Desperate Measure....

This really isn't recommended, but sometimes one has no other option.

Ideally, TNRM means that a feral cat should be kept with its own managed colony upon recovery, but that's not always possible. The situation I'm currently involved with deals with a feral female who was trapped in a neighborhood close to me that has seen several cats deliberately poisoned. It would not be safe to release her back to that neighborhood, so I'm hoping I can release her into my colony.

Since her original neighborhood is only a few blocks away, my group was concerned that she would try to make her way back to it; to prevent that we're trying a three-step process.

The first step was to house her indoors in a large dog crate--first to allow her to recover from her spay surgery and second to "scramble her GPS". She has been held indoors for about three weeks, largely because of the unpredictable weather at this time of year.

This week the weather is expected to improve--I'd like to move the recovery crate outside onto the back deck to let her get acclimatized for a few days. She would remain in the crate until being released.

The hope is that since the colony here is small and primarily female she should have little trouble fitting in. This is a cat-friendly neighborhood with plenty of food and shelter. My only real worry is that she might try to return to her old home after I release her....

for her!

People are just SICK. We ended up getting seriously involved in TNR when we found out that the farmers around here were putting out poison to get rid of the cats. Went on a MAJOR campaign. Thank goodness they let us do it.

Having kept her inside for 3 weeks, I'm hoping that will do the trick. It's what everyone recommends as the ideal time when relocating a feral.

Please keep us posted!

Laurie

One of points of returning them to their original colony is, it isnt necessary they are 100% recovered. They return to wellknown milieu and their own pals. Hopefully dont need to fight for their rang or need to defend themselves. (I saw a reportage on dog-TNR in Thailand along these lines - the dogs even females returned within 24 hours).

Here she did had plenty of time for recovery, so it should be OK. That dire necessity isnt so bad, as long as they had their full recovery.

Do you have possibility to let her met one of the alpha-individes, so they can get pals in advance?? If she get pals in her new colony, the urge to return to the old colony will perhaps be lesser.

Originally Posted by LDG

Went on a MAJOR campaign. Thank goodness they let us do it.

Click to expand...

This is interesting, and worth an own thread I think. Tell more!

It is quite common people think homeless cats are a nuisance. Especielly if they are fertile.
That is another reason why helpers must hava a programme when they try to help. It is NOT enough to give food - it create waves of hate and rage among some people! Giving food is nice, but it must be followed by more steps. TNR and or adopting...
Thus, it will be easier to explaing for the suspicious and negative neighbours what is going on, and why.
This should reduce the negative feelings, and hopefully - even make allies of some of them...

Not to hijack the thread... Stefan, it was TCS that got us involved. We'd been caring for what we thought was a feral, but turned out to be a pure bred Maine Coon - and we took her in to be spayed, and found out she'd been spayed (and that she was a Maine Coon). But then a litter of kittens turned up in our yard, and I got online and found TCS. Here we learned about TNR. We were living in an RV Park on a farm at the time (we're back again ) - a VERY rural area - and they have a "No Pets" policy - so we let them know that we were going to start trapping the cats. That's when Gary found out that most of the farms around here had been putting out poison to kill the cats. Gary asked them to give us a chance, to let us get them sterilized - and we'd pay for it all and all they had to do was pick up the poison. That's when we found out a number of the farms around here were doing the same, so they said they'd do it, but it was up to us to deal with the others. Alley Cat Allies (http://www.alleycat.org) has a lot of info and brochures up on their website, and so we printed out the stuff on the benefits of TNR and managed colonies, and went around and told them what we wanted to do. Thankfully none of them were big cat haters - they were just all sick of so many cats and so many kittens. Two farms cared enough to do it themselves, we just supplied the traps and got them hooked up with the vet.

We trapped in the area for 2 1/2 years before leaving. We hadn't seen a "new" feral cat here the last kitten season before we left the area. That was... late summer, 2004. We returned this past summer, and there is basically no ongoing cat problem here. There were three kitties, obviously dumped here, that people in the park had been feeding. We got them speutered and adopted out (Billy, who we brought inside in November is one of them ). We've only seen one other feral. Apparently there are a few strays up the road a few miles in the mobile home park. And people definitely drive cats they don't want any more out this way and dump them. But it was nice to see that all our hard work really did have an impact.

Laurie

I would be sure to give her a box or something, in the new area, where she can hide from the resident cats. Females can be more territorial than neutered males, sometimes.
Also, worth a try, is the "old wives" treatment of rubbing a little butter on her paws before letting her wander in the new area - she'll lick her paws & get the scent of her new territory imbedded that way. Sounds weird but I've had excellent results with that.
It worked for my former feral Scotty when I brought him inside the house.
Sending prayers for a successful relocation & that the cat-poisoners in the other area get stopped

It's no problem at all to set up an enclosed shelter she can use, and it won't be far from the communal feeding station. What may be problematic is the personal dynamics between the cats, and we humans are powerless over that....

again that all goes well!

Laurie