Do you feed stray cats or ignore them?

[ringmastery]

I don't want a cat and I know if I feed the stray cats in the neighborhood they'll start hanging around my home and could cause problems, yet when I see obviously thin and hungry stray cats, I sometimes pity them and give them leftovers.

What do you do with strays?

[Ready4Change]

1. One option:

Catch them, get them neutered and tested for FIV, etc..., then re-release them.

That one cats life may be miserable. But at least it won't be making more cats to live similar, miserable lives.

[BiggJawn]

6. We do the "Catch and Release" thing here.

I reckon we've spared the town a coupla hundred feral cats since we had "Miss Kitty" fixed. She'd throw about 6-7 kittens every litter, mostly females. After the second litter we knew of, we put a stop to that shit. She's still feral as all get out. Allows us within 10 feet, no closer.

Then along came Reesie, who is either a militant cat, or was fixed before she got dumped, because she's never been pregnant. Took a year or so, but now we can pick her up for a SHORT time!

Then there's Stoner (you should see him with a fistfull of catnip) who is the first cat I've ever seen who comes when you call. He's everybody's buddy...:-)

We feed 'em all and they have warm places to sleep in the winter.

Then there was Buster, who showed up last winter with no fur and pneumonia. who would dump a house cat at the start of winter? (I know! A heartless bastard. A bush-voter, perhaps)
after we got his lungs straightend out, he took a trip to the vet to get "divested" of a few things. Now he's a house cat, and a damn fine mouser.

[Feanorcurufinwe]

2. They feed my dogs.

[bratcatinok]

3. We don't have many strays here

since they have to survive the coyotes and most don't. My ex-MIL has several acres on the far edge of town and she feeds all of the strays that come up. One reason she's able to keep strays around is because my ex-dog lives there and my ex-dog keeps the coyotes run off.

[Mikimouse]

4. I feed them...

I live in a complex full of undergraduates, many of whom think it is real cool to abandon their cats at the end of the semester when they go home to mommy and daddy (who wouldn't let them have a pet in the first place). Most of them also believe that animals don't have souls, so it is OK for them to be abandoned. :mad:

[BiggJawn]

7. You live near a bible college or seminary?

"Animals don't have souls"... Sounds like Jesuits to me...What a silly notion.

[Rhiannon12866]

5. I not only fed a stray cat,

but I finally had to borrow a have-a-heart trap from the animal hospital to bring her in. She was obviously terrified, having been a housecat who was accidentally left behind when a neighbor moved. I just wish that I had known about her much sooner and spared us both, though mostly her, so much suffering. I also wish that I had taken her in for necessary dental work much sooner. She became a different cat, jumping up into my chair when I'd call her and lying next to the computer while I was typing. Her teeth must have made her horribly uncomfortable. I lost her in February, despite the best veterinary efforts, and miss her terribly.;(

[Ready4Change]

9. Thanks for giving her a happier ending.

Sometimes that's the best one can do.

[Rhiannon12866]

15. Thank you. That's what they said at the vet's

But I just wish that I had known about her sooner, before she became so traumatized. I just cannot imagine her experience. And I didn't get her dental work done right away because I was dealing with a dog with Cushing's and then cancer. My goal was for her to know that she was finally safe. I don't really think that she ever completely did, so I feel that I let her down. All my guys have sad stories, but hers broke my heart most of all.;(

[Autobot77]

8. We used to not have any strays

Probably our dog scared them off, but unfortunetly the dog died and recently I discovered a kitten living in our side yard, though I'm not 100 % sure its a stray. We just started to leave food and water for it, if it is a stray we'll prob take it to get shots and spayed/neutered.

[Piltdown13]

10. We don't feed them, but don't ignore them either

There are plenty of wandering cats in our neighborhood because for some reason just about all of our cat-owned neighbors let their kitties go outside. That's probably why there are very few strays about -- all the territory is already taken. So, when we notice cats that might be strays, we don't put out food for them, because it's pretty much guaranteed that the stray wouldn't get much of the food, and we don't want to be the kitty fast-food joint!

However, when we start seeing a cat that we don't recognize with no collar, we do keep an eye on it, watching out for injuries and the like. That's how we acquired our new kitty, Wes, last month; he had been coming by for a couple weeks, and we noticed how emaciated he was. We still don't know if he was abandoned by former owners or if he escaped and couldn't find his way home, but we couldn't risk him starving to death, so we took him to the vet. It's been a month now, and no previous owner has turned up, so it looks like he's staying! :-)

[Khephra]

11. We adopt them, sad to say

we've been trying to get pet free--but they keep on pulling us back in!!!

[Cybergata]

12. I adopt them....

that's why I have five cats!


:hippie:

[elsiesummers]

13. don't name them, number them, to avoid attachment.

There was a serious stray problem in my last neighborhood - and a friend who adopts strays named one of the local strays Dorothy - but we chose CAT429 as a tag instead - keep it impersonal.

[DenverDem]

14. Compassion should extend to all species.

Sadly, humans have perfected the ability to live in denial about the misery we inflict on all others on this planet through our hubris, gluttony and greed.