Jury-Duty Spay and Neuter

Tuesday

Oct262010

Frequently Asked Questions

What is the difference between a stray cat and a feral cat?

A stray cat is a pet cat who is lost or abandoned. Feral cats are the
offspring of lost or abandoned pet cats or other feral cats who are not
spayed or neutered.
Stray cats are accustomed to contact with people and are tame, but feral
cats are not accustomed to contact with people and are typically too fearful
and wild to be handled.
Whereas stray cats may be reunited with their families or adopted into new
homes, feral cats do not easily adapt or may never adapt to living as pets in
close contact with people.
However, there are many things you can do to help improve the health and
quality of life of feral cats.

B ack to top

Why are there feral cats? Where do they come from?

Feral cats are the offspring of lost or abandoned pet cats or other feral cats
who are not spayed or neutered. Females can reproduce two to three times
a year, and their kittens, if they survive, will become feral without early
contact with people. Cats can become pregnant as early as 4-5 months of
age, and the number of cats rapidly increases without intervention by caring
people.

Feral cats typically live with a group of related cats known as a colony. The
colony occupies and defends a specific territory where food (a restaurant
dumpster, a person who feeds them) and shelter (beneath a porch, in an
abandoned building) are available.
Since feral cats typically fear strangers, it is likely that people may not
realize that feral cats are living nearby because the cats are rarely seen.

Trap-Neuter-Return (TNR) is a strategy for improving the lives of feral cats
and reducing their numbers. At a minimum, feral cats who are TNRed are
spayed or neutered so they can no longer reproduce, vaccinated against
rabies, and surgically ear-tipped on one ear (ear-tipping is the universally-
recognized sign of a cat who has been TNRed). Dedicated caretakers feed
and provide shelter for TNRed cats, monitor the TNRed cats for sickness
and remove new cats for TNR if feral or possible adoption if tame.

Many people see a homeless cat and start feeding the cat even though
many communities have feeding bans meant to discourage feeding.
Ideally, the person quickly does more to help the homeless cat:
If the cat is tame, the person should take steps to find a permanent home
for the cat.
If the cat is feral, unapproachable and wary after several days of feeding,
the person should find out if there are any groups in their community that
are currently doing TNR and consult one of the many resources to learn
about Trap-Neuter-Return (TNR).
Once a cat or colony of cats has been TNRed, a dedicated caretaker
provides food, water and shelter, monitors the cats for sickness and
removes new feral cats for TNR or new tame cats for possible adoption.
Trap-Neuter-Return is a strategy that many dedicated caretakers pay for
out of their own pockets to help improve the lives of feral cats and reduce
their numbers. Without TNR and a dedicated caretaker, the population of
the colony would continue to increase.

Consider implementing a Trap, Neuter Return (TNR) program. By
implementing a TNR program these free roaming cats can continue to live
out their lives without adding to the homeless cat population. After
spay/neuter surgery cat’s live healthier lives and many of the unpopular
behavioral problems associated with unaltered cats will dissipate

Trap, Neuter, Return (TNR) is a program that allows free roaming cats to
live out their lives without adding to the homeless cat population. Cats are
humanely trapped, often evaluated to ensure they are healthy enough to live
a free-roaming lifestyle, vaccinated, spayed/neutered, ear tipped to identify
them as being altered and released back to their familiar environment.
Often kittens and tame cats are placed with rescue organizations for
adoption into homes.

Ear tipping identifies free-roaming cats that have been sterilized. Ear
tipping is completely safe and it is performed under general anesthetic. Ear
tipping provides immediate visual identification, which alerts animal control
that a cat is part of a colony. It also helps colony caretakers track which cats
have been trapped and altered, and identify newcomers who have not.
Once a cat is trapped, the caretaker should look for an ear tip. If the cat has
an ear tip it should be released immediately.

A caretaker is someone who monitors a colony to insure any new cats that
appear in the colony are altered. The caretaker provides food and water
for the cats, making their lives a little easier. Some caretakers feed an
entire colony of free-roaming cats, and there are a number of organizations
which provide for the care of free-roaming cats in a limited area, such as a
college campus or a beach front

Spay or neuter the entire colony and continue to monitor the colony to
ensure any new comers into the colony are also altered.

Absolutely! People bond with the cats and the cats bond with their
caretaker. Many of the cats that are cared for by a caretaker know their
feeding schedule and will wait at a designated area for their caretaker to
bring them food and water. Others may recognize the sound of their
caretaker’s car and wait until they hear the familiar sound before appearing
from their safe hiding spots. Free-roaming cats tend to bond with their
caretakers and may even allow them to get within a few feet of them.
Otherwise, they are fairly reclusive.

Cats can be trapped using a humane trap. The trap has a door on one
end, which can be lifted up and set in place with a small catch. The door is
connected to a flat metal trip plate on the bottom of the trap. The trip plate is
set far enough back in the trap so that the animal's tail won't get caught in
the door when it slams shut. A small amount of aromatic food is placed in
the back of the trap, past the trip plate. With kittens and very small cats, it is
important to set the food all the way at the far end of the trap so the kitten or
cat will be forced to put its full body weight on the trip plate, thus setting it
off. The door will spring shut behind the cat as soon as a paw hits the trip
plate.

Before trapping the cat, you can line the bottom of the trap with newspaper
so that the cat is not walking on an exposed metal cage floor. As soon as
you have trapped the cat, you should cover the trap with the towel. This
often has a calming effect on the animal.

Yes. The closer she is to giving birth the more closely she should be
monitored after surgery and should not be released back into her
environment until the end of the day following her surgery. The repeated
cycle of giving birth can be much more difficult on a female cat than being
altered while pregnant.

At what age can a cat start having kittens?

A lot depends on the length of the daylight period, time of the year, and
family (genetic) tendencies of the cat. We recommend you spay/neuter cats
by four months of age

You can make a reservation by visiting our online booking registration form,
or you can call our reservation line at 425-673-2287 ext 2. What if I can’t
trap my cat and miss my appointment? Unfortunately, not everybody is able
to catch their cats reserved for surgery. If this occurs, please contact our
reservation phone line (425-673-2287 ext 2.) and leave a message as
early as possible that you will not be bringing in your cat(s). This may allow
another cat that does not’t have a reservation to use your reserved spot.

Animal shelters already care for and try to find homes for thousands of lost,
injured, abandoned and relinquished pet cats. Whether the shelter is an
independent non-profit organization or is funded by the municipality, many
do not have the resources to pro actively trap and remove thousands of
feral cats. Animal shelters that receive complaint calls or calls of concern
from the public may attempt to humanely trap and remove feral cats. Or,
they may provide information and loan traps to citizens interested in
humanely trapping feral cats. If there is a local group helping feral cats, the
shelter may refer callers to that group. Feral cats brought to the shelter,
especially those who cannot be identified as members of a known TNRed
colony, are likely to be euthanized right away or after a mandatory holding
period. It is difficult to safely care for a feral cat in a typical shelter cage,
and it is very stressful for a feral cat.

Some people feel sorry for feral cats because of their difficult and
dangerous life. Others are annoyed by the cats' behaviors and want the
cats removed. But many people don't feel that the cats should be
euthanized. Even if there were enough people and money to remove and
euthanize feral cats, other feral cats would move into the vacant territory to
take advantage of the food source and shelter now made available. It's an
endless cycle.
The alternative is Trap-Neuter-Return. When feral cats are TNRed, their
health improves because they no longer have kittens and fight over mates,
and nuisance behaviors are greatly reduced or eliminated. The colony's
dedicated caretaker provides food, water and shelter, watches over the
health of the cats and removes any newcomers for TNR (if feral) or
adoption (if tame).
TNR improves the quality of life for existing colonies, prevents the birth of
more cats, and reduces the number of cats over time. Additionally, many
groups that provide resources for TNR have calculated that the costs
associated with TNR are considerably less than those associated with
removal, shelter care and euthanasia of feral cats.

A colony of unneutered/unspayed feral cats can produce a number of problems,
including:

a growing population of cats
frequent and loud noise from fighting and mating behavior
strong foul odors from unneutered male cats spraying to mark their territory
flea infestations
visible suffering from dying kittens and injured adults.
In addition, the shelters in a community with a large, unneutered feral cat
population may experience:
higher intake rates of cats into shelters due to the rescue of feral kittens
and the capture of feral adults
higher euthanasia rates for all cats due to the unadoptability of feral adults
and the necessity to euthanize adoptable animals due to limited cage
space
higher animal control costs due to trapping efforts and/or costs associated
with caring for and euthanizing feral cats
a constant rate of nuisance complaints about feral cats.

There are many reasons why feral cat problems are rarely solved by efforts to
trap and remove them. Feral cats live at a certain location because the habitat is
suitable for their survival and offers food and shelter. If the cats in any one colony
are removed, feral cats from surrounding colonies move in to take advantage of
the newly vacated habitat and start the cycle of reproduction and nuisance
behavior anew.

In addition, if all the cats in a colony are not trapped, then the ones left behind
tend to have more kittens that survive to adulthood due to lack of competition for
resources until the colony reaches its former population level.

Other factors which usually make removing feral cats ineffective include:

the difficulty of catching all the cats in a colony
the lack of animal control resources available to accomplish this task
the unwillingness of volunteers to trap cats who face an uncertain fate upon
capture
the ongoing abandonment of unaltered domestic cats who can also
repopulate a vacated territory
the lack of cooperation of the cats' caretakers—the only people who really
know the cats' numbers and patterns and who can control whether or not
they're hungry enough to enter a baited trap.

Trap and remove will only result in a temporary reduction in the numbers of feral
cats in a given area.

Back to top

Why don't feeding bans work to eliminate feral cats?

The logic behind bans against feeding feral cats is that if there is no food
available, the cats will go away. This is not true.

Feral cats are territorial animals who can survive for weeks without food and will
not easily or quickly leave their territory to search for new food sources. Instead,
they tend to encroach closer into human habitations as they grow hungrier and
more desperate.

Their malnourished condition will make them more susceptible to parasitic
infestations, such as fleas, which they will spread into work places, garages,
homes, etc., within their territory.

The cats will also continue to reproduce despite the effort to "starve them out,"
resulting in the visible deaths of many kittens.

As a result, feeding bans, if enforced, tend to make the situation much worse
instead of improving it.

A second reason why feeding bans are rarely effective is that they are nearly
impossible to enforce. Repeated experience has shown that people who care
about the cats' welfare will go to great lengths, risking their homes, jobs and even
their liberty, to feed starving animals. Someone determined to feed the cats will
usually succeed without being detected, no matter the threatened penalties.

Back to top

How does TNR solve common complaints associated with feral cats?

When feral cats are trapped, neutered and returned to their territory, they no
longer reproduce.
When the colony is then monitored by a caretaker who removes and/or
TNRs any newly arrived cats, the population stabilizes and gradually
declines over time.
The cessation of sexual activity eliminates the noise associated with
mating behavior and dramatically reduces fighting and the noise it causes.
Foul odors are greatly reduced as well because neutered male cats no
longer produce testosterone which, when they are unaltered, mixes with
their urine and causes the strong, pungent smell of their spraying.
Neutered feral cats also roam much less and become less visible and less
prone to injury from cars.

Helping feral cats can be very rewarding. There are many options for you to be
involved.

First, you may want to look for an existing feral cat group or individuals who are
practicing TNR in your area to help you learn the ropes. To learn more about feral
cats and TNR on your own visit the Feral Cat Resources page.

If there is a colony of feral cats in your area that does not have a caretaker you
can become their caretaker. Feral cat caretakers practice Trap-Neuter-Return,
feed, provide shelter and monitor the cats for any problems.

Back to top

What resources are available to learn more about TNR?

Please visit our Feral Cat Overview page for more information and resources,
including relevant articles, webinars, courses, handbooks and websites.

Back to top