Living with a semi feral cat

**a post by the mom

First a little background. Eight years ago now, a neighbor and I spotted some kittens and decided to do some TNR in our neighborhood. The first set of kittens were smaller and socialized really well and were adopted through a local shelter. Shortly after that we caught a slightly older kitten.

Once we had him, I didn't have the heart to let him go back outside. Unfortunately, he was about 3 months old which is about the outside edge of being able to socialize kittens. I will also say that I didn't know as much then as I do now. The downside to my decision is that I have what I term a "semi-feral" cat living in my house. He has been here since we caught him. He has been seen by a vet twice since I can't catch him easily or without stressing him out. He lives a good life and is good with kittens and the other cats that live here (mostly - he has some stalker tendencies with Ivy). But he won't come near me. Recently he has gotten up on the bed every once in a while at night when I am reading and will lay at the very edge, but that is as close as he is willing to get. But if I move - he is gone.

Don't get me wrong - I am a proponent of annual check ups for all pets. However, in Junior's case, it is more stressful to try catch him. However, a few months ago I noticed he seemed to be having some mouth pain when he yawned or ate something. I had to decide....let it go and hope it wasn't serious and knowing he was uncomfortable, or set an appointment for a dental and catch him.

 

Busted and headed to the vet

I am very lucky that the tech at my vet's office is also a friend. We talked about it a couple of times and I set an appointment.

However, how do you catch a cat that is afraid of people? I went through a couple of plans in my head. The other thing we had spoken about was trying to get gabapentin into him before bringing him to the office. After some thought, I decided to try to live trap him in one of the bedrooms. I could mix the meds in the food and have a safe way to move him. Plus once we got to the vet, the trap could be set up on one end to be able to sedate him with an injection.

Junior had other plans. Tuesday morning I locked the girls in the back bedroom, herded him into my bedroom and set the trap. After over an hour....nothing. I was now down to 45 minutes before I had to be to the vet. I moved the trap to the bathroom. However, once he got out the bedroom (and I shut the door behind him to limit his space), he freaked out. He bounced around the living room and would not head where I wanted him to go. I knew if I didn't catch him, he wasn't getting to the vet and moreover it would be months before I would even be able to try this again.

Finally he wedged himself behind a pillow on the sofa. It was now or never. I put one of the soft carriers on the chair and grabbed a towel. I threw it over him and wrapped him as much as I could then shoved him into the carrier. It wasn't elegant, but it seemed to work. I locked the zippers on the carrier, threw a towel over the top of the carrier and headed off.

The nice part about the mesh on the carrier is they were able to sedate him by injection right through the mesh - I hadn't thought about that but it was brilliant. He finally dozed off and they got him set up for surgery. I did get a chance to pet him a little and also get a look at his teeth.

I will admit, I did fear that we would find something really bad....up to a possible mass in his mouth. They clipped his nails and he had a full bloodwork panel done along with getting a rabies shot. The bloodwork came back excellent. However, he ended up losing 9 teeth. They could have done more but wanted to not take everything now. I joked with the tech that with a 3 years rabies shot, we would be back then.

The only thing that overcomes ignorance is education. I've learned a lot in 8 years. Would I make the same decision today that I made then? I honestly don't know. While he may be afraid of people, showing his feral birth, I know he has lived a much safer life inside. Right now, he seems to be doing OK. There has been canned food left out and while I think Daiquiri is eating most of it, he is eating. He REALLY does dislike me now though - I so much as breathe in his direction and he disappears. Hopefully that will taper off (or at least back to his normal) after a while.

Random Fridays

We got over 4 inches of snow on Wednesday, so mom got a snow day. She says that there can be disadvantages to working in a small office, but sometimes there are good advantages too. She spent the day doing....not much of anything with all of us. She did put together something new for Chanel. More on that next week.
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Mom has gotten some emails from the neighbor lady Carol that helped with the TNR in our neighborhood. One of our original girls, Annie, isn't doing well. It is so hard when it is a house cat when at least you can provide some comfort. But it is harder when it is a feral you have cared for over the years and there really isn't much you can do for them without causing more stress. We suspect Annie doesn't have much longer here and we hope she crosses peacefully.

It does make mom worry that much more about Allie. She was in the garage on Thursday morning when mom left for work and they have built JUST enough trust that mom managed to get out of the house and into her car and out of the garage and Allie never left her bed on one of the shelves. Which is good since there is snow and probably salt and it is just plain cold here. Mom wishes she could just talk to Allie and convince her that coming inside wouldn't be such a bad thing.

Allie in nicer weather this summer

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Adoption events this weekend for the rescue. There is a fuzzy calico girl at one of the stores. So far there have been 3 applications for her....all of them bad for different reasons. Sheesh....
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We are supposed to stay cold here and get more rain...which means more ice. Stay safe and stay home if you can!! 

Dear Fiona

Dear Fiona:

We wish we could explain to you why you were caught and then put in a big crate with your kittens.

We wish that we could explain to you that living in a house with a family is a good thing.

But sometimes that just isn't meant to be the case.

We do make you this promise.....we will take VERY good care of your kittens.
We will raise them and help find them loving homes.

Love, your short term foster family


**note from the mom: the plan originally was to move the kittens in with Marilyn (the other momma car) over the long weekend. That went fine. Fiona has gotten more and more stressed over the last week - the minute I would enter the foster space (the door has a creak), she would start to growl. She never lunged at me when I opened the crate to clean her box or feed her but I suspect it was only a matter of time. She did swat at me once through the back of the crate however when I was moving something and got too close.

However, getting her caught and spayed didn't quite go as planned. I had the trap upstairs Tuesday morning with the intent of getting her to go in and then dropping her off at the clinic. Instead, she shot out of the crate. Around the foster room, up the curtains, across the large shelving unit and eventually up the screen door....and into the condo. CRAP! I tried to corner her by the front door but no luck. She got cornered by the TV, but I am by no means dumb enough to stick my hands any where near her.

Eventually I got her back downstairs and herded her into the garage. Thinking later, I had her pinned behind a table in the entry way and might have been able to get her into the trap, but let's be honest - it was early, I was now hot and sweaty, and honestly, my blood pressure was probably through the ceiling after a couple of fly bys from her.  I set the trap in garage and went to work hoping a couple of hours of calm and quiet would work in my favor. I went back home, taking lunch early (if you can get a feral in a trap to the clinic before noon, they can be done same day) but no luck.

Here is where I make a hard confession: I am certain she somehow managed to get out of the garage. I left the trap and food in there with the door closed for 2 day. The food was never touched....and she was always willing to eat. Hopefully she will stick around....there is food, water and shelter available in the garage. Hopefully Allie will find her and they can be a pair. I will keep my eyes open and keep setting the trap in the hopes of catching her. I just feel like I failed her in that final step....but I will keep trying.

take a deep breath

*a post from the mom

Some of my friends know part of this story, but here is the whole thing.

Just over a couple of weeks ago, a friend I volunteer with mentioned that she had seen some kittens on a construction site (she works for the city water department). We talked about options and I offered her my trap to catch the family. I figured a rescue that focuses on TNR would be a good fit and that under the circumstances I would be ok getting permission after the fact. And I got the go ahead a couple of days later.

Unfortunately the mom cat moved the kittens, but after several attempts (and keeping in mind my friend isn't on site every day so that slowed everything down), the kittens were found last Tuesday (a week ago now) and the mom cat was caught later that day.

Mom is tiny, black, fuzzy and feral. No doubt about the feral thing either.... the hope was maybe she was scared and had been abandoned, but she has been calling me names from the start.

The mom cat got flea meds on the way to the house and the kittens got a bath once we were all home. They are SO tiny....their teeth are coming in and based on the timeline, they have to be at least a month old. I know this is going to be a battle. 3 black kittens, 1 gray one. There was a fifth one, but a driver had seen the mom cat drop it as she was presumably moving kittens over a week before we caught the rest of the family and took it home with him - their family has had bottle babies before and I got an update last Thursday that the kitten is doing well and they are going to keep him (or her).

Tuesday night was a long one. The gray kitten started going downhill and I pulled him out. I sat with him and tried to warm him up and get him to eat with no luck. I finally took him into the bathroom where I had moved Marilyn and her kittens when I put the feral mom in the large crate. Marilyn took to the baby right away, but I knew his chances were slim. I kept checking on everyone during the night. It is hard to get a feel for the other kittens since I can't really see them if they are curled up with each other or with mom - it is just one black blob.

Unfortunately, the gray kitten passed away Tuesday night. Considering his condition, I wasn't surprised, but it still hurts to know that I couldn't save him.

Wednesday was a long day. I tried to move the web cam so I could see in the crate, but managed to actually disconnect the camera somehow, so that was a bust. (it is back online now [more or less] and I am NOT moving it ever again - haha) I work about 20 minutes from home (if traffic is moving) so running home at lunch isn't an option. 

I finally made it home after work. I went into the foster room and the kittens were quiet. Knowing I wanted to check on them, I still hesitated. It was the ultimate moment we face as fosters: if you don't check, you don't know; but if you don't check, you can't get bad news. 

I pulled up the sheet covering the crate and 3 little black kittens were walking around and started meeping when they saw the light.

I put my head down on the crate and took the first deep breath of the day.

They still may not make it. I know that. They are so tiny and fragile. They are older than Marilyn's kittens but about about half their size. I will have an update later in the week as decisions are made about how to keep them going. The issue for the moment is that I can't reliably get my hands on them since their momma is very freaked out.

Oh - and as for mom....there is another city site that actually built a shelter for their ferals (YAY). Mom cat will be spayed and ear tipped and moved down there. Ideally she would be taken back to her original location, but this other site is much safer and she will be watched over there as well.

the name Fiona has been running around in my head, 

so that is the name mom will have from now on

No names for the kittens yet....

wordy Wednesday

Can you believe it was June 2012 that mom first saw Allie (our feral girl) and caught the alcohol kittens??  (for their first post, click here)

At the time Allie was spayed, the vet aged her about 2 years old, which would make her about 5 years old now. For a feral, that is pretty good. We do what we can for her...keep an eye out, leave the garage door up a crack for her to get to food, water and shelter. There are even some toys in the garage (we know someone is playing - those toys move around). And while we wish we could wrap her up and find her a home and everything, she truly is feral. Mom can get within about 4 feet of Allie before she takes off. Even when she was crated with her kittens, Allie made it VERY clear to mom that she wasn't happy about the situation.

But Allie is spayed and she has safety and food. One of our neighbors has a shelter set up for her too and puts food out as well. And the neighbor said that she has seen Allie lounging under another neighbor's dryer vent in the winter. Resourceful our girl.....

We aren't sure how far Allie roams. And especially when the weather gets nice, mom doesn't see her as often. A couple of weeks ago, mom had seen her on a Monday morning. On Tuesday evening, mom drove to the shelter to volunteer and there was a cat on the side of the road that had been hit by a car and obviously died from it. Mom was almost sure it was Allie. But she couldn't bring herself to go check more closely. Mom said that just wasn't the image she wanted in her head of our girl. We were heartbroken....but we also knew that locking Allie in a house was never an option.

Well, that Saturday evening, mom ran an errand, and there was Allie - sitting just like she is above...across from our garage, waiting for mom to get out of the way. Mom was stunned. And while we hope the black cat mom saw along the road didn't suffer, we are glad it wasn't Allie.

We know she won't live forever.....none of us do. And life for a feral cat is even harder. Though with her being 5 years old now, she certainly has to be street smarter than most. We will continue to provide her with what we can.  Mom has sat in the garage before and talked to Allie, but Allie makes no indication that she is going to give mom a chance to get too close.

For anyone who loves a feral, you understand. And we certainly don't ever want to discourage anyone from getting involved in TNR and caring for colony cats. It can be incredibly rewarding.....and getting them spayed and neutered cuts down on fights and disease and overpopulation.

National Feral Cat Day

When mom starting volunteering for our local humane society, she had no idea about feral cats or TNR or anything like that.

Fast forward to today and she volunteers with a local group that started out doing TNR and remains firmly committed to that as their primary objective.  And in that time mom has helped TNR 9 cats on her own and with the help of a neighbor and picked up 12 kittens that have been fostered and adopted since then. (including our Junior boy)  We are also lucky that we have a local low cost spay/neuter clinic that is feral friendly - they will take cats in live traps and do surgery same day.

Alley Cat Allies started National Feral Cat Day in 2001 to help promote education. This is the most important thing we can do. No matter what you hear in the news and from some other groups, feral cats are not the bad guys of nature. Human beings attempted to domesticate cats and then failed them (in our opinion). And TNR works....since mom started in our neighborhood, we had a stable population and NO NEW KITTENS in 2 years. Taking a feral cat to a "shelter" is simply a death sentence....

Also, check out the No Kill Revolution information on the Best Friends website.

What can you do?

Find a local TNR group and offer to help....most need volunteers to feed colonies or pick up and drop off cats in traps for surgery. Or donate...they need money for food and for live traps. Want to donate a trap to them directly? Check your local farm store (we know Tractor Supply has them) or online (we found one at amazon).

Promote spay and neuter. And remind people that seeing a "stray cat" is not something to be ignored. Take a stand. And please don't think that doing nothing solves the problem. While these cats can care for themselves, human kindness in the manner of food and shelter goes a long way. And about shelters: Alley Cat Allies has a great guide you can use

It can be hard but rewarding. Mom says that if you do this long enough, there is little more satisfying than coming up to a trap you have set and finding a cat in it (not as satisfying to find a raccoon or opposum that you just have to convince to get back OUT of the trap - MOL). And check for the ear tip...that is a sign that your "stray cat" is actually part of a colony that has already been spayed or neutered.

Allie snoopervising the rebuilding of the neighbor's balcony 

Allie likes to hang around - waiting for mom

to get a move on in the mornings so Allie can get

in the garage for her breakfast.

 She would be killed in a shelter...and deserves better than that.

Which is why we provide her food and a place to live and our protection.

And remember too - Coral and her siblings were born to a
feral mom who has now been spayed and released.

weekend wrapup

No transport.....
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Caturday morning, mom locked us in the bathroom (except Junior who refused to cooperate) and then moved around the furniture..... and then two guys showed up and cleaned the carpet.

They did a great job, were very nice (they were from Stanley Steemer if you were curious) and the stairs look awesome!! Mom told the one guy she wasn't sure if she should be amazed or appalled.
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And then it happened:

Mom was over at the adoption center for the rescue talking to the head rescue lady (Miss Mona). She mentioned that a woman had been trying to catch a cat and managed on Friday night to get her in a carrier on Friday and close the door. Of course, rather than call then, the lady waited and called Saturday morning - with the added bonus of "and I think she may have kittens".

By the time mom got over there, the momma cat had three kittens - two torties and one orange tabby that looks like mom. The concern was momma cat....and it turns out she isn't so friendly. For now she is in the bathroom and is caring for the kitts but is very unhappy. Mom is in contact with the rescue and we will see how things move forward.

But for now.....awwww:

Finally Friday......

Let's see......

Mom got a call from her neighbor last weekend about our neighborhood cats. Seems the one boy they haven't caught yet was limping....mom gave her access to the house to get the live trap but no luck yet. However, she has nearly caught Blackie 3 times now (he has been caught once every season we put out the trap...no fear of live traps). :)

Speaking of ferals, Brian has a chip-in set up for a local group in his area that needs some help. Mom got paid today so we are stealing some green papers to send.

Otherwise, we have been behaving....as much as we ever do. Mom says she is busy tomorrow but we are planning a slow Sunday.....

takin' after my bro - and stealin' more warms

back off or I shoot you with my lasers

Trouble Tuesday.....

We weren't sure how many of you had heard about this, so we wanted to get it out there.

Loews hotels in Florida had a feral cat problem. One of their bellman - out of the goodness of his heart and his own pocket - started doing TNR. The hotel management didn't seem to care one way or the other. And the maintenance department even built feeding stations for the cats that matched the hotel. The colony population went from about 40 to 8.

Then a change of management and the cats became a "liability". Though we wonder cause they have never said how they came to that decision. Traps were set and the cats were going to be taken to a local shelter - and we all know they would have been euthanized. Riverfront Cats stepped up and was helping to keep the cats from the shelter. They are also helping organize people to let Loews know they are making a bad decision. You can check out their efforts to stop the move on the Facebook page.

Right now, they are organizing a letter writing campaign - if you can write a letter, sign it and scan it, please email it to Riverfrontcats@yahoo.com and they will cover the postage to mail all the letters together.

It bothers us....so many people are suddenly taking flack for doing the right thing to help these homeless cats and lower their population. Disney has a feral cat colony that is controlled. At least one casino in Las Vegas got help from Best Friends and now has a controlled colony (they choose to remain anonymous to keep people from dropping off cats there).

So, please like their facebook page and write a letter if you can. Loews claims to be "pet friendly" and a good corporate citizen - but that apparently doesn't extend to the cats that are living on their property.

Some of you may remember that Junior was live-trapped when we helped control our local colony...this was his 2nd day in the bathroom. While mom isn't allowed to pet him, he at least doesn't look this ticked off anymore....  But imagine him being trapped by this hotel and relocated (which doesn't always work) or euthanized....just for being born outside.

PSA: Pawblic Service Announcement

Most of you guys know we support TNR!!  Heck - we support it so much that Junior never left (you know: trap, neuter, don't release - MOL). :)

Anyhow, we got an email from Best Friends about what the US Fish and Wildlife Service is up to now. Seems they plan to offer a class on inflencing communitys about TNR. And we aren't talking about the good influence - they want to complete do away with TNR. WHAT???? And it sounds like they have no intention of showing the cost savings to communities from TNR. They seem to be advocating going back to killing feral colonies and they certainly aren't saying how they (using our tax dollars) intend to pay for it.

Ticked off yet????  Click here to go the Best Friends Advocacy Center and send an email. And feel free to blog this forward.....

You can read more about feral/commity cats at the Best Friends Cat Initiatives and also from Alley Cat Allies. And check out this video about the latest TNR effort by Best Friends in Utah - the whole town came together to help their community cats...it is pretty cool. :)