SEPTEMBER saw killer dogs, a World War II bomb explosion and monster veg.

* The owner of a cat mauled to death by killer dogs called for action against the fashion for fighting dogs on a Hitchin estate.

Neighbours were woken to the sounds of animals fighting in the early hours after two Staffordshire bull terrier type dogs were left roaming Westmill. A neighbour tried to save the cat but was too late.

The owner said: “Kids are buying them to show their friends and boast about them. A lot of young kids are buying dogs like these to show them off. It’s ride around here.”

* A bomb blew up in the middle of Stevenage after workers found a suspected World War II grenade at the bottom of a drained pond.

The area was cleared before army bomb disposal experts set off a controlled explosion in Town Centre Gardens.

Barrels of diesel near the grenade forced the team to move the device to open land before burying it, covering it in sandbags and triggering the explosion.

* A pensioner was left pinching herself after she was sent a letter telling her she was dead. The demand for housing benefit repayment from Stevenage Borough Council explained how sorry the authority was about the 84-year-old’s demise but she owed �168.20 to the authority.

“My daughter’s furious – the letter could have killed me,” she said.

* The hot summer combined with a wet spring was causing strange things to happen in the garden.

Veg across Comet country was reaching extraordinary sizes as the conditions made for super growth. Two marrows went in opposite directions, one grew to a startling 63 inches in Hitchin while in Shillington one pipped the scales at a whopping 86lbs.

The grower of the Hitchin giant, a former Mediterranean farmer, said it reminded him of when he was in Southern Italy.