Ranting about stray cats . . .

morganafay

We now have 5 stray cats around! 1 grey and white, who doesn't cause any problem. But 4 black cats! of all different ages. At least three of the black cats are tom cats and are really annoying me, chasing my kitten and fighting with my tom cats! And one of them has scabby paws, so I was thinking maybe has demodectic mange (which my tom cat just had recently). I really hope they don't have FIV/FeLV, since my tom cat fights them, and I do keep him indoors nearly all day and night (through his own choice!), but can't keep him in 24 hours (live with my parents). It's really weird because we've never so many cats hanging around all the time . . . I guess it's because my kitten isn't neutered yet (will be in a week).

But I think one might be a girl, because she will eat with my girl kitten, instead of chasing her like the others do. And my oldest tom cat will immediately chase off tom cats, but didn't chase this cat. She is less than a year old I'd say, and very very skinny, so I'm trying to feed her and gain her trust. If she is a girl then I want to get her used to me and get her neutered (or at least be able to look after her if she has kittens and try to catch the kittens). If she has an owner then they're not feeding her much . . . There's pretty much no chance that I will befriend the boys really, since my tom cat chases them off.

It's funny how three of the cats are almost identical, maybe they all come from the same house (who probably aren't looking after them so well) or there's just one black tom cat in the area fathering kittens everywhere!

Taltos

Good idea about neutering the stray. We did the same yrs ago with a family of cats that had taken up residence close by.
Best choice we ever made.

Not sure what to do about the other tom cats - except keeping an eye out for when they are around and not encouraging them by leaving any food or scraps around.

goodlad

Not Allowed.

Taltos

To be honest - if I saw anyone being cruel to a cat I would immediately report them to the DSPCA for animal cruelty.

goodlad

Not allowed.

Taltos

I can see where you are coming from.
My gut reaction was that it was a bit extreme.
With one of the toms that used to terrorize my once stray - I used to chase out of the garden or threaten to throw something at him - but actually attempting to hit another animal - sorry - guess I will just have to disagree.

Dogs - yup- you do see a lot of folk walking their dogs with sticks...

But shooting at a cat?
OK - shooting close to it is one thing - but attempting to hit them? Are you so sure in your aim that there is zero risk of hitting an eye or another piece of soft-tissue?

As I said - agree to disagree. Will not get into an argument here that will derail the thread - just hope you think abit more about this and hope that no one either sees you or reports you.

goodlad

hehe, yeah we can just agree to disagree.
One last thing to mention though, yeah my aim is good enough!

And if i did actually hit the cat in the eye or something you can bet i would try wrap it up in a blanket and go get the cat fixed up.

On topic again though:

The estate i live in is absolutely jammed with wild cats.
Any night i can open a window and hear cats fighting around the place.

Previous to my own intervention to protect my cats, i kind of had to bite the bullet and let the cats fight for dominence. Any cats arount might consider the area their own and they will fight to keep things that way.

One of my cats is pretty big for being so young (I named him Little Dude) and he eventually out grew one of the attacking cats and kicked its ass and not frequently kicks its ass when it invades my back garden.

Its impossible to protect your cats all the time, but if your not making your cats in door cats then your cats fighting is just something your going to have to get used to in my opinion.

Even with neutering cats will still, in their own mind own territory.
They will only give up that territory if they get beaten away from it by another cat.

morganafay

One of my tom cats is massive so he beats up all the other cats anyway! (They start it so they deserve it!) I'm just scared he'll bite them and catch something, though I kinda doubt that they fight THAT viciously. He just scares them off (since he's neutered). Sometimes he can scare them off just by sticking up all his fur, cos he's longhaired And if that doesn't work then my 10 year old female cat will chase them off! She's kinda vicious.

My dad tries to throw stones at the stray tom cats, but I think it's kinda mean. Then again they kinda deserve it, even though they're just doing their natural behaviour, they're annoying. I wouldn't want to hurt them even if they did hurt my cat. Then again when my dogs got attacked by a Staffy I hit that dog as hard as I could with my fists and kicked it . . . did it feel anything, I doubt it!

planetX

I'm hoping it's just a bad time of year for it - mating season.
Otherwise I'm going to have to move house, I've just paid out nearly 200 euros on vets bills for injuries to my neutered male cat. If he gets bitten again soon I won't be able to get him treated.
It makes me sooooo angry, you try to do the right thing, get your cat neutered and because no-one else around here does the same you end up with the vets bills and the traumatised cats. My cat was neutered young, he does not have territory or any ounce of fight in him. The neighbours cats are built like battletanks, and they're going to kill him. If I don't get them first:mad:

Sigma Force

If your own cats are allowed outside unsupervised they could go into other peoples gardens where they might think they are stray cats.

morganafay

Guineapigrescue wrote: »

If your own cats are allowed outside unsupervised they could go into other peoples gardens where they might think they are stray cats.

That's true, but at least if they're neutered cats they won't really do it much and won't be causing trouble (like they won't attack other cats, my cat just defends himself on his territory, and they won't be spraying) One of my cats gets fed by a few neighbours, but I think that's it (from talking to the neighbours). They like him anyway. And apart from him, the others are too nervous of strangers, or are girls who don't roam, or are old and don't leave the garden at all.

It's just the unneutered toms that annoy me. I like seeing cats around, if they're not fighting with mine. If there are cats around that don't fight with mine then I'll feed them, but I don't feed the ones that fight.

And I don't usually mind people's cats in my garden at all. But I'm thinking these cats could well all belong to the same person, who is just letting them breed every year (3 identical cats, all a year apart in age I'd guess). And I can tell that the youngest one is either not being fed much at all, or has worms or something. She is so skinny, her muscle even looks wasted in her back legs.

morganafay

planetX wrote: »

My cat was neutered young, he does not have territory or any ounce of fight in him.

Same with my younger tom cat, he won't fight back at all. He just runs up trees and gets stuck.

I don't blame the cats though, I blame the owners. Grrr

planetX

Wait till the kittens start arriving in a few weeks.:mad:

morganafay

planetX wrote: »

Wait till the kittens start arriving in a few weeks.:mad:

If I see any kittens around I'll definitely catch them! (and keep them!)

Speak Now

I adopted 2 neutered cats, male and female a few years back. The male who has since died used to put the run on any cat or dog that came into the garden, the female is the complete oppostite and is afraid of her own shadow. She spends half the day under the shed hiding from local dogs but will sit a few feet away watching a fox eat from her bowl I was looking at getting a new neutered male, should i get him before he's neutered to let him mark his territory first or does it make any difference?
Is it likely he'll have no fight in him anyway when he gets done? Was i just lucky with the last fella?

morganafay

Jerry Seinfeld wrote: »

I adopted 2 neutered cats, male and female a few years back. The male who has since died used to put the run on any cat or dog that came into the garden, the female is the complete oppostite and is afraid of her own shadow. She spends half the day under the shed hiding from local dogs but will sit a few feet away watching a fox eat from her bowl I was looking at getting a new neutered male, should i get him before he's neutered to let him mark his territory first or does it make any difference?
Is it likely he'll have no fight in him anyway when he gets done? Was i just lucky with the last fella?

It shouldn't make any difference. When they're neutered they can still mark their territory, but it won't smell really bad. If you get him as an adult, then make sure to keep him in for a while to get him used to living in his new home. And if you get him as a kitten, then you can get him neutered at around 4 months. If your other cat is nervous, then it might be better to get a kitten, so she'll be less scared of him.

The Sweeper

morganafay wrote: »

It shouldn't make any difference. When they're neutered they can still mark their territory, but it won't smell really bad.

Yes it will. Cat piss smells like cat piss, not violets. Neutered cats can still spray to mark territory, but their grasp of 'territory' is different to an intact tomcat.

An intact tomcat will set himself out a territory that he considers to be exclusivey his - he will include any female cat he can find when making the shape of the territory, and he will roam outside his territory if he hears a calling female or gets the scent of a female in season. He will attack and fight with other cats within that territory, male or female. Just about the only cat he won't attack is a female in heat, or a cat he is long used to because he was raised with it.

A neutered cat will establish a smaller territory, often limiting it to their own yard, or theirs and the neighbours; and they aren't as easily encouraged to change the boundaries of their territory or roam from it by the sound of a calling female. However, neutered cats will still defend their territory, and they WILL still start fights with a cat they feel is trespassing if they have a strong claim over that territory.

Neutered cats who spend a lot of time indoors will often limit their territory to what they can see out the windows of the house - so your yard, a bit of the street, maybe a bit of your neighbour's yard. They can become extremely upset if they see other cats in that space, to the point where it can affect their health with stress-related ailments, including interstitial cystitis, and behavioural problems such as spraying inside the house or fighting with the other cats inside the house if they're in a multicat household.

Subsequently if your cat roams out of your yard, whether or not he or she is neutered, it can cause extreme upset and vets bills in other people's houses, even without an actual fight happening.

morganafay

The Sweeper wrote: »

Yes it will. Cat piss smells like cat piss, not violets. Neutered cats can still spray to mark territory, but their grasp of 'territory' is different to an intact tomcat.

What I mean is, if an unneutered cat sprays, you can smell it right across your garden, it's horrible. If a neutered cat sprays it hardly has a smell. If it's outside then you won't even notice, I don't notice anyway. It has a very slight tom cat smell, compared to a female spraying.

My neutered tom just sprayed inside for the first time ever :rolleyes: but there was no smell really . . . well just a normally piss smell, but I honestly couldn't smell anything (and obviously cleaned it up right away!

morganafay

The Sweeper wrote: »

Subsequently if your cat roams out of your yard, whether or not he or she is neutered, it can cause extreme upset and vets bills in other people's houses, even without an actual fight happening.

I see your point. If I could keep my cats inside all the time then I probably would, but I live with my parents and there's no way they'd let me. When I move out then I'll keep the cats indoors, unless I live in the middle of the countryside. I keep three of them in at night and for most of the day, but then they ask to be let out. And the other two don't like being in the house. (Used to be feral but tame now, still nervous though) And my cats Sugar and Tanora (used to be feral) hate each other for some reason. Sugar is a bully and Tanora's very nervous and if they had to both be in the house at the same time, Tanora would be extremely stressed out. She already is if she's in the house alone even! And obviously rehoming them is not an option either, since I know neither of them would be able to settle into a new home ever.

But actually there aren't any cats that can see my cats from their houses. Two of my cats only wander down the fields, two stay in my garden, and one only visits an elderly neighbour for food (she loves him) and another neighbour for food (who must like him too!). They don't have any cats. Actually nobody on my side of the road has cats. These black cats come from across the road, and I don't think my cats cross the road (I'm fairly sure of that.) Also, nobody has any indoor cats. And three of my cats would never go anywhere near a stranger's house, they'd be too nervous.

My cats don't go out looking for fights or trouble. I think I've done the responsible thing by neutering them, so hopefully they don't cause any trouble for the neighbours. I can't really see how they would to be honest.

Maybe I should have them inside, but either way, I wish the neighbours would neuter their cats too. Or at least feed their cats properly (for the skinny one) and look after them properly (for one of the males with scabby paws)

planetX

The last house I lived in we had neighbours with neutered cats. They used to come into our garden and after a few bouts of chasing, they made friends with my male and female cats and used to sleep in the shed with them. So I have not experienced neutered cats defending territory like The Sweeper described.
An intact Tomcat is a different matter, and it is a disaster for us. We have a semi-feral colony being fed and sheltered by a well meaning but crazy, elderly person nearby. Unfortunately it means a never-ending supply of unneutered males. I'm having to look for a new house

morganafay

Yeah neutered tom cats don't cause a problem for me, or female cats. I like having them visit actually My dogs won't even bark at them, I think they know that they're not causing trouble!