Hubert Strobel missed his cat Maczko.
After hours he found him - caught in a snap trap.
Strobel does not rule out that someone set up the device on purpose to harm cats.
Bernbeuren – Maczko, a slim, one-year-old tomcat with long fur and green eyes, gropes his way into Hubert Strobel's house every morning and gets his breakfast.
But last Tuesday the food bowl remained untouched.
"Maczko didn't come," says the 75-year-old from Bernbeuren.
Strobel spent the whole morning searching the neighborhood for his hangover.
He yelled Maczko's name, rode his bike down the streets, and asked his neighbors to see if they might have accidentally locked the animal in their home.
But in vain: The cat could not be found.
After hours of searching: Bernbeurener finds a cat in a brutal snap trap
Strobel says he assumed the worst: he looked on the main street to see if Maczko's lifeless body was lying somewhere.
“I live near Kaufbeurer Strasse,” he explains.
"A lot of cats get run over there."
Around noon, the man from Bernbeuren finally discovered his tomcat.
Bleeding and powerless, Maczko crouched behind the small, gray wall that separates Strobel's property from that of his neighbor.
It was a coincidence that he saw the animal there, says the 75-year-old.
"I actually just wanted to check with the neighbors again." Maczko hadn't made a sound.
The animal's left front paw was caught in a snap trap - a brutal device resembling a bear trap that snaps shut if someone steps inside.
The police confiscated the trap and passed it on to the prosecutor.
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The police seized the trap.
© Police Schongau
The cat probably didn't have the strength to whine loudly and draw attention to himself.
"He must have screamed like an ox beforehand," Strobel is sure, who immediately set about rescuing the cat.
Because the trap was an "ancient, rusty device", as the 75-year-old describes, he had to use force.
The mechanism could not be cracked.
So he got two screwdrivers and pried open the metal clamps.
Maczko was finally free.
Strobel packed the injured cat into the car and made his way to the vet, who gave Maczko an injection to stabilize the circulation.
Then the two drove to a veterinary practice in Peiting, where the cat was x-rayed and treated with painkillers.
Luckily Maczko didn't break anything.
Rumors of "cat haters" in the neighborhood - but Strobel doesn't want to accuse anyone
The cat is now back home in Bernbeuren, but he is not healthy yet.
"The paw is twice as thick as normal," says Strobel with concern.
He drove to the Peitingen vet again.
During the examination, he found that the wound had not become infected, reports the owner.
So it's slowly going uphill with Maczko.
"He can perform again."
Hubert Strobel would not have thought that something like this could be done to his cat.
"But it wasn't news to me that something like this was possible," he admits.
After all, he has already heard from acquaintances that there should be a "cat hater" in the neighborhood.
"But I just couldn't believe it." The first moment he saw his injured cat, he immediately thought of this person.
"I was so angry."
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Still, he doesn't want to accuse anyone.
"I have no evidence," says the 75-year-old.
In addition, he could not rule out that the trap was actually aimed at another animal, such as a marten, and Maczko accidentally stepped into it.
"It can be both," says Strobel.
"Perfidious thinking or a lot of stupidity."
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