Uninvited guests

I have three outside cats that I feed. They have been neutered and spayed and I take good care of them. For the past two months three cats have been coming in my back yard and eating their food. (they ae always together - must be realted). My husband has tried to get them to take them to where he works since there are other cats there and the workers feed them but it is impossible. You can not get close to them.
Please help me, What can I do. I do not want to harm them, I love cats but I can afford to feed any more and two of them seem to be females so you know what that means.

I know what you talking about and have the same problem . What I do now is that : I only place portion outsite to feed my cats what I know they can eat up and the rest I pick up after a while ( lets say maybe 30 - 60 minutes ) . I do the same thing in the evening .
But I do need to say that all the other 8 cats who come to eat at my place are the neighbours cat , besite one cat nobody knows who he belongs to . Now I did not have a problem feeding them at all . My problem were the constant spraying from 6 male cats who are not neutered and my insite cats started to spray insite the house . It is much better now and the cats come less to my house now . Still looking though for food and I do feel bad for that one cat nobody knows around here and I am guesing now he don't have a home to go to .
Now I don't know if you just have stray cats or feral cats . But either way , you can borrow a trap from animal control to catch them and try to re locate those cats . But I am sure if you look around in the SOS forum or caring for stray cats you will find a lot of help and answers there .

Originally posted by vinny
I have three outside cats that I feed. They have been neutered and spayed and I take good care of them. For the past two months three cats have been coming in my back yard and eating their food. (they ae always together - must be realted). My husband has tried to get them to take them to where he works since there are other cats there and the workers feed them but it is impossible. You can not get close to them.
Please help me, What can I do. I do not want to harm them, I love cats but I can afford to feed any more and two of them seem to be females so you know what that means.

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The three newcomers to your yard sound like they're either strays or a neighbour's cat.

Do these three arrive together from the same direction or separately and are content to share? Cats do live in colonies and have social sturcture amongst themselves.

Moving the cats isn't an ideal option based on what you have posted. If they are truly strays with no owners, simply moving them to another location isn't necessarily going to work out well, especially if the females are not spayed and the male isn't neutered. Things probably won't work out at your husband's work. There will probably be a fight for territory and this could end all feeding of cats at the workplace period. And with all cats disappearing for a while, chances are, kittens will be born resulting in more cats to be fed.

If these cats are owned by someone in the neighbourhood, then you could be moving someone else's cats away. Create some flyers with a decription of these cats, include a photo if you can, with your contact number asking for the owner to contact you. That way, if they are owned by someone, at least that way, they know what is happenning and where their cats are going.

If no one answers your call, then assume that no one owns them. Are there shelters in your area that you can borrow a trap from? That way you can trap the cats and take them to the shelter. It's best to take them to a no-kill shelter as the cats won't be killed if no homes are found within a short period of time.

Have a look in this thread for a list of no-kill shelters.

No-Kill Shelters Thread in Cat SOS Forum

And have a read of some of the threads in the Caring for Strays and Ferals Forum. There's a lot of advice given and discussions as to how to trap cats and how to gain their trust.

Caring for Strays and Ferals Forum

And lastly, removing these three cats from your yard, if that is what happens ultimately, won't guarantee you of more unlwelcome visitors. Removing a cat or more from a location simply frees up space for replacements. Think of it like the job market. Job openings don't stay open for long. You may have to consider feeding your three outdside cats within a particular timeframe and then take the food away. Keep doing this at the same time everyday and your cats will learn to eat all their food or what is required during those times. This will stop other cats eating your cats' food. It won't stop cats visiting your yard though.

We had the same trouble after taking in our last cat (a feral that moved into our yard after most of his "colony" was trapped and taken to a shelter). Originally we fed him in the yard, then the garage, and gradually moved him into our furnace room, first by leaving the window partially open, and then by installing a cat flap in the window. He never moved upstairs completely, so I often found 6 - 8 other cats (some belonging to neighbors, one of whom I notified if I'd fed her cat, who was seriously overweight) in the furnace room when I went down to feed him in the morning. The original idea was to lock the flap during his feeding times, and open it again after he'd eaten, but we never went through with that because he had to have most of his teeth removed and turned into a very slow eater who nibbled. Is there any way you can gradually move your outdoor cats into a shed, garage, doghouse with a door, large fish cooler with an entrance cut into it and air holes, or cellar room at mealtimes? My mom feeds some ferals in a plastic "igloo" (actually a doghouse) placed right beside the back door, which opens onto a roofed porch. The ferals aren't afraid of her (cat-friendly) dogs, but most other cats give them a wide berth. The bluejays don't - they help themselves to the cat food! She insulated the igloo with styrofoam and carpet remnants, and the cats sleep in it when it's bitter cold. It can take months, but generally works eventually, if you move the bowls about a foot or two per week.