Caring For Ferral After Neutering

Hi yall,

Its been a long time since Ive visited. Everything has gotten pretty guiet here now after we had a huge stray dog issue several months ago. Im down to 5 cats now as to the 18 I had when I first posted about a year ago.

Today my only male cat, Rocky went for his neutering (the females were spayed some time back). I need some info..of course! How do you care for a ferral on the first few days after hes been neutered? He's not accustomed to being in the house and except for the time of his surgery, he's been in that carrier since 8pm last night. Do I keep him in the carrier when he comes home? What about going to the potty? Do I let him out for awhile to do his thing and hope I can catch him? Gosh, I just hate to think he will be in that carrier for more than 24 hours....8pm last night until---

I know the vet last time said that the females couldnt have water for the first 6 hours....Is he going to dehydrate being without water for so long? Then what do you feed them when they are first able to eat? I know. So many questions. But I know you ladies have always had ALL the answers

Congratulations on getting your last cat neutered. Some caregivers only hold males for 1 day and then release...it's mainly to make sure his..umm...area is ok. I would keep him in the carrier overnight and make a judgement as to whether you want to release him tomorrow.

Katie

Im not sure on what question really is. You are apparently experienced cat-person...

In any case, you dont need to overwork it with a male if everything seems to be OK. Not with your homecat who usually manage quite well after the first some hours, and not with ferals who are survivers. This wound isnt no big deal for them.

It is more complicated with the females yes. Take care with him, but dont overwork it.

48 hours for males, at least 72 for females. Once they're no longer in danger of opening their sutures they can be released, unless they're being treated for another condition.

Case in point: I've a female feral I'm holding now who was spayed on Friday. So far her recovery is routine, and normally I'd be looking at releasing tomorrow. But she has a tail wound and a respiratory infection--she's on an eight-day Baytril regimen and will be released about 48 hours after that's completed, barring further complications....

Originally Posted by ipw533

Case in point: I've a female feral I'm holding now who was spayed on Friday. So far her recovery is routine, and normally I'd be looking at releasing tomorrow. But she has a tail wound and a respiratory infection--she's on an eight-day Baytril regimen and will be released about 48 hours after that's completed, barring further complications....

Click to expand...

The points here: One difficulty keeping a feral may be you dont have the place or resources. This is why some must to keep it as short as possible.

The other possible difficulty is the feral, being feral, dont accept being imprisoned. As long heshe is sick it will probably accept - either because it is too weak to fight, or by sheer instinct. The cat "knowing" it must have shelter somewhere, so why not here?? This is lesser evil than many other evils outside there.

So, in our example, the female, being spayed, having wounds in the tail AND respiratory infection - is probably willing to stay, and perhaps even accepts to be treated.

But. Case in point. The WINDOW is open now. The question here should therefore be not when to release her, but if it is possible to foster her to become homecat.

As known, it is often possible to foster even ferals to homecats. It takes plenty of work and time and knowledge yes, but usually possible. If you do have own friendly homecats it is often easier. Sometimes even a lot easier.

There are two WINDOWS where it isnt so hard and dont takes much time:

Kittens, 2-7 weeks are usually easy to foster tame homecats.
The second WINDOW open when you help a much sick or injured feral. Here they can be tame in surprising short time. They will of course not be homecat at once, but they accept the helper.


So is my thoughts here. What is practically possible I dont know. You Ipw are the pilot here, you alone must decide how and where to land.

Good luck!

Last night I released the female--she had completed her course of antibiotics, was visibly much healthier and had recovered from her surgery. She was also very visibly eager to get away from us.

We've captured and held two ferals for several week periods--both were female (not sure that matters), both required medical treatment, and both were quite wild. Regular human contact and medical treatment didn't change the latter and may have reinforced it--even housecats tend to dislike being put into a carrier and taken to the vet.

Even as they obviously got physically healthier, both showed signs of psychological stress--no doubt fear-based tending toward depression (yes, I believe cats do suffer depression under aggravated circumstances). To keep them in captivity longer than necessary (confined to large dog crates) would have been unnecessarily cruel; it would likewise have been unnecessarily cruel to continue to frighten them as we did simply by being humans instead of cats. Such prolonged capture has risks over time be it from stress-related depression to muscular atrophy from simply hiding in a corner all day.

Logistics also played a part in the decision. We live in a two-bedroom rowhouse (rented--I might add). We have five full-time cats of our own plust three "boarders". One of the boarders is FIV/FELV positive and so ocuppies an entire room by himself. We've literally no more room for anyone other than "transients", although I'll always make space for a "patient".

Yet that too causes problems. Cats, especially indoor ones, don't like a lot of social change, yet that happens to one degree or another every time a new cat is introduced for more than a day or so. And they make their displeasure known.

I know about socializing border-line ferals--our most recent "regular" was one (he still shys away from me except at breakfast, when he insists on being petted). I'm also realistic enough to know that trying to socialize adult ferals is currently beyond our capabilities. That said, the most merciful thing that can be done is to maintain the cats in their home and minimize our intrusion. Unless our recently-released guest has further medical problems there's no need tor me to bother her. She's healthy and free--pretty much all a real feral cat would ask for....

Thanks guys for all the posts. Im just now getting back to replying. I kept Rocky indoors overnight. Kept him in his carrier for a good part of the time, but let him out twice so that he could get his sea legs. I made sure he was drinking and I fed him the next morning. He did great! He stayed on the porch next door (we have a trailer there) and lounged around for about two days. Was even sweet to the one female who he put in exile earlier and let her hang out with him. But now hes up and about and chasing her again. I was really surprised how fast he snapped back...

Thank you all....!!!

I've got to tell you, those feral cats are something. My last spay/neuter the vet sent my baby home in new fangled cage. She said something about they can't get out of this one.

I got the cage and cat out of the car, unlocked the door of my house, and didn't even have time to shut the door when I heard, "scritch....scritch..." and the cat was gone.

All of my feral spay/neuters did very well all by themselves. I did try to keep some in the carrier 24 hours, but no body in the neighborhood got any sleep, so that stopped real quick.

The vet that fixed most of my ferals would keep them overnight and i would pick them up the day after surgery and release.

The last vet to do a feral for me did not keep him overnight so I brought him home and put back in playpen in living room for a couple more days before releasing. I felt real bad for poor Lippy because I'd had to hold him for a month before I could get him fixed. I knew if I let him go before getting him neutered I'd never catch him again. He hung around for a couple years before I was able to get my hands on him as it was.