A community reacted swiftly to raise the cash needed to replace a youngster’s quad bike after it was stolen on Thursday night.

The boy’s mum posted details of the theft across Wisbech Facebook groups appealing for help to trace the New Force bike.

“Hi guys, can you share the heck out of this post,” she said adding that her son would be “heartbroken when he found out.”

She wrote; “Our son saved long and hard for this over the past two years.

“Some lowlife scum of the earth came on to our property last night (after 10.30pm and before 6.30am) and took his quad, without the keys.

“If you have any information or are offered a quad like this please either contact myself or call 101 crime ref 35-12765-19.”

But a JustGiving page set up to raise £100 to replace the bike reached £235 within 24 hours.

The woman who launched the appeal wrote; “This young lad has saved every piece of money he has received for the last two year’ to buy himself a quad bike only for some low life to steal it.”

She added: “Some people may think there are more important things to donate their money too but I want to restore this lad’s faith in others and to realise there are still good people out there.

“This lad learnt so much about saving in the last two years and I do not want him to think this was all for nothing.”

She added: “Please help to just get him started again.”

And so they did with donations soon reaching – and then passing – the £100 target sum set.

Many chipped in with £5 or £10 or £20 donations but an anonymous donor weighed in with the full £100.

“I hope this helps,” the anonymous donor wrote on the appeal page.

On the mum’s page alone the theft of the post was shared nearly 400 times and shared 300 times on other sites: there were also hundreds of other shares of the post across forums in the Wisbech, Lincolnshire and West Norfolk area.

One mum wrote: “I hope that he gets his quad bike back in one piece; scumbags cannot leave anything alone.”