Urgent - I need your help

Please help save two precious cats from needless harm.

My neighbor, Gloria, has two lazy housecats, named Leap-in-the-air and Tubs.
There is a mouse in her house and is Gloria is setting traps for them. The
kind of mousetrap you bait with cheese or peanut butter and when the mouse
goes for the bait a piece of metal snaps down and breaks the mouse's spine.
Gloria insists that such a trap if sprung by a cat's paw would do no harm to
the cat's paw.

I believe she is wrong. Although I would never use such a trap in the first
place, even if I would consider using one I certainly would not leave it
where a cat might accidentally get a paw caught in it.

What I need from you guys is testimonials -- not opinions, but actual
stories of injuries to cats who've encountered such mousetraps and been
seriously hurt by them. I will show those to Gloria and hope she at least
decides to put the mousetraps out of reach of her kitties.

Time is of the essence!

Thank you.

I don't think you're going to get much in the way of testimonials since
most of us have the sense to know that something that has the capability
to kill a small animal can cause harm to a larger one.
The only thing I can suggest, and I am very serious about this, is that
you go over there, set a mousetrap, and *insist* your friend stick her
own finger in it to prove her theory that it won't cause harm to a more
fragile cat's paw. That might be enough to get the point across.

Megan



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Friendly-like, have Gloria "test" trap by sticking her own
finger on it and springing trigger on her finger....she must
be a few sandwiches short of a picnic, and if so, is dumb
enough to do your "test" if you suggest it.


"Pat" wrote in message
...
Please help save two precious cats from needless harm.

My neighbor, Gloria, has two lazy housecats, named Leap-in-the-air and
Tubs.
There is a mouse in her house and is Gloria is setting traps for them. The
kind of mousetrap you bait with cheese or peanut butter and when the mouse
goes for the bait a piece of metal snaps down and breaks the mouse's
spine.
Gloria insists that such a trap if sprung by a cat's paw would do no harm
to
the cat's paw.

I believe she is wrong. Although I would never use such a trap in the
first
place, even if I would consider using one I certainly would not leave it
where a cat might accidentally get a paw caught in it.

What I need from you guys is testimonials -- not opinions, but actual
stories of injuries to cats who've encountered such mousetraps and been
seriously hurt by them. I will show those to Gloria and hope she at least
decides to put the mousetraps out of reach of her kitties.

Time is of the essence!

Thank you.

She told me that she did try it on her finger and it didn't even hurt, and
that's why she thinks it won't hurt a cat's paw.

"Hopitus" wrote in message
...
Friendly-like, have Gloria "test" trap by sticking her own
finger on it and springing trigger on her finger....she must
be a few sandwiches short of a picnic, and if so, is dumb
enough to do your "test" if you suggest it.

wrote in message
...
I don't think you're going to get much in the way of testimonials since
most of us have the sense to know that something that has the capability
to kill a small animal can cause harm to a larger one.
The only thing I can suggest, and I am very serious about this, is that
you go over there, set a mousetrap, and *insist* your friend stick her
own finger in it to prove her theory that it won't cause harm to a more
fragile cat's paw. That might be enough to get the point across.


Megan, when she originally told me of her plan she claimed that she had let
the trap snap on her own finger and that it didn't hurt and therefore it
could not hurt a cat's paw. We've already had a long argument about how the
bones in a cat's paw are smaller than a bone in a human finger. She is dead
sure that these bones are close enough to the same size that a mousetrap not
only could not break such a bone but would not even hurt the cat.

See why I am desperate?

in article , Pat at
wrote on 3/19/05 11:19AM:

Please help save two precious cats from needless harm.

My neighbor, Gloria, has two lazy housecats, named Leap-in-the-air and Tubs.
There is a mouse in her house and is Gloria is setting traps for them. The
kind of mousetrap you bait with cheese or peanut butter and when the mouse
goes for the bait a piece of metal snaps down and breaks the mouse's spine.
Gloria insists that such a trap if sprung by a cat's paw would do no harm to
the cat's paw.

I believe she is wrong. Although I would never use such a trap in the first
place, even if I would consider using one I certainly would not leave it
where a cat might accidentally get a paw caught in it.

What I need from you guys is testimonials -- not opinions, but actual
stories of injuries to cats who've encountered such mousetraps and been
seriously hurt by them. I will show those to Gloria and hope she at least
decides to put the mousetraps out of reach of her kitties.

Time is of the essence!

Thank you.



I could find nothing on the net about spring traps injuring cats, but I did
find this hint:

Place the trap inside a small cardboard box that has enough height to allow
the trap to snap. Some shoe boxes work for this). Cut a 3" x 3 opening on
two opposite sides of the box. Place the box with a baited trap in a known
rat path so that the rats will be able to enter the box as they travel on
their path.

This should prevent your pet from being snapped by the trap.

Pat wrote:
Please help save two precious cats from needless harm.

My neighbor, Gloria, has two lazy housecats, named Leap-in-the-air
and Tubs. There is a mouse in her house and is Gloria is setting
traps for them. The kind of mousetrap you bait with cheese or peanut
butter and when the mouse goes for the bait a piece of metal snaps
down and breaks the mouse's spine. Gloria insists that such a trap if
sprung by a cat's paw would do no harm to the cat's paw.

I believe she is wrong. Although I would never use such a trap in the
first place, even if I would consider using one I certainly would not
leave it where a cat might accidentally get a paw caught in it.

What I need from you guys is testimonials -- not opinions, but actual
stories of injuries to cats who've encountered such mousetraps and
been seriously hurt by them. I will show those to Gloria and hope she
at least decides to put the mousetraps out of reach of her kitties.

Time is of the essence!

Thank you.

I don't have any testimonials about cats getting hurt but when I had to use
spring traps for a mouse problem years ago I shoved them way back behind the
refrigerator and back in cabinets where the cats did not go. And if she's
ever seen one that didn't quite DIE because it was caught in the trap, she'd
abhor using such a thing, too. I switched to bait traps (again, shoved way
back). I didn't have a cat at the time but I had a dog smaller than my cat.
I made sure the bait wasn't anywhere near where my dog (or a cat) could
reach.

Her finger is not at all an indication of how this would hurt a cat paw and
if she doesn't think it hurts, she's never really done it. I only had a
trap spring on me once and it HURT like Hades.

Jill

"jmcquown" wrote

I don't have any testimonials about cats getting hurt but when I had to
use
spring traps for a mouse problem years ago I shoved them way back behind
the
refrigerator and back in cabinets where the cats did not go. And if she's
ever seen one that didn't quite DIE because it was caught in the trap,
she'd
abhor using such a thing, too. I switched to bait traps (again, shoved
way
back). I didn't have a cat at the time but I had a dog smaller than my
cat.
I made sure the bait wasn't anywhere near where my dog (or a cat) could
reach.

Her finger is not at all an indication of how this would hurt a cat paw
and
if she doesn't think it hurts, she's never really done it. I only had a
trap spring on me once and it HURT like Hades.


I'm hurting from the very thought... Can you image what this could do to a
cat's tongue? She doesn't feed them much, they are always begging for food
and what food she did buy for them was rancid right out of the bag, the dogs
won't even touch it when they are starving, so I can't imagine any little
morsel of anything in the house going uninvestigated by her cats. Aren't
they smart enough to catch and eat the mice? I guess not and I guess this is
her way of punishing them for not catching those mice. Honest to Bast it
makes me want to start packing and move away from here but where else could
I live on $600/month and still have six cats. I am already in a trap.

On Sat, 19 Mar 2005 12:19:47 -0600, Pat wrote:


wrote in message
...
I don't think you're going to get much in the way of testimonials since
most of us have the sense to know that something that has the capability
to kill a small animal can cause harm to a larger one. The only thing I
can suggest, and I am very serious about this, is that you go over
there, set a mousetrap, and *insist* your friend stick her own finger in
it to prove her theory that it won't cause harm to a more fragile cat's
paw. That might be enough to get the point across.


Megan, when she originally told me of her plan she claimed that she had
let the trap snap on her own finger and that it didn't hurt and therefore
it could not hurt a cat's paw. We've already had a long argument about how
the bones in a cat's paw are smaller than a bone in a human finger. She is
dead sure that these bones are close enough to the same size that a
mousetrap not only could not break such a bone but would not even hurt the
cat.

See why I am desperate?

I would suggest you take the cat to your house until she traps the mouse.
Could you convince her this is the best way? MLNB

"mlbriggs" wrote

I would suggest you take the cat to your house until she traps the mouse.
Could you convince her this is the best way?

There are two cats there, one of which can't be touched. The other, Tubs,
used to live here but anytime he has tried to come back and visit Tommy and
Eli have read him the riot act.

Remember we are dealing with an extremely stubborn woman. Two years ago when
I saw hemp dogbane growing thick in one of the pastures I told her it is
deadly poison to livestock and she should eradicate it. She said it was OK
and even stopped me from pulling the plants out by the roots. The following
summer one of the baby foals ate some of that plant and died from it. Then
she went about eradicating the weed from all the pastures.

The only way she learns anything is through hard experience. The best advice
is unwelcome and universally rejected simply because it was not *her* idea
or because she believes it is wrong.