Oh,no! What should we do?

Lately there has been this Siamese cat hanging around our area of the neighborhood. I don't know who he belongs to, if anybody. He may have been left behind by the losers who got kicked out of an apartment across the street.
He is a VERY vocal & friendly little boy-he will meow at us from across the street & come over if we say anything to him. He is a cutie, too.
This normally wouldn't be a problem, but several weeks ago we had another local visitor on our windowsill that wreaked havoc in our quiet little world with our two cats. My two ended up in a huge fight in the living room, Mini was freaked out all weekend & I had to scrub the livingroom twice because he peed through the screen! Mini hasn't been the same since- she gets defensive easily & hisses at me or Tucker sometimes.
Anyway, I'm trying to ignore the cat so he doesn't get encouraged & follow us to our door & hang around outside, causing further chaos in my home. It's against my nature to ignore a sweet, friendly cat! I was outside earlier, watching a rocket launch & there he was, rubbing against my legs.
My fiancee is worried about him being hungry, but he looks healthy. We want to help him, but know it may lead to disaster. He is a sweet boy & I'd love to be friendly with him, so..
What should we do?
P.S. if there is anyone in the Melbourne Florida area that would like to help a sweet male siamese cat, this is the one!

Gee, thanks for the suggestions.

sometimes people dont answer because of the time difference or they dont know how to?
How about taking the cat and see if he is microchipped, or if he has a tag? if so then return him to his owner.
Or else you can just take him to the cat protection or some cat society.


Oh yeah and put posters around, the owner might be looking for it!!!
just feed it anyway.

I'd say the same as Fwan, but certainly give it something to eat

Please take into account that it is the weekend and many times people are not on the site as much as during the work week. Also, it's easy for threads to get buried in The Lounge. I'll move this to the proper place, Caring for Strays & Ferals, where the people who may know how to help will see it.

Yeah, I can't hang with The Cat Lounge. Things move too fast in there.

But to the problem, if I were in your situation -- of strongly wanting to help a high quality recent stray but not having room in my own home -- I would do the following:

1. start feeding her in an outside bowl so she keeps her health and appearance, but move fast -- don't let this process drag out for more than two weeks
2. try to look for "lost cat" postings
3. failing that, initiate some "found cat" postings
4. contact a private rescue group or a no-kill shelter and plead your case -- you have found a high quality recent stray who is tame and affectionate, but you have "no room at the inn" for her
5. if they hedge about resources, offer a "sponsorship" (money) for them to take this cat into their system
6. if all of that fails, take her to the animal control center and ask her to be checked for a Friendchip (it is a nice idea but the number of pets who turn up at the pound with a microchip is next to nil in my area -- do this step earlier if it is prevalent in Florida)
7. the last option is leave her at the animal control center and hope she is one of the 1-2% who are deemed strong adoption candidates -- don't become hysterical, but strongly emphasize how tame and affectionate she seems to you

Good luck!

Please don't ignore this cat - I understand why you think you need to, but if he's been abandoned, and it sure sounds like he has, he needs help.

There are breed specific rescue groups for virtually every type of cat. Do a search, in fact, try Petfinder.com, and see if there are any Siamese rescue groups in your area.
Sometimes even if a group is not in your immediate vicinity, but still in your state, arrangements can be made to transport the cat to the rescue group. I've got a friend who lives in NY state who adopted a boxer from a rescue group in Massachusetts! My friend drove part of the way, and the rescue group used a "relay system" of several people to get the dog closer to my friend.

Nano also gave you some good advice, but you need to do those things quickly. Start making calls today to all the good, no-kill shelters in your county. If they're full, and don't be surprised if they are, try the surrounding counties. Look in the paper for a "lost" ad. If there's any way for you to keep this cat (maybe in a separate room from your cats) you can post "found" ads, but be careful... too many animal dealers will look for ads like that, just as they do "Free to Good Home" ads. If you do post an ad, (either in the local paper and/or on flyers tacked to telephone poles), don't divulge too much info about the cat's appearance. Leave out some detail - if someone calls claiming it's their cat, they should be able to give a full, detailed description of him, as well as provide a photo proving that he is in fact their cat. From the sound of it, though, it doesn't seem likely that someone will claim him.

Put food and water out for him in the meantime. He's probably been an indoor kitty all his life and may be ill prepared to survive on his own even though he looks good. A small shelter to keep him out of the rain would be very helpful, too.

Please try all of the above suggestions - you and your fiancee are the only friends this little guy has right now.

You also could try putting a cat safe collar with a note and your number on it and see if anyone calls you when he goes "home", if he has one. Then of course let them know how scared for their cat you are because it is out wandering alone in such an unsafe world. Maybe they will keep him in.

Good luck.

Btw, I use the "Read new" button to read posts, but it sometimes resets if I idle to long, so posts get marked as read when I did not read them.. but I am glad I stumbled across your post today. Don't give up.

Yeah, KTLynn and Cirque made good comments that you should also consider.

To speed things up, here is a starting list of Florida resources:

http://muttcats.com/shelters/florida.htm

I don't know about the quality of those links, but I checked that same site for my area and it was up to date for me.

Originally Posted by Cirque

You also could try putting a cat safe collar with a note and your number on it and see if anyone calls you when he goes "home", if he has one. Then of course let them know how scared for their cat you are because it is out wandering alone in such an unsafe world. Maybe they will keep him in.

Good luck.

Btw, I use the "Read new" button to read posts, but it sometimes resets if I idle to long, so posts get marked as read when I did not read them.. but I am glad I stumbled across your post today. Don't give up.

Click to expand...

First, I have to say I'm sorry for being such a butthead in my second post.
These are all pretty good ideas, too. He seems to come from the same area all of the time-I've been wanting to ask the guys across the street but they are all mexican over there, I hope they understand me! I have a whole bag of good dry food that my spoiled brats won't eat, I would be happy to feed him, but am afraid he will be at my window, wreaking havoc with my neurotic pair. I don't think he's fixed, either, I can see his little dark brown nards! If he starts spraying near the door, on my plants that I bring inside, I'll have a problem, to say the least.
I have to do something tomorrow after work (that's when those guys hang out, outside) because this cat is going to break my heart with his blue eyes & friendly nature. He is the kind of cat that sometimes you wish your cat was like!

By all means, I would avoid taking him to a shelter as only a very few cats are placed. He probably was left by his owner.

If you're familiar with your neighborhood, you can determine how safe it is for him to stay outdoors. Our Moo cat has been gone for a few weeks and I suspect some type of foul play. He, too, was a stray that we were taking care of and he was kept in a very sheltered location outside of the house, as he wouldn't go into our garage. Moo was neutered, so we assumed he wouldn't roam much. Well, we were wrong, as he began roaming the last month or so for several days at a time. They say that the biggest cause of cat fatalities are cars and disease, but I'll add coyotes to the list.

We've been hearing the howling, yipping, and hooting of coyotes in the woods. And if your cat is safe during the evening, he still may not make it home that night or the next day.

I'm hoping that Moo is safe somewhere, or maybe he's found someone who's feeding and taking care of him, but we don't have much hope left.

I found out yesterday that he belongs to the young girl who lives at the end unit of our apartment building. This breaks my heart, too, because she has another cat (I think he was the visitor who started so much trouble in my house before) who is INSIDE most of the time, while this one is outside crying for attention! Maybe she has had problems with spraying, but there is a low-cost clinic 2 blocks away from where we live, if she took the time to get him fixed.
I am hesitant about going to her door with it, if she is ever home, because I know how I am..there is a good chance it'll turn into an argument. I mean, why take a living being into your life if you can't accept the responsibilities? Ugh-it makes me mad.

Well, mystery solved. Thanks for sorting it out.

Hope the cat survives his owner's nonchalant caretaking style.

Yep, the mystery is solved, but the situation is making me increasingly angry!
I can't resist petting him, his fur feels dirty, & he had ants on him-the mean Florida ones. This was yesterday. It's been raining now since last night. He's outside, the other cat is inside. Today, now this REALLY made me livid, we are walking past her door & somebody had at least bothered to throw some dry cat food on the ground outside of the door. I have never seen a food or water bowl. What is she expecting him to drink? Puddle water? Mike is upset about it, too.
It's not that I am afraid to go to her door, I am more afraid of myself. I know me very well, & it'll take about 30 seconds to develop into a full-scale argument. If anyone can tell me how to be diplomatic about this, I would appreciate it, because I HAVE to say or do SOMETHING.
For now I am going to use a couple of our old plastic bowls & set out some food & water for him in a clean, dignified manner & maybe this stupid girl can take a hint.

if you have a few extra cheap bowls laying around that you dont need you could always take the cat back to the people and give them the bowls and say that you were feeding him before u found out that he belonged to them and these are the bowls you were useing so they can just keep them outside.

There probably isn't a whole lot you can do otherwise. I am going to assume he isn't neutered either and you could also say that he keeps coming to your window and spraying pee inside. Suggeest the low cost clinic and even offer to take him to it as long as they pay for it. Just so that it gets done. Point out that he will most likely stop spraying if they neuter him.

If it carries on and becomes a big problem and they WILL NOT do anything about it, if it were me, (and this probably isn't right) I would just take it to the clinic myself and neuter him. Then you can let him go again after he recovers and they probably wouldn't even notice he was gone...

no matter how stupid she is calling her a stupid girl wont make her see things from your point of view.

maybe write her a letter telling her about the low cost clinics and saying how you'd be happy to help her solve her problems so the cat could go an live inside.

in the meantime leave out food/water/shelter and if she hasnt cleaned up her act in a month or two take the cat to a breed rescue

No, I wouldn't call her stupid! I wouldn't resort to actually shouting that at someone till they REALLY had it coming. I was angry, & still angry, but as chance would have it, I was able to ask her about him. Right after I posted last night, I got 2 of our bowls w/food & water & was walking around looking for the cat- I wanted him to know he had it, & where he could find it. I was going to leave it by her door. She comes out & I asked her if that was her cat, & she said no, it always comes from the house across the street! I had already asked the Mexican guys, they told me it was her! Some other Mexican people live next to THEM. Maybe they hang out together, who knows who is who over there. We just do our own thing & don't pay much attention. So anyway, I am glad I had a chance to talk to her in a nice way. I still don't know where the poor guy came from, but we have basically committed ourselves to helping him out with food & water. Our brutal summer is coming, he needs somebody!
I'm not sure if he is a pure Siamese.. he has the definite look, & the most beautiful blue eyes you have ever seen, & very trusting, too. Friendly. If I can find someone who will love him,& take care of him, I will gladly "kidnap" him. It's obvious that no-one would miss him.I wish I had a digital camera to show you a picture of him. My secret name for him is "Skyler" because of his eyes.
My fiancee is so sweet..as soon as we got home from work, he took charge of the bowls!

KIdnapp him and follow throught with one of the siamese rescue groups , Hes just doesnt seem to belong to any of these people they just seem to be feeding him enought so that he hangs around.

I would find a way to get him to Siamese Rescue (http://www.siameserescue.org) in Virginia - they have volunteers in Florida. If they do not care for him, they very likley won't even notice he is missing. The other option is contacting the SPCA but that may mean even if they find him uncared for (no proper food and water), they will take him to the shelter and he would end up pts. But then you couod step in and contact Siamese Rescue.