as we want to be sure he finds the perfect home," it wrote August 7th in an untitled article on Facebook.

The person lucky enough to take home this special cat will need, however, to be patient with him and not to crowd him. "Littlefoot is a shy fellow for as big as he is," Pet Partners continued on Facebook. "He comes out to get attention on his own terms and does not like forced attention."

He is said to get along fine with other cats but it is not known how that he would react to being forced to live with a dog. Placing him with a family that has either small or rambunctious children would not be a productive idea.

He is litter box trained and he uses a cardboard scratch toy, as opposed to the furniture, in order to keep his claws sharp. Owing to his handicap, he does however require an owner who would be willing to groom him once or twice a day.

"Littlefoot needs his long beautiful flowing fur brushed occasionally," Pet Partners added on Facebook. "He does get mats in his fur where his leg is missing and on his neck where he can't groom himself. He keeps the rest of his coat well-groomed."

That requirement is hardly worth mentioning in that any true cat-lover would be more than willing to help him keep his fur looking nice. Besides, the boundless joy and faithful companionship that he would bring to any owner would more than compensate for a little assistance with his coat.

Jack Was Speared in the Abdomen by a Spiked Fence in Rotherham 

Nevertheless, Pet Partners is absolutely correct in making that requirement mandatory for anyone wishing to adopt him. After all, anyone who would be too lazy and uncaring in order to groom a cat, especially a handicapped one, would hardly make a fitting owner.

Although  it is not known what Littlefoot's earliest days were like, Rawlins is certainly not any place for a homeless cat during the wintertime. Located six-thousand-eight-hundred feet above sea level, winter comes early in the Rocky Mountains with the thermometer plunging to 30.4° Fahrenheit in October and overnight lows to not recover to the freezing point until May.

During the interim, the thermometer drops to an average of 12.8° Fahrenheit in December, 13.2° Fahrenheit in January, 14.5° Fahrenheit in February, 22° Fahrenheit in March, and 27.3° in April.  On top of all that bitter cold and ice, Rawlins receives 54.1 inches of snow annually. Hopefully, all of that bone-chilling cold, deep snow, perilous fences, and the threats posed to his fragile life by, inter alia, dogs, gray wolves, black and brown bears, and coyotes is now a thing of the past.

Although it is extremely difficult to accurately evaluate any rescue group without first being an insider, Pet Partners nonetheless appears, at least from afar, to be the antithesis of Black Dog. First of all, it inaugurated a TNR program a decade ago and has a working cats program with several area ranchers.

Secondly, it pays for the sterilization and vaccination of all the cats and dogs that it impounds as well as for the veterinary treatment of small animals that are owned by the residents of Carbon County. Thirdly, it operates both adoption and fostering programs. Fourthly, it even investigates cases of animal cruelty.

It does all of that out of the donations that it receives from the public and US$10,000 that it is allotted annually from the city of Rawlins. It additionally is greatly aided in its endeavors by nine volunteers and seven foster families. It sans doute also helps that Carbon County, including Rawlins, has fewer than fifteen-thousand residents.

A resilient as cats like Littlefoot are, that in no way detracts from the sobering reality that this world is chock-full of dangerous, and totally unnecessary, fencing that takes a heavy toll on them and wildlife. For example, on June 21, 2010 a twelve-week-old mackerel-colored kitten named Bridget nearly lost her life when she fell into a razor-wire fence that had been strung between two buildings in Cypress, forty-kilometers south of Los Angeles.

Luckily for her, Randi Custodio of the 9100 block of Julie Beth Street heard her plaintive cries for help and summoned the Orange County Fire Authority which rushed to the scene and freed her from the razor-wire. By that time, however, the damage had already been done.

Drenched in blood from her head to her toes and with multiple deep wounds to her paws, abdomen, back, and elsewhere, she was taken to VCA Lakewood Animal Hospital in Cerritos, seven kilometers northwest of Cypress, where staffers shaved away most of her fur, sutured her wounds, and fitted her with an Elizabethan collar. After that, she was moved to Fuzzy Dog and Cat Rescue in Santa Monica, seventy-one kilometers northwest of Cypress, which paid her initial US$1,300 veterinary bill and promised to find a home for her.

"The vet bills will be quite expensive," Sheila Choi of Fuzzy Dog and Cat said. 'It's (the damage done to Bridget) pretty gruesome."

Her recovery was destined to have been lengthy and difficult but, best of all, she was expected to have made a full recovery. (See Cat Defender post of July 10, 2010 entitled "Bridget Sustains Horrific Injuries after She Slips and Tumbles into a Strand of Razor-Wire Fencing Inhumanely Strung Between Two Buildings.")

Friar Park Is a Sprawling Mansion in a Tony Neighborhood...

Later that same year, a three-year-old black tom named Jack from Rotherham, eleven kilometers northeast of Sheffield in South Yorkshire, slipped and became impaled in a fence constructed out of sharp, metal spikes. In particular, one of the the rusty spikes speared him in both his midsection and right front leg.

Local firefighters cut him down and he was rushed to the Arncliffe Veterinary Centre where his leg was repaired and his abdomen sutured. He was expected to have made a complete recovery but the fur shaved off by the attending veterinarian was anticipated to have taken several months in order to have grown back.

"The thing is the fence is not necessary because it is in front of a seven-foot-high fence," his thirty-two-year-old owner Nicola Milbourn told the Daily Mail of London on September 9, 2010. (See "Nine Lives? Lucky Black Cat Jack Is Down to Eight after Surviving Being Impaled on a Rusty Fence.") "It's bad enough that Jack was hurt but it could have been a child."

She later petitioned the Rotherham Council to have the deadly fence removed but it is not known if she was successful in that endeavor. (See Cat Defender post of October 1, 2010 entitled "Jack Slips and Falls While Pussyfooting Along the Top of an Old Fence and Is Speared Through His Midsection by a Rusty Spike.")

The most famous incident in recent memory involving cats and perilous fences concerned ex-Beatle George Harrison's sprawling mansion, Friar Park, located in Henley-on-Thames in Oxfordshire. Fearing for her own safety after an intruder broke in and stabbed her husband seven times in 1999, his widow, Olivia Trinidad Arias, had one-thousand yards of six to eight feet-tall razor-wire fencing installed around her thirty-eight-acre estate. Soon thereafter multiple cats belonging to her neighbors became impaled in the razor wire.

One of them was a six-year-old mackerel-colored tom named Maurice who was owned by seventy-two-year-old comedian and actor Rodney Bewes. "Is the razor-wire really necessary?" the anything but amused comedian asked the Henley Town Council. "Our cat has been caught three times, once severing an artery (and) nearly losing his tail on another occasion, and we know of three other cats who have been injured."

He additionally questioned the efficacy as well as the appropriateness of the fencing in such a tony neighborhood. "It doesn't make it (Friar Park) any more secure," he argued. "The bottom half is wood and with a good crowbar you could get through it no problem."

In the end Arias conceded to the demands of her irate neighbors and decided against installing more of the deadly razor-wire. It was unclear at the time but presumably the razor-wire that already was in situ was not taken down. (See Cat Defender posts of January 11, 2010 and July 15, 2010 entitled, respectively, "Razor-Wire Fencing Surrounding George Harrison's Mansion, Friar Park, Is Taking a Heavy Toll on Cats from the Neighborhood" and "In a Major Victory for Cats, George Harrison's Widow Changes Her Mind and Decides Not to Install More Razor-Wire Fencing at Friar Park.")

It did not take her long, however, to go back on her word and in 2012 she once again sought approval from the Henley Town Council in order to install additional razor wire but, mercifully, her petition was denied. "Razor wire has no place in Henley," Marin Akehurst, vice chairman of the Henley Town Council's planning committee, told the Daily Mail on November 17, 2012. (See "'Razor Wire Has No Place in Henley': George Harrison's Widow Abandons Plans for Fence Around Oxfordshire Mansion Where Beatle Was Stabbed by Intruder.")

Looking ahead, the encouraging news concerning Littlefoot is that he, at least outwardly, appears to have adjusted as well as could be expected to his newly acquired handicap. "He gets along just fine on three legs," Pet Partners disclosed on Facebook. 

Although most humans have a great deal of difficulty in managing once they have lost an appendage, cats appear to fare considerably better. Of course, since they are unable to communicate their feelings to humans, no one knows for certain what they go through under such trying circumstances.

Even so, their uncanny ability to adjust to having only three legs in no way detracts from the utter senselessness and injustice of humans deliberately robbing them of their appendages. That is especially the case when safe, humane, and equally effective alternatives that do not include barbs, razor-wire, and steel spikes are readily available to ranchers, farmers, governmental entities, homeowners, and businesses.  

As deadly and as injurious as some types of fencing are to cats, they are far from being the number one crippler of cats. Au contraire, distinction belongs to wildlife trappers who set leghold traps in jurisdictions where they are banned by law and in places where they do not belong.

Almost as reprehensible as they damage that they inflict upon animals, it is unheard of for any of these villains to be publicly identified, let alone arrested and prosecuted. The cats that they maim and kill are simply written off as collateral damage.

Even those who, like Littlefoot, are fortunate enough to be taken in by rescue groups that are willing to foot the bill for their treatment are nevertheless still left to pick up the pieces of their shattered lives and to persevere as best as possible. The unlucky ones either bleed to death in these wretched traps or are killed off by veterinarians and shelters too cheap and uncaring to save their lives. (See Cat Defender posts of August 18, 2005, February 9, 2006, September 4, 2007, and July 19, 2020 entitled, respectively, "A Brave Orange Tabby Dubbed Hopalong Cassidy Loses a Limb to a Leghold Trap in British Columbia," "A Newspaper Cat Named Tripod Is Killed Off by the Journalists That He Befriended in Vermont," "A Kitten Named Moppel Is Rescued Unharmed from a Leghold Trap in Sachsen but a Nameless One in Decatur Is Not Nearly So Fortunate," and "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.")

...but Its Razor Wire Makes It Look More Like a Concentration Camp

Hit-and-run motorists who make a game out of seeing how many cats and kittens that they can deliberately run down are likewise responsible for a large percentage of this world's crippled and three-legged cats. Their contribution to this sick and disgusting carnage would be even greater if they did not kill outright most of their intended victims. (See Cat Defender posts of November 2, 2006, January 5, 2011, August 8, 2019, August 14, 2019, and November 22, 2020 entitled, respectively, "A Three-Legged Bobtailed Cat Named Opie Melts the Hearts of the Hardened Criminals at a Rural Tennessee Prison," "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," "Hounded Down and Nearly Killed by a Hit-and-Run Motorist, Eli Desperately Needs Additional Surgeries in Order to Fully Restore His Previous Level of Mobility," and "No Respect for Life: Early Graves and Crippling Injuries Are All That Cats Who Dare to Set Foot in the Street Can Expect from the Bloodthirsty Motoring Public.")

Quite often, however, it is never known how that cats lose their limbs. (See Cat Defender post of November 28, 2008 entitled "Natchez Politicians Pause to Remember Tripod on the Twenty-Fifth Anniversary of His Death.")

Not only does this world abound with three-legged cats but many others are forced to get by on only two appendages. (See Cat Defender posts of November 17, 2010, September 6, 2011 republished on September 22, 2021, and March 17, 2017 entitled, respectively, "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," "Deuce Is Divested of Both His Rear Legs and Part of His Tail but Somehow Manages to Survive on His Own for More Than a Month," and "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.")

Still others are crippled from birth by inherited genetic disorders, such as the Manx Syndrome. (See CNN, July 2, 2023, "Cecily the Cat Has a Lifelong Disability. It Hasn't Stopped Her from Spreading Positivity Online Through Fashionable Outfits.")

Being robbed of two or more paws is almost as difficult for cats as losing an entire limb but that is precisely what reckless combine operators do to countless members of the species each autumn. (See Cat Defender posts of August 20, 2009, November 24, 2009, and November 20, 2010 entitled, respectively, "A Combine Operator Severs Howard's Front Paws and Leaves Him in a Ditch to Die but He Is Saved at the Last Minute by a Pair of Compassionate Lads," "Howard the Combine Kitty Is Adopted by the Lads Who Saved Him from a Sure and Certain Death in a Ditch Alongside a Michigan Wheat Field," and "Celebrated as the World's First Bionic Cat, Oscar Now Has Been Turned into a Guinea Pig with a Very Uncertain Future.") 

Most amazing of all, at a veterinary clinic in Theodore, Alabama, there is (if she is still alive?) a cat named Callie Mae who does not have any legs at all. She was chased up a tree by a predatory dog where she subsequently became entangled in electrical wires, was electrocuted, and fell to the ground fracturing all of her legs. (See WKRG-TV of Mobile, August 9, 2010, "Legless Cat Ready to Start Another Life.")

To sum up, although Littlefoot has been put through Hell there is not any reason that he cannot yet still have a long and happy life. The only impediment standing in his way is his glaring lack of both an owner and a home. Therefore, anyone who would be willing to open up their heart and home to him is encouraged to contact Pet Partners at either (307) 321-4024 or by Post Office Box 1618, Rawlins, Wyoming 82301.

Photos: Pet Partners (Littlefoot), KTLA-TV of Los Angeles (Bridget), Arncliffe Veterinary Centre (Jack), the Henley Standard (Friar Park), and the Daily Mail (razor-wire fencing at Friar Park).