What is a farrel cat

By Christine Michaels

Chances are that you will come across stray and feral cats in your lifetime. These outdoor animals are often misunderstood. Whether you spot them in your backyard, around your office park, or while traveling abroad, misconceptions still prevail worldwide about stray and feral cat. Learning the facts can help overturn the myths and stop the overpopulation and mistreatment of homeless cats.

What is a Feral Cat?

A feral cat is typically born in the wild or outdoors with little to no human interaction. If you attempt to get too close or try to pet them, feral cats view your hand as a claw that will harm them and will hiss and/or run away. Feral cats are born from other ferals or from stray cats. What is the difference between the two? Well, a stray cat was once a pet cat, until it was either lost or was abandoned by its owner. While they struggle to survive in their new outdoor environment, some strays become fearful of people, even adopting feral behaviors after a period of time, depending on their surroundings. However, most stray cats remember that humans feed them and try to stay near homes, carports, and other areas where people concentrate.

When a regular caretaker notices a stray cat that is friendly, it is recommended to take the cat to a veterinarian to scan for a possible microchip. In lucky instances, the stray cat and its owner are happily reunited.

Anyone Can Become a Caretaker for Stray Cats- How to Care For and Feed Feral and Stray Cats

Feral cats have a rough life and live, on average, two years on their own. With regular care, which includes reliable shelter and daily feedings similar to the care of barnyard cats, they can live as long as ten years. If you decide to become a caretaker, an important lesson is to never forcefully grab an outdoor cat or make a sudden movement towards it. These cats are fearful of people and tend to run away as strangers approach them. Let the feral or stray cat come closer to you on his/her terms.

Through daily feedings, in time they will let you know if it's acceptable to touch them. Another helpful hint: If you do decide to become a caretaker, squat or sit on the ground so you're at their level when you regularly feed them. This approach indicates to the feral or stray cat that you are not threatening.

How Wild is Wild?

In my work with feral cats, I learned that there are varying degrees of "wildness." Most of the feral cats will not allow me to touch them, but I can come within millimeters to dispense their food. One cat, Lion King, after three years of feeding him, gradually came closer to the feeding bowl; he now rubs against my legs. Recently, I was able to start petting him, but only when he's facing away from me. If Lion King turns to face me while I am stroking his gold fur, he hisses in displeasure. Pretty Boy and Tabitha allow me to pet them, but nervously jump out of my arms when I attempt to pick them up. The lesson learned: respect their limits.

Raging Hormones Lead to Unwanted Behavior

One recurring statement I hear is that feral cats are a nuisance. The fighting and yowling from protecting their territory or mating is obnoxiously loud. An immediate remedy is to have them spayed/neutered. You can reach out to local nonprofit groups for assistance which will humanely trap the cats and get them spayed/neutered. Trapping feral cats should be left to the professionals and incorrect trapping can result in injuries to both you and the cat. This is one of the reasons why it’s important to have all pet cats spayed and neutered, including indoor cats. You never know when one will escape or get lost.

The Universal Sign of a Sterilized Cat

If you decide to become a caretaker of a feral cat colony, it's extremely important to ensure they are all spayed and neutered. During the sterilization surgery, the cats are administered a rabies vaccination, and they are also "tipped," which means that the tip of one ear is surgically removed while the cat is still under anesthesia. Ear-tipping is a universal sign that a feral or stray cat is sterilized, another term for spayed/neutered. This prevents the trauma (an expense) of re-trapping and unnecessary surgery.

History has taught us that overturning misconceptions and prejudices takes time and education. One way to begin the conversation is to abandon the word "feral" and refer to them as "free-roaming" or "community" cats. This removes the stigma associated with "feral" or "wild" cats.

No one likes to be misunderstood, including outdoor cats. It's up to us to share the facts and keep educating the world.

Image: Lee Ming Hui / via Flickr

The official definition of feral is, “living in a wild state after domestication”. We consider that feral simply denotes unsocial behavior toward people. Behaviors can be modified, and some feral cats become tame. Regardless of whether a cat loves people or fears them, any outdoor, unaltered cat reproduces and contributes to the homeless cat problem.

We choose “free-roaming” to best describe what most people call “feral cats”, because free-roaming includes lost, abandoned, loosely-owned and stray cats in addition to “feral”. People feed and care about all the cats.

How does spay/neuter change the lives of free-roaming cats?

Body condition is a reliable indicator of health, that is, a robust cat is a healthy cat. Scientifically conducted studies reveal that altered free-roaming cats gain weight after altering. This makes sense considering that females no longer endure pregnancy and raise kittens. The risk of uterine infection and mammary infection disappears after spay surgery. Neutered male cats stop vying for breeding and fight less resulting in a healthier lifestyle.

Why do we care about cats that aren’t pets?

No one questions that people frequently enjoy relationships with wildlife, whether they are bird watching or crouching near tide pools to take in the amazing diversity of life.  We care about other creatures in our world even when they can’t be snuggled and many people bond with free-roaming cats and find great satisfaction in helping them lead healthy lives.

Why do we spay/neuter cats that aren’t social with us?

All unaltered cats contribute to the pool of unadopted kittens and cats euthanized in shelters every day. If we magically altered every free-roaming cat today, more would be born tomorrow. Tame cats are the original source of all free-roaming cats. The cats haven’t chosen their owners nor their social skills. For our purposes, whether a cat is tame, feral-behaving, shy, friendly, semi-feral, stray or something else, just doesn’t matter. We offer spay/neuter any of them, because it changes their lives forever.

How does altering a free-roaming cat save the lives of shelter kittens?

A scientific study revealed that about 85% of pet cats are altered while only 2% of free-roaming cats are altered. Population projections estimate 33 million kittens/year come from pet cats and 147 million come from free-roaming cats.

Every time a litter is born, it lowers the odds that others will be adopted. Competition for homes increases. What happens to the kittens that aren’t adopted? You know. But with spay/neuter, fewer kittens are born, competition for homes is reduced and lives are saved through prevention.

Why are we the “Feral” Cat Spay/Neuter Project, if we alter non-feral cats?

When we started, our goal was to provide access for the feral-behaving cats that veterinarians didn’t accept in traditional practices. We provided access to caretakers that could not afford to alter a colony of 5 or 10 cats at a regular vet. Quickly we learned that many of the unaltered, free-roaming cats are not feral-behaving, yet they produce thousands of kittens with the potential to live the feral lifestyle. We could not turn them away.

Because feral-behaving cats have less access to spay/neuter services, we prioritize our surgeries for them. But we also realize that tame cats produce feral-behaving cats. We strive to make spay/neuter services accessible for tame cats as well: Feral Cat Prevention.

By Peter J. Wolf

Feral cats have multiple definitions. There is the definition used in a 2003 article published in the Journal of the American Veterinary Medical Association, that says a feral cat is “untamed and evasive; they either were born in the wild and lack socialization or were returned to the wild and became untrusting of humans.”

The more common definition, according to many shelter and rescue workers, animal control agencies and various policymaking entities, uses “feral cats” to mean any cat without a permanent, indoor home — stray, abandoned or truly feral.

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Determining if a Cat is Stray or Feral Isn’t Easy

Pinning down the precise status of these cats is no trivial matter, as the different categories are determined more by context than anything else. A pet cat abandoned when her guardians move away, for example, may soon adopt behaviors we associate with feral cats. Upon reconnecting with humans, though — perhaps by way of handouts from a neighbor — this same cat may well find herself living indoors again.

Indeed, such situations are not uncommon for those involved with trap-neuter-return — a method for managing the population of stray, abandoned, feral and community cats through sterilization — or with the ongoing care of TNR colonies. These cats are ear tipped (a simple procedure in which about 3/8 of an inch is removed from the tip of one ear — usually the left one — done under general anesthesia at the time the cats are sterilized) for easy identification. Newcomers are, as a result, also easily identified. Friendly cats can be reunited with their guardians or re-homed; the others are sterilized, vaccinated and returned to their colony (or, occasionally, relocated to barns or horse stables via “barn cat” programs).

But again, a cat’s temperament can change over time. Many of us have taken in “reformed” colony cats — their tipped ears a constant reminder of previous, wilder lives.

Feral Cat Trap and Neuter Programs are Helping

So, if today’s “feral” cat can become tomorrow”s spoiled house cat, what difference does it make what we call these cats?

Far too many friendly cats brought into open-admission shelters don’t make it out alive; cats deemed feral don’t stand a chance. This is changing, however, with Feral Freedom programs, such as those in Jacksonville, FL, and San Jose, CA. Such programs — which sterilize, vaccinate and return feral cats to the neighborhoods where they were found — are not only better for all cats, but also provide a fiscally responsible alternative to the costly and ineffective lethal control methods used for generations. “There’s no department that I’m aware of that has enough money in their budget to simply practice the old capture-and-euthanize policy,” observed Mark Kumpf, former president of the National Animal Control Association, in a 2008 interview with Animal Sheltering magazine. “Nature just keeps having more kittens.”

Despite the obvious benefits of Feral Freedom programs, and TNR in general, such efforts are frequently opposed by individuals and organizations arguing that feral cats pose a threat to other cats, wildlife and humans. And, just as frequently, their talking points — which can often seem intended to inflame fears — are picked up by a mainstream media eager for sensationalist stories. All of which can leave policymakers and the general public badly misinformed — and feral cats at risk.

How You Can Help Cats

• If you feed feral cats, be sure to get them sterilized. In many locations, low-cost spay/neuter services are available, and there’s probably a local TNR group eager to help.
• Know your local laws regarding TNR, and the feeding of outdoor cats.
• Support TNR in your community by participating in the policymaking process. Attend home owners association and neighborhood meetings, write letters to the editor, and contact local, state and federal agencies when the issue comes up.
• Get involved with National Feral Cat Day — launched in 2001 by Alley Cat Allies to raise awareness about feral cats, promote Trap-Neuter-Return and recognize the millions of compassionate Americans who care for them.

Peter J. Wolf has been involved in the world of animal rescue and feral cat management since 2007. He currently lives with seven cats and helps manage three small feral cat colonies. To learn more about feral cats, visit Peter’s blog, Vox Felina.