Kerry County Council apologised last night for the incident and said that it will investigate the matter.

It follows publication of a distressing photograph yesterday of the dead animal lying on the side of a road with yellow markings painted over the lower parts of all four of its legs.

The cat was apparently struck and killed by a vehicle on the recently resurfaced road in Bouleenshere, near Ballyheigue, late last week.

The cat was painted over by sub-contractors working on behalf of Kerry County Council either last Thursday or Friday.

A photograph of the dead animal was sent to Animal Help Net Kerry, which published it on its Facebook page, sparking a flood of angry comments.

“Shame on those concerned,” said spokeswoman Wendy O’Connor. “Nobody cared enough to move this poor cat who had been killed by a car and the line was painted over it.

“I would like to think that they would push the animal to the side. But I think whoever did this, saw the cat and just couldn’t be bothered. They just didn’t get off their machine, turned a blind eye and kept going. This was a lousy and callous thing to do. It could have been somebody’s pet, a child’s pet.”

Harry McDaid, the chief inspector with Kerry SPCA, said he had never seen such an incident in his 30-year career.

“I just can’t believe the driver of the road-marking truck would blatantly roll over a dead animal,” he said.

“It’s possible that he just didn’t see it. I’m sure if he had seen it, he would have moved the animal to the side. I’m sure it was a pure accident.”

Charlie O’Sullivan, Kerry County Council’s director of services for roads, pledged to investigate. “All of our road- lining is carried out by private contractors and we will be consulting with the contractors to establish what happened,” he said.

He said road-lining was performed using a large truck, with a computer controlling the positioning of and spacing between the road markings.

Ideally, he said, either the driver of the truck or the team involved in traffic management would have spotted the dead cat and moved it.

“We obviously regret this unfortunate incident and any distress that was caused,” he said.