So I am new to TCS. I want to share the experiences with a little feral that I could not bear to leave outside anymore. Early last summer I got a call about a mama cat with 4 babies living around a restaurant by my house. I went and looked for them and found a gorgeous little calico with the babies. The people in the businesses nearby said she was a excellent mother and they had seen her trotting across the parking lot with a mouse in her mouth to feed her babies. I set traps to TNR them. I did not get any cats and they disappeared. I could not figure out where they were and I spent lots of evenings trying to figure it out. Around labor day a woman contacted Laura Carlson..Laura has a special needs cat rescue here where I live..As it turns out Sue had been feeding this mama and babies directly next door to the restaurant. There was a dumpster with a fence around it and bushes..the cats lived there..so they really hadn't moved..just were hiding a wee bit. Sue had grown concerned for them. By then one kitten was missing and that left 3. I trapped Mama kitty, and one kitten and took them in and got them spayed at our Feral Cat Clinic. After releasing them I never saw the one kitten again. Even Mama kitty who had been such a good mama disappeared again. That left 2 kittens. A gorgeous tortie/torbie and a orange tabby. I fed them and made plans to trap them as well. I would watch them and the tortie was way more assertive than her brother. He never came out to eat until she did it first. I went away for a few days at Thanksgiving. Sue tells me Wednesday morn before Thanksgiving the Tortie was there. In the evening when she left work it was gone. We never saw her again..that left the orange..and at times his Mother showed up..but she would hiss at him. I felt so bad for the orange tabby...he was so shy and never did anything without his sister. When I would bring food at night he would meow at me from the bushes and one night he walked out and sat near me and sort of cried. I could not stand it..and Sue had grown attached to the mama kitty whom we had named Charm. For some weird reason Charm started coming around alot and Sue was able to start petting her. Go figure. So Sue said she was going to catch Charm. One Friday night she had a carrier and I watched as she just picked her up and dropped her in the carrier. I followed her home and we opened the carrier..Charm inspected the apartment and then got on Sue's bed! So then I knew I could not leave shy little Tigger out there. So I trapped him and took him to clinic..had him neutered and tested and dewormed and all that. I brought him home and put him in a large cage in my garage. Inside the cage was a carrier so he went in there when he was scared. I had food and a little litter box for him. After two days I could pick him up..I left him for about 2 weeks in the cage and then moved him into the house. He has had free run of the house now for about a month. He is tentative still..but he will come to me for pets sometimes. What has been fascinating for me is watching what he is scared of. He is no longer afraid of us..but he is still afraid of things. More later.