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I have had the privilege of meeting this author via email. Her involvement with ferals is as intense as her love for them. Here are some of her reflections and observations:
Simply Survival
By Lana
Unless you work with ferals on a daily basis, I would not be so quick to come to any conclusions about them. I rescue exclusively, ferals and otherwise abandoned outdoor cats. I have been known to take feral kittens from shelters and socialize them. I help manage a dozen feral cat colonies. This means that I give shots to the manageable cats, worm the ones who need it by doctoring their food on a scheduled basis. I trap the newcomers to the group and try to outwit the sly ones and coax them into a trap. My goal is every cat that is under my care will be spayed and neutered for the health of the colony. I do this of my own accord.
My process is to trap the cats, transport them to the vet where all their needs are then met. I keep them contained safely in my garage inside their traps until they recover from the surgery. They are then re-released back where I originally found them. I provide cat food to the farmers and other folk who have adopted one of my ferals for their barns.
Feral, outdoor, and barn cats (actually one and the same) are shining examples of the motto “survival of the fittest.†The kitten mortality rate in the beginning is high in these colonies, but the kittens that do survive are healthy, smart, agile, athletic and immune to most of the standard cat diseases. Human intervention (feeding, vaccinations, taking care of sick or orphaned kittens) helps to decrease the mortality markedly, but the offspring from this type of upbringing are not as healthy as those who have outlasted the most brutal environments.
Many ferals survive our cruel Midwest winters by living in small igloo doghouses packed with straw. These cats are similar to our smart, hardy, enterprising pioneer ancestors who settled America. Our ancestors, the ones who survived childhood illnesses, epidemics, childbirth and all the natural dangers that were present in their day, enjoyed a long full life. It has been my experience that the cats in the colonies under my care, also live long and prosper, defying the odds. Once colonies are spayed/neutered and vaccinated with FCVRP, the cats tend to live as long and sometimes longer than most housecats.
The cats that died in the past couple years out of one colony were all over fifteen. They died of cancer, causing me to speculate that since they lived near a farm, they became exposed to slow toxic poisoning from pesticides being sprayed in the fields.
One cat in a colony is over 15 years old. She is missing a leg and an eye from a run-in with another animal. She has delivered three litters of healthy kittens a year (which I trap, socialize, adopt out). She
has also eluded my trapping her for years. Even after her accident she would not go inside a trap. She self-recovered!
Upper Respitory Infections were virtually nonexistent in my colonies until I introduced a shelter cat labeled “feral†to the group. Otherwise, all the noses and eyes of the feral felines were clean and dry. After the arrival of the shelter cat, I had to stock up on antibiotics to treat all the sickly ones.
If outdoor cats are fed even a cheap dry food to supplement their diet of mice and other rodents, they are strong enough to handle the parasite load and pass it.
If they are not fed, then the parasite load weakens most of them and they fall victim to viruses and harmful bacterial infections, which could kill them. It is imperative that the farmers feed the cats, or only the hardiest of the cats will survive.
When I have to relocate feral cats, my rule is that the farmer must confine the cat for at least a week in a secure cage in the barn and the cat is fed only wet food during this time. Upon the catâ€[emoji]8482[/emoji]s release, the farmer must then feed on a routine basis and provide good solid shelter, and water year-round.
For suburban/city type cats the same guidelines apply. The cats don't wander after they are s/n, and kept in this fashion. My motto is “Spay and Stay. Ironically, I do not advocate that cats live outdoors. My own cats are inside only cats, though I do have an outdoor colony as well; however, living outside is a better alternative than death.
I do follow-up (and an initial barn inspection) visits and phone calls to check on my charges. I tell the farmers to call me for medical problems and I trap/pay for treatment with my own money. This is called colony management. Surprisingly, the s/n cats rarely have medical problems.
I have read, the difference between a wild animal and a tame animal is
that wild animals have to be handled and tamed with each generation. If kittens are not exposed to humans and handled by the time they are about 4 months (at the oldest -- sometimes 8 weeks is the cut off), they are afraid of humans and cannot be handled. They become the unmanageable ones, hard to tame and only the more skilled rescuer has the capability to locate that trust bond and build on it. The socializing time frame for these kittens varies from months to even years!
So overall, are felines really tame domestic animals or just wild animals that we tame every generation by our handling? This is a part of the feline mystique and the fascination point for me.
Behind any pampered pet cat is a feral cat ready to survive. For if
the cat is dumped (and many sadly are) it has to live by the genetic code, the natural instincts that will kick in, like an autopilot switch turned on. On the opposite end of that spectrum, some ferals revert to tame cats in weeks, letting me believe they were obviously pet cats that returned to their feral state simply to survive.
Simply Survival
By Lana
Unless you work with ferals on a daily basis, I would not be so quick to come to any conclusions about them. I rescue exclusively, ferals and otherwise abandoned outdoor cats. I have been known to take feral kittens from shelters and socialize them. I help manage a dozen feral cat colonies. This means that I give shots to the manageable cats, worm the ones who need it by doctoring their food on a scheduled basis. I trap the newcomers to the group and try to outwit the sly ones and coax them into a trap. My goal is every cat that is under my care will be spayed and neutered for the health of the colony. I do this of my own accord.
My process is to trap the cats, transport them to the vet where all their needs are then met. I keep them contained safely in my garage inside their traps until they recover from the surgery. They are then re-released back where I originally found them. I provide cat food to the farmers and other folk who have adopted one of my ferals for their barns.
Feral, outdoor, and barn cats (actually one and the same) are shining examples of the motto “survival of the fittest.†The kitten mortality rate in the beginning is high in these colonies, but the kittens that do survive are healthy, smart, agile, athletic and immune to most of the standard cat diseases. Human intervention (feeding, vaccinations, taking care of sick or orphaned kittens) helps to decrease the mortality markedly, but the offspring from this type of upbringing are not as healthy as those who have outlasted the most brutal environments.
Many ferals survive our cruel Midwest winters by living in small igloo doghouses packed with straw. These cats are similar to our smart, hardy, enterprising pioneer ancestors who settled America. Our ancestors, the ones who survived childhood illnesses, epidemics, childbirth and all the natural dangers that were present in their day, enjoyed a long full life. It has been my experience that the cats in the colonies under my care, also live long and prosper, defying the odds. Once colonies are spayed/neutered and vaccinated with FCVRP, the cats tend to live as long and sometimes longer than most housecats.
The cats that died in the past couple years out of one colony were all over fifteen. They died of cancer, causing me to speculate that since they lived near a farm, they became exposed to slow toxic poisoning from pesticides being sprayed in the fields.
One cat in a colony is over 15 years old. She is missing a leg and an eye from a run-in with another animal. She has delivered three litters of healthy kittens a year (which I trap, socialize, adopt out). She
has also eluded my trapping her for years. Even after her accident she would not go inside a trap. She self-recovered!
Upper Respitory Infections were virtually nonexistent in my colonies until I introduced a shelter cat labeled “feral†to the group. Otherwise, all the noses and eyes of the feral felines were clean and dry. After the arrival of the shelter cat, I had to stock up on antibiotics to treat all the sickly ones.
If outdoor cats are fed even a cheap dry food to supplement their diet of mice and other rodents, they are strong enough to handle the parasite load and pass it.
If they are not fed, then the parasite load weakens most of them and they fall victim to viruses and harmful bacterial infections, which could kill them. It is imperative that the farmers feed the cats, or only the hardiest of the cats will survive.
When I have to relocate feral cats, my rule is that the farmer must confine the cat for at least a week in a secure cage in the barn and the cat is fed only wet food during this time. Upon the catâ€[emoji]8482[/emoji]s release, the farmer must then feed on a routine basis and provide good solid shelter, and water year-round.
For suburban/city type cats the same guidelines apply. The cats don't wander after they are s/n, and kept in this fashion. My motto is “Spay and Stay. Ironically, I do not advocate that cats live outdoors. My own cats are inside only cats, though I do have an outdoor colony as well; however, living outside is a better alternative than death.
I do follow-up (and an initial barn inspection) visits and phone calls to check on my charges. I tell the farmers to call me for medical problems and I trap/pay for treatment with my own money. This is called colony management. Surprisingly, the s/n cats rarely have medical problems.
I have read, the difference between a wild animal and a tame animal is
that wild animals have to be handled and tamed with each generation. If kittens are not exposed to humans and handled by the time they are about 4 months (at the oldest -- sometimes 8 weeks is the cut off), they are afraid of humans and cannot be handled. They become the unmanageable ones, hard to tame and only the more skilled rescuer has the capability to locate that trust bond and build on it. The socializing time frame for these kittens varies from months to even years!
So overall, are felines really tame domestic animals or just wild animals that we tame every generation by our handling? This is a part of the feline mystique and the fascination point for me.
Behind any pampered pet cat is a feral cat ready to survive. For if
the cat is dumped (and many sadly are) it has to live by the genetic code, the natural instincts that will kick in, like an autopilot switch turned on. On the opposite end of that spectrum, some ferals revert to tame cats in weeks, letting me believe they were obviously pet cats that returned to their feral state simply to survive.
