No, they are not fine and healthy!

I know most of this blog has been about cats, but that’s what I’m involved in right now. I hope to soon get involved with more of the dog area of the humane society soon and even start foster some dogs as Drifter has moved back in with my parents. But I was emailed today about a colony we’re trying to trap; the owner of the building where these cats live behind was met and he sees nothing wrong the cats being there doesn’t want them touched as they catch the mice. He doesn’t seem to understand that some of them NEED medical treatment; some have bad eye problems and burrs firmly matted into their hair so tightly the skin is being punctured. They have fleas, mites, and worms. He thinks they are all just fine living off the mice they catch, the colony is over a dozen from what we were able to see and still new ones pop up. So this is to enlighten those who don’t seem to understand that the life of a feral is not easy.

Burrs so tightly matted into this kitten they were in her skin and surgery was thought to be needed. Thankfully we managed to get them all out (there were more patches of them on her) by shaving her down.

Feral cats are cats that have returned back to their wild state of mind due to being apart from humans for so long. Some are out of house pets who were never spayed/neutered and let outside, others were born to family pets (strays) who were dumped. The difference with ferals and strays is that strays were family pets that were dumped while ferals have never been in a home as a pet and have known nothing but the outside world and all its dangers.

Where one colony lives, among pipes, lumber and heavy traffic with large trucks on one side and a busy main road on the other, airplanes fly over head every few minutes as the airport is only a few blocks away.


The average life span of a feral cat is around 5 – 6 years, most of the time less, sometimes more. Some people will claim the same cat has been around for 15 years in their backyard or behind their business but really it’s the offspring or grand offspring of the first cat or a cat that looks similar to the first cat. Many people can’t tell the difference between two black/tabby/white/spotted/ etc cats for two reasons a) they don’t care enough or b) they just aren’t able to tell the difference as they never get close enough to the cat. Most of the ferals die off at an early age, usually around 2 years, if they go over this mark it’s a surprising. The littlest scratch can become horribly and painfully infected in a feral, slowly killing them.

A starving feral kitten.

These cats don’t get two if not more meals plus numerous table scraps a day, they don’t have a constant source of fresh water in a cute little dish that as “spoiled rotten” written on the bottom with little paw prints and fish around the sides. Ferals have to search out there food, be it mice, birds or dumpster diving these cats have to work for every mouthful sometimes going on an empty stomach for a few days. They don’t get to pick the beast grub out there, if the mice have eaten poison before being eaten, if the birds have some disease, if the meat they stole from the dumpster is rotten they get the painful effects of it They suffer, no one is there to offer them the best of the best every day twice a day.

A feral cat we caught that had such a severe eye infection the ate was eaten away. The affected eye has since been removed. Two kittens have now had eye removals from this colony.

Injuries and disease slowly kill them off, the smallest scratch or puncture can become horribly infected, worms and fleas slowly suck the life out of both adults and kittens. Infections are numerous and run rampant in feral colonies. The littlest infection will kill the kittens if they haven’t died from starvation or the elements. 80% of feral kittens die in their first year, but kittens, they gain sympathy from us humans when we see them and therefore they end up getting rescued. Rescues like Mississauga Humane end up going out and grabbing these kittens knowing full well that there are probably plenty of adults as well in horrid situations. Then you end up with hissy little kittens who want to hide under and in anything they can wiggle into/under. Though kittens of a certain age can be tamed and turned into wonderful housecats, this is of course if anyone sees them and tries to help. If they aren’t taken pity on or even noticed, if they live past their first year they stick around the colony and help it expand. Cats can and will breed as young as 6 months of age having litters ranging from 1 kitten to 8 kittens on average with as many as 3 litters per year. One female and one male can produce 429,000 kittens in just 7 years, how many would a colony of a dozen females and males produce in that length of time?

This poor girl was trapped and later died, her insides were filled with a yellow fluid making her look heavily pregnant.

TNR steps in when a colony is found. Usually this is a rescue that sends out volunteers to place traps out to catch the cats, baiting them with smelly cat food, fish, turkey, chicken anything that has a good smell to it and will lure them into the trap. If kittens are caught they are put into foster care to be tamed and hopefully adopted, though even when you get a kitten at the perfect age to turn around (10 weeks and younger) they sometimes can not be tamed. All of the cats if they are old enough and neutered/spayed, treated for any medical problems and if they are too feral they are returned to the site they were caught. To know which cats have been caught the vet will ear tip them; ear tipping is removing the point of one of the ears while they are getting neutered/spayed. This doesn’t cause any harm or distress to the cat. There are many people, who disagree with TNR, but those types of people are everywhere and you won’t change their minds. They see ferals as pests, disease spreading pests who should all be put to sleep. In some cases there is no option and they are put down but in many if the colony is maintained they are released or are placed in barns that have agreed to take on feral cats.

These cats are NOT fine out there, they need medical attention, many of them do some might not show it like the poor white and black female who died at the clinic and found out after that she had a thick yellow fluid in her organs. Others like the poor grey and white kitten would have died and slow and painful death from a little infection that was left untreated for too long. Several we have trapped have been nothing but skin and bones as it was thought they didn't need to be fed, they could fend for themselves which they can't, not when the colony is a large one, when they have kittens, when larger cats come in and steal away the food from the hungry mouths of small kittens. That any injury they have from a car, other wild animal or dog they will adapt to and be fine, they won't they will die a slow death. They won't be fine without shelter and won't be just fine in a freezing cold blizzard in the dead of winter. They need care, they need to be spayed and neutered, to be maintained. If your fine with them on your property, catching unwanted rodents then fine, but don't think they are just fine out there without any care, we humans created this problem so don't say it isn't your problem to deal with it is. Even more so if you tell us you want the cats kept around for rodent catching.

We caught 9 kittens all around 4 weeks old. All were infested with fleas and ear mites, had runny stool and bad eye infections. Several now have bad UTI's and are in and out of the vet clinic.