Should I try to re-home cats if I move?

Fionne

I have 5 cats, which are basically farm cats technically belonging to next door farm. I'm considering buying a house of my own (renting at the moment) but won't be able to afford a house in a rural area (well, not a habitable one anyway) and don't know if my "free-range" cats could make the transfer to being either totally indoor cats or being confined to a small town back garden (there are special fencing systems that are meant to be cat-proof) I adore and idolise the cats but they also cause me an awful lot of stress (I worry incessantly every minute they're out of my sight to the point of making myself ill from anxiety)

Would I be a bad person if I was to try and re-home them? I can't just leave them as they are, they may romp around the next door farmyard but they don't get fed there as far as I can tell. Plus I've had a couple since they were tiny babies and they would miss the human contact. They are all spayed/neutered.

How would I re-home them if it came to that? I've taken cats to the Animal Care Society in Cork before but could hardly hand them 5 and expect them to get homes for them.

Has anyone done this before? Did you ever stop wondering about the cats/dogs you had re-homed? I wonder if I'd ever stop wondering how they were.

Any advice would be gratefully accepted.

morganafay

Some or all of them might be able to adjust to being indoors. Some of them might not be too happy indoors. They might be fine in a small garden though. I think they would probably adjust to that. It's surprising how easy cats an adapt to new situations.

What ages are they?

It's really up to you, if you feel like they won't be happy, then you should rehome them. But if you'd miss them too much, then maybe you should try moving with them, and if they seem unhappy in the house/garden then maybe try to rehome them?

Maybe some will adjust fine and you could keep those ones. Or maybe they would all adjust. I think I'd try to see if they would be ok with it, before rehoming them. They might be happy enough there. But obviously it's up to however you feel about it.

You could try to rehome them yourself? through this forum and irishanimals. You could do home checks and everything to find good homes? You wouldn't be a bad person to rehome them. You'd be doing it for their own good, if they aren't happy.

Fionne

Two of them are about 3 years old, the others I'm not sure of as they were adults when they started calling on me but they're pretty young cats (the mortality rate was so high before they were neutered that I don't think any lived to old age)

I think what you said makes sense, try them out and see if they settle and then make the decision to re-home or not. I do love them to bits but just wish I could stop worrying about their every movement, I never voluntarily take on a cat for this exact reason, that I know I get too stressed over them, treating them more like babies than cats with a will of their own.

convert

fonril wrote: »

I have 5 cats, which are basically farm cats technically belonging to next door farm.

What exactly do you mean by this? Do they actually belong to your next door neighbours even though they live with you?

morganafay

I'd count it that if the neighbours don't feed them and they've lived with you for years, then they're yours.

convert

So if I happen to have a pony on loan for a number of years and keep it at my expense, then it's my pony?

convert

fonril, if I've misunderstood your post above, I'm sorry, but if they are technically your neighbours' cats and you do plan on bringing all/some of them with you (or on rehoming them) maybe you should mention it to your neighbours first? Do you think that they'd be willing to keep them instead of you having to rehome them? At least that way they'd still be in their local environment.

Or if you have to re-home them go to a reputable shelter/rescue rather than a pound. Have you any friends/neighbours/family who could take them?

Our man in Havana

I think you are getting the wrong end of the stick.

star-pants

morganafay wrote: »

I'd count it that if the neighbours don't feed them and they've lived with you for years, then they're yours.

Well, we did have a case before where someones dog was being fed by neighbours and slowly moved itself down to the neighbours even though it still belonged to the OP.

So in this case, unless you actually own them yourself - I'd ask your neighbours would they mind (if they've not already consented to you having them).

morganafay

I had a cat who had kittens and we gave one of her kittens to our neighbour. She kept bringing the kitten back for a few days but eventually gave up and just went to live at the neighbours house! Totally abandoning her 4 other kittens but whatever!

I think in this situation though, it sounds like the OP's neighbours don't want the cats. They don't feed them, and probably haven't seen them in years, so technically they belong to the neighbours, but not really. The OP said they were farm cats and not being fed by the neighbours. And the OP got them neutered and all.

The Sweeper

The farm that the cats roam on may claim ownership of them as rodent control. It's not unusual for farms to support an unfed colony of feral cats, and there is often a belief that cats can 'fend for themselves'. The farmers may not even be aware that the OP has been feeding the cats, had them desexed or vaccinated or is even worming them.

The idea that we should always inform someone what we're doing if we think they own an animal isn't just inspired by rights of ownership. There is also a strong emotional aspect, because we all love animals and we wonder at the horror of waking up one morning to find all of your animals are gone, and you never know what happened to them. This is only an emotional problem, however, if you gave a shit about them in the first place.

OP I think it's worth calling the farmer and explaining that you have become attached to the cats and you want to take them with you when you move. There may be one cat that the farmer IS attached to and considers to be theirs. They may view the others as hangers-on. Who knows - you won't until you check.

If they consider the cats as working cats, you could conceivably decide to leave a couple, or you could take all of them and take two neutered adult cats off death row to replace them, and ask the farmer to be conscientious about feeding and worming them. There is a place for working cats on a farm because there is no doubt at the work they do in rodent control, plus the dangers they face and the nuisance they pose is different in a rural area than in suburbia. However it's mean-spirited to simply leave a tribe of skinny ferals fending for themselves on your property. The concept that feeding them reduces their efficacy as hunters is misguided; a starving cat has little energy to hunt for anything but food, where as a better fed cat may kill more mice in a day, they just won't eat all of them.

Fionne

I should clarify about the cat ownership thing....

The cats were all feral, living in the ditches or in the barn of farm next door, their "owner" so-called believed they would die out from inbreeding eventually and was happy to let that happen.

I do consider them mine (in as much as anyone "owns" a cat as they're so independent) as I feed them, take them to vets, had them neutered, etc. But I would be ok to leave one or two behind as they are still semi-wild but wouldn't feel happy leaving the very tame ones which are those born since I started looking after the cats so they've never been totally wild.

I am dreading the prospect of moving them at all, it's making choosing somewhere so much more difficult as I have to take them into account. But the alternative is to live somewhere that the cats love but where I'm unhappy.

biko

I don't think that cats born and bred outdoors would appreciate the move to indoors, even if it came with a small garden. m2c
If possible I'd look at giving them away to another farmer that can have them for rats etc and maybe get a kitten that you can rear indoors.

Our man in Havana

Legally you cannot own a cat. It is considered a wild animal.

MsFifers

Bond-007 wrote: »

Legally you cannot own a cat. It is considered a wild animal.

Really?! That surprises me. What piece of legislation refers?

Our man in Havana

Try reporting a cat stolen to the Gardaí. That is what they told me.