A life down but still purring

Abused kittens recovering

LOREN BATSON/ The Dominion Post

TIME FOR A CAT NAP: Wounded kittens Twist (pictured) and Oliver are lapping up the care at Lower Hutt's Cat's Protection League after surgery to amputate their mutilated legs. Once recovered, they will be adopted out.

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Two kittens brutally wounded by having their paws cut off believed to be by children using a knife or scissors still have eight lives left and are expected to make full use of them.

Oliver and Twist, the nine-week-old kittens who each received injuries to their hind left leg, had their entire legs amputated on Wednesday and are now recovering at the Cat's Protection League foster home in Lower Hutt.

Miramar vet Alan Probert, whose clinic Animalz completed the surgery on the kittens on Wednesday, said cats were "amazingly resilient creatures''.

The hour long surgeries on each of the cats had gone well and they were expected to make a full recovery, he said.

The pair spent yesterday recovering in front of a warm fire, being cleaned by the other kittens and running around as normal, committee member Susan McNair said.

"They never had use of the damaged leg so they have adapted and run around, and jump and climb on things.''

 Following the publication of the kittens' abuse, offers of money and adoption "came flooding in'', Ms McNair said.

People had donated more than $2000 from as far away as Norway, Britain, the Netherlands and United States.

Ms McNair said she thought the children, who left the cats with the league before leaving without any contact details, were joking when they told her the kittens' feet ''fell off''.

"I never thought that their feet had actually gone,'' she said. "It's just horrendous.''

Ms McNair said she has received seven critically abused kittens in the past four months, a huge rise on the one case per year previously experienced.

"It's sickening,'' she said.

One kitten had an industrial staple gun wound through its head, while another was left on her doorstep entangled in fishing wire which had caused deep wounds around its stomach.

Both kittens died.

- © Fairfax NZ News