Strays been missing for 5 days I dont know what to do.

Our friendliest stray (creamsicle) has been missing for 5 days (since saturday). It's not in her nature to wander off and never come back, she normally stays in my yard for about 95% of the day, sometimes going into a neighbors yard. If she hears my voice or the back door open she would always run into my yard and greet me or run inside my house. She will also come to greet us if she hears my parents car in the driveway. So when we havent seen her for 5 days I know something is up, and it cant be she just left and doesnt want to come back.

She is a spayed female a year old, so she wouldnt be wandering off to mate or giving birth, anyway it wouldnt make sense of her not to come back to where she gets her food and shelter, so something is stopping her from coming back.

She liked to go in my garage, and it's a pretty messy place. I have checked twice a day for the past 5 days in their for her, banging around to see if she is stuck anywhere or I hear a meow, but I dont see or hear her. And if she died in my garage I think I would have smelt it, but there is no bad odor so she cant be in my garage.

One of my neighbors keeps his garage open alot, and is only home once a week, but he opened his garage a few days ago and no creamsicle, so I dont think she is in his garage either.

I looked and saw no dead cats in the road, then again if she was hit and died somebody could have cleaned up the mess before I was outside to see.
My other neighbor hates cats and our yards touch by a tiny chain link fence (no privacy by the way), and he owns a big dog who is very fast. He does chase the cats and let the dog out everytime he sees a cat in his yard, he also blocks all the holes in the fence with bricks because he thinks thats how the cats get in his yard (obviously they just hop over) I dont think he would kill or trap a cat, but we cant be 100% sure. Our other 5 strays are healthy and all are around still. He also keeps his garage open, so their is a chance creamsicle MAY have went in their, but if she got trapped in their and he found her, I know she isnt coming out....

My problem is what should should I do? I want to put a poster up to see if anyone found her, but i'm worried my neighbor will see this, and I cant offer a reward if someone did find her. (we havent told our neighbor we feed cats actually, he may see them in our yard but mabye he thought they were our 2 we owned he knows we own 2 cats as pets, not strays, so I dont want to endanger the strays lives by advertising we feed them because then he may do something bad knowing this.)

I did tell a cat lover down our block to be on the lookout for her, sometimes a cat will go in her yard and she doesnt mind at all.

All I can think of is checking with any local animal control or rescues, maybe vet clinics? I'm sorry!

Is she friendly enough that she could have made friends with a neighbor somewhere nearby? Maybe someone decided to "adopt" her. I hope you are able to find her.

She's very curious i'd say, i'm not sure if she would go up to anyone else because no people on my block have tried going up to her, but mabye if their house door was open she might have slipped inside, being I would let her inside my house once in a while.

I only know of one other cat lover on the entire block, and she would not have adopted her she already has 4 cats. Everyone else are dog lovers or have no pets at all, so I dont think anyone adopted her.

I told the other cat lover on my block about her missing so she can be on the lookout for her.

She's spayed, so if someone caught her and knew about cats, they would know someone had to have caught her previously to get her spayed. So, if they were nice they might have put up a lost cat sign, but i've seen no signs put up.

If animal control or a shelter did pick her up and I found her, would they even give her back to me? I mean, I feed her and got her spayed (have papers), but dont "officially" own her. If they were going to have someone adopt her I would say keep her though.

I think if you feed her and take care of her and you had her spayed then she's yours doesn't matter wether she lives outside.(unless it's against the law to let them out)You can say she escaped,Only you know that
I would print pictures and take them round your neighbours, for all your neighbours know she might not be a stray,so if they see her they can contact you, take a couple of posters to the shelter too and leave one behind the desk and one on the notice board.
I would also contact the refuse/trash dept because they are the ones who clear dead animals off the roads hopefully they haven't picked her up,but either way at least you'll
know what's happened to her.

Good luck,I hope you find her

I just realized I dont have any pictures of her so now the posters are really out of the question.

I only have a video of her uploaded to photobucket.

Mabye I can still call the local shelter or the trash place.

I almost forgot someone else on the block doesnt like cats and I forgot about that house, they are really bad people and may have trapped her or poisoned her, they already tried that with a neighbors cat. That's why i'm going to talk to the other cat lover on the block, she may know something she lives next door to them. But she hasnt been home for 2 days so I havent been able to talk to her, and the cats been missing for about 6 days now, it may already be too late.

Originally Posted by keith p

I just realized I dont have any pictures of her so now the posters are really out of the question.

I only have a video of her uploaded to photobucket

Click to expand...

Yes I remember you posting the video of Creamsicle.

That's a shame you have no pictures,I can't remember but you can see her clearly
in the video?I know she is a tuxie
If you want Keith, I can take a still picture from that video and you could
use that.
You would only have to post the link to the video.

I was thinking the same thing, but wasnt sure if it would be clear or not. I'll PM you the link anyway.

Oh no. I am so sorry your creamsicle has been missing for some time. I know how frustrating that can be!! Keep us posted please, if you find her or anything!! (((Come home soon kitty kitty)))

Originally Posted by keith p

I was thinking the same thing, but wasnt sure if it would be clear or not. I'll PM you the link anyway.

Click to expand...

Thanks

She's gorgeous ,she looks just like my little Beanie
I hope you like the pics ...and more important I hope you find her

Thank you so much for the pictures they came out much better than I thought!

I contacted the local animal shelter two days ago and gave them a full description of Creamsicle, in case anybody brought her their, but they said no cat there fits her description, but they will keep an eye out for her. I just sent them two pictures of her so they can get a full view of all her markings.

Unfortunetly though, if someone does turn her in their, the shelter would then own her, not me, and I would have to buy her back.


So if she's not at a shelter she could be trapped in someones house/garage and the people dont even realize it, or mabye someone trapped her and drove her far away and let her go?

Originally Posted by furryferals

I think if you feed her and take care of her and you had her spayed then she's yours

doesn't matter wether she lives outside.(unless it's against the law to let them out)You can say she escaped,Only you know that

I would print pictures and take them round your neighbours, for all your neighbours know she might not be a stray,so if they see her they can contact you, take a couple of posters to the shelter too and leave one behind the desk and one on the notice board.
I would also contact the refuse/trash dept because they are the ones who clear dead animals off the roads hopefully they haven't picked her up,but either way at least you'll
know what's happened to her.

Good luck,I hope you find her

Click to expand...

Good suggestions. Keith, your cat-hating neighbor doesn't have to know that this is an outdoor cat you feed in your yard. As furryferals has pointed out, for all he knows, this is one of your indoor cats. Let him think that.

If there is someone on your street whom you know for a fact is poisoning cats, you should contact the ASPCA immediately.

You need to take Creamsicle's picture to all your neighbors, and put posters up on your street as well as the streets on either side of your block. Offer a reward. You don't have to specify how much, but people will be more motivated to keep an eye out for your cat. Ask everyone to check their garages, sheds, playhouses, etc. to make sure Creamsicle didn't get locked in. Re-check your garage as well. Find out if your police department keeps lost/found records for dogs and cats - have them check if anyone has her listed as found, if not, put her name on the lost list. Keep checking the shelters.

Two of my ferals went missing once. I printed up 75 flyers and went door to door in the area surrounding their usual location. I got 3 phone calls within two days. One of the callers identified my cats as having shown up on her property occasionally for a couple of weeks. Sure enough, when I went to check, there they were. A neighbor of the woman who called me had been putting food out for them. They had relocated themselves to a safer area. It turned out that one of the cats, Nicky, had been shot in the shoulder with a pellet gun. He and his kitty friend apparently decided it was time to move to a safer neighborhood. I still go to see them every day in their new location.

Take a look at this website: www.catsinthebag.org A woman in my town whose cat was missing for over 5 weeks was able to find her with tips she learned from this site.

Best of luck to you. I'm sending all good thoughts and prayers for Creamsicle's safe return home.

If there is someone on your street whom you know for a fact is poisoning cats, you should contact the ASPCA immediately.

Their neighbor did report them and the ASPCA let them go with a warning, I dont know if they currently try to poison cats, I doubt it because their neighbor would have told me as she knows I own cats.

put posters up on your street as well as the streets on either side of your block.

Man this bites! My printer just ran out of ink (color and b+w) I cant print out pictures now and I cant buy new ink either. I have paper and a magic marker, but without a picture I dont know if the poster would be good enough. We may be getting a bad storm tommorow so no point worrying today, they would most likely blow away in the heavy wind and rain.

Find out if your police department keeps lost/found records for dogs and cats - have them check if anyone has her listed as found, if not, put her name on the lost list.

They dont.

Keith check your printer options or preferences,when printing in colour it hardly
uses black so when you run out of a colour it looks like you also run out of black.
If you change your options/preferences to black and white you should still be able
to print but in black and white.

I tried that the black ink is gone too, I have used it alot to print out text documents.

I just put an ad up about her for "lost pet" on Petfinder.com, I forgot all about that! I searched for any found or lost pets by my area, I found one ad for "lost pet" for the next town over, but no ads for my town and no found pets.

I looked on other nearby shelter sites to see if they found her, there were 3 good look a likes, but amazingly, all were de-clawed, which she is not.

If you search for pets lost in New York you will eventually see her ad.

I made 4 posters today by hand and put them up in my neighborhood. I have no printer ink so I had to make do with what I had, white paper and a blue permanent marker.

On the posters I put the date she went missing, a thorough description of her, my name and my email for contact in case somebody finds her.

My parents were highly against me giving out our telephone number so if nobody has an email address, unfortunetly they wont be able to get in contact with me.

A teen I know on my block saw the poster and said if he sees her he will tell me.

sending many prayers that she comes home soon !!

Hi Keith P,

I just wanted to send you some good vibes in finding your stray. I am also on Long Island and care for a colony and some of my cats are missing too! Including a personal pet. I have called the shelter and they said no cats were picked up in my area, but the whole thing is strange. I too, have neighbors that hate the cats so I am scared to death.

Good luck finding Creamsicle.

JIL05