Advice and info please

Hello, I am new to this site. A couple of weeks ago, a beautiful young cat stated appearing. I have seen her before. I noticed that she looked pregnant and have heard that this is her second litter since May. I have been feeding her in hopes that I could get her comfortable with me. This morning, I gave her some food. She was no where to be seen tonight. Which is very atypical as she is always there, morning and night for the past couple of weeks. I was told by a friend that if I don't see her, it means that she went off to have her kittens. Is this the case? Will she come back for food? I am very worried about her. Also, there are some kittens who are between 10 and 12 weeks -- if even that. One of them comes by for food and then runs off when finished. He has a large gash on his neck that seems to be healing. It doesn't seem to affect him. I believe that this kitten and the other I have seen are from the pregnant cat's first litter  -- the one that I have been feeding -- they sit near each other but don't seem to interact at all. Any and all help is very welcomed! Please respond soon.

Hi and welcome to TCS. It's impossible to know if your pregnant stray is off having babies. It well could be. It is really good of you to care about and feed her and her possible kittens. If you would like to do more and prevent a cat population explosion in your neighborhood, you could look into TNR programs. Most will allow you to borrow humane traps and spay/neuter for free.

I'll move this to the Caring for Strays and Ferals forum. I think there are more people posting there who can give you good advice.

What you do is depending on what you are willing to do, and what resources you do have.

For example, the optimal with this high preg was to take her in, not just feeding her.

It IS entirely possible to help them when they are outside, feeding them and hopefully doing TNR (spaying/neutering), like mentioned above.

But taking in is the best.  This way you make sure you will foster and socialize the kittens, so they can get real adoption homes.  And with a little luck, perhaps also the mom gets socialized enough to find an adoptions home...

Observe, sending such a homeless high preg to a shelter is often a bad solution. In most shelters they are just killed off.

Lets continue to talk and think aloud.

Good luck!

 Welcome to our Forums!

Hello,

This morning when I went outside, the mother stray/feral was back. When I saw her I noticed that she no longer had a big belly. I gave her a plate of food. She was starving. She ate the whole plate and then left. I believe she had her kittens. I just don't know where. What should I do? She is quite young. I also had the little orange tiger kitten come back for more food this morning. I am going to build a shelter for them in hopes that I can bring them to our local spay and neuter clinic. I have never trapped before but I believe I can get some help. I also believe that there is a feral cat community in the woods behind my apartment. Everyone along my way is feeding them. The local cat rescues in my area are so full and I will not be calling the human society or the SPCA as I know they will be euthanized. The local spay and neuter clinic will spay/neuter and then release. Anything I should be wary of here? I have 2 indoor cats of my own and am not allowed to have anymore, otherwise I would take them in. Also, should I be concerned about transferring any diseases to my cats or to myself. I am wearing gloves when I pick up their food dishes. None will come close enough to pet with the exception of one. The mother cat is really starting to trust me and counts on me for food.

Thanks again to all who provided such great information.

Re: dangers, there are practically none to you, as cat diseases dont go on humans. These you can get from cats, you can also get from other sources.

Unless you provoke some of them to attack you, of course. Cat bites and cat scratches arent to play with.

But it is wise to protect your residents, unless they are wonders of health, used to roam outside.

So gloves /or  washing hands with alco gel, and preferably changing of clothes and shoes when you get home, is wise.

The Felv, Fiv, Fip they do often talk about as horror of horrors arent much contagious (FIV the least of them), but the common distemper is quite contagious. It is fully possible to carry it home on the soles of your shoes.   Perhaps also some variations of flu.  Fleas.

Re this feral cat colony.  Its splendid most neighbours do care and try to help them with giving them food.  Above average!

But are these cats neutered/spayed?  This is very important if you/the neighboorhood want the colony to be a stable, successfull colony with the cats with good chances of thriving.

Hello. Thank you so very much for your response. I really do appreciate the information. To the best of my knowledge, none of the cats in this community have been spayed/neutered. I am really just getting more familiar with this colony. It is very small but growing as one of the cats has had kittens recently. My plan is to have them get accustomed to me first. I volunteer at our local cat adoption center so I will ask for some assistance with the trapping and then spay/neuter and then release or adoption -- which would be best. One of the cats has pretty much been adopted to a neighbor. I am relatively new at this so I once again, I appreciate your time.

Thank you so much for helping them.  You said you have no experience trapping.  No one here did either when we started, so don't let that scare you.  It is a little traumatic for the cats (and the humans!) but it is the absolute best thing you can do for them.

If you have access to a spay neuter clinic, you're ahead of the game.  Ours lets us make appointments and its no problem if we can't trap that day.

Buy or borrow a humane trap and set it up.  Use twine or a zip tie to tie the door open.  Leave the trap unset for a few days and put the food inside the trap.  Once the cat is used to eating inside the trap, you can set the trap normally and catch the kitty.

There are a lot of posts on TCS about other trapping methods (some of us use drop traps).  Also try www.alleycat.org.  Its a wonderful organization with lots and lots of info and resources.

The bottom line is, you and the neighbors need to start getting these kitties fixed.  Feeding them without fixing them can actually be cruel, as the colony gets bigger and outgrows its resources.  Some are chased off and Lord knows what happens to them.  Getting them fixed will stabilize the colony and be the best for all concerned.