Strays

I just thought I'd put out the word for all you dedicated cat lovers to call your local shelter or SPCA and ask about their policy on stray neutering/spaying.

I live in a town especially over run by stray animals. Many of them are still socialized to humans, at least enough to be in the same general vicinity. I have taken four into my little home and that is simply all I can reasonably handle. Unfortunately, that did not even dent the local stray population.

I know it can be a divisive issue, but I simply do not agree with rounding them up and taking them to shelters to be killed. A wild, free animal needs to be wild and free. I have an outdoor cat who goes into pure distress if I don't let him out at least once a day. It's even beside the point in this town because even the SPCA has gone no-kill and is completely full.

This is a tragic set of circumstances because, not only do these animals not have a home but they breed absolutely out of control. It can be devastating to the local wildlife and a poor way for thes enoble and intelligent animals to have to live. If you are one of those people with the will and the means, you should be aware that many shelters have programs where they'll give you a trap and do free or very reduced cost neutering and spaying of stray animals. In this way, you can do your part to help ensure the local stray population has some added control and not have to bring another, more feral generation of wild cats into a world who doesn't seem to have time to be concerned with their well being.

 

That's nice to know! At one point, it would've been great knowledge for the area where my parents live. When I was a child, there were a million and a one stray cats roaming the area. One even decided to stick around their house (for 10 years and counting) and eat dog food. She was a smart one. Most of them died out, so the population issue isn't so much an issue, but this kind of thing would've helped for a few years in there.

 

Unfortunately our local animal shelter was on the news for its gruesome treatment of animals left in their care, so I won't be checking them out. I would have, had all that nasty business not come to light/been going on in the first place. We've got a stray dog hanging around that we're trying to find a home for because there is simply no where else for it to go. I wish our shelter was under better management, or that there were other, better shelters around.
I think education is key to keeping animals out of animal shelters and having them properly taken in and cared for by owners. If owners were spaying/neutering and managing breeding properly we wouldn't have over-run shelters and masses of animals without homes. The problem with the strays now, the uncontrollable breeding.

 

I wish every domestic animal had a home. It's heartbreaking to see how strays are treated. Today I was walking with my daughter to Walmart and I saw a calico cat with its tail cut off. It was not a naturally tailless cat.
The tail was not neatly surgically removed, it was clearly chopped off by someone sadistic. Walmart is near my daughter's high school and we live in an urban area, so those constantly bored teenage hoodlums from the school probably decided to have fun with the cat. That cat is lucky to be alive.
I hope the tail stump doesn't get infected. I didn't get too good of a look at the cat because she was understandably afraid of humans and took off when my daughter and I got close.