Trying To Help The Feral Cats....UPDATE.....LOOK WHAT I GOT!! PICS INCL.

I again everybody. There has been an outbreak in my neighborhood of stray cats. There has been this one mama around my house for a while and I have gotten pretty close to her, but she is very mean. Last week I saw about 10 kittens in a yard about 4 houses down. They look about 12 wks old. Nice sized kits. Last night there were four kittens and the mom on my porch...so I decided to try to trap them and get them fixed and vaccinated. The mom is too mean to adopt out so I will just let her go when she is done, but the kittens I will try to domesticate them and adopt them out. I set out two live traps last night with a small amount of canned food in them. One cage was not closed, some how they managed to get the food but not trip the trap. The other trap caught mama. I will take her in on Monday to be spayed and vaccinated as well as ear tipped. I am going to set up the traps again tonight in hopes to get a couple of babies. Here are two pics of the mom. She is really feral but very pretty.

http://i112.photobucket.com/albums/n...escPics013.jpg
http://i112.photobucket.com/albums/n...escPics012.jpg

MY GOODNESS SHE IS A PRETTY CAT.
WHAT A SHAME IT IS THAT THERE ARE SO MANY PETS RUNNING AROUND COLD AND HUNGRY WHEN THEY SHOULD HAVE GOOD HOMES.
BUT IN A SOCIETY WHERE CHILDREN ARE OFTEN ABUSED AND MISTREATED , WHAT CHANCE DO THESE POOR CREATURES HAVE?
THIS REMINDS ME OF WHEN I HAD A HUMANE TRAP OUT FOR POUNCER ROCCALNO, AND EVERY NIGHT A DIFFERENT POOR SCARED FACE WAS THERE.
BLESS YOU FOR CARING AND HELPING BREAK THE CHAIN OF UNWANTED KITTENS.
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v6...ats1011222.jpg
BO BO AND I SALUTE YOU!!!!!!!!!!!

OH! She looks quite like my Cuddles! Hi Sweetie!

There are kitten traps as well. They are smaller and more importantly, need less weight to trigger the door. When I do TNR, I have some of each.

At 12 weeks, it will be a bit of a challenge to tame the babies, so you are getting in at the last moment. We usually try to get them at 5 weeks or so. Here is a link, the last essay under "Kittens" is tips on socializing. May be of interest to you. The hardest part (for me anyways) is that you need to separate them.

http://www.alleycat.org/resources_care.html#10

Bless you for caring about these kitties!

She has a Puddy expression on her face if I ever saw one. How cute!

My wife and I contribute to a fund at our no-kill animal rescue unit that helps trap feral cats at apartment complexes throughout the city. The apartment owners trap them, especially with their kittens, and bring them to us..We spay/neuter them and socialize the kittens. The adults which cannot be socialized are sent back to the apartments where they were found. Many times it is the only home they know as they were abandoned there by people moving. The apartment owners have their maintenance people get cat food from us and then feed them there. A lot of new apartment lessee's also feed them. The kittens are adopted out to good homes. We even have people that goes to the kittys prospective homes to inspect it and make sure it's ok.

What a beautiful girl! So sad that she is so scared! :(

Pete, welcome to PT! Your wife and you are doing a wonderful service! Thanks for sharing that with us!

Kim

Freedom -- Thank you for the link...it is very helpful

Pete -- Welcome to PT...and great job with the stray kits....you and your wife are angels for caring for these poor babies. It is good to know so many people care about their well being.

Well, I set up two more traps earlier today and around 7:15...look what I got......

Lil' Boy (sorry it's blurry...he moved)
http://i112.photobucket.com/albums/n...escPics019.jpg

Lil' Boy...so sweet
http://i112.photobucket.com/albums/n...escPics017.jpg

The family reunited....
http://i112.photobucket.com/albums/n...escPics014.jpg

I know there are at least 4 more babies out there. I was worried that they were not mama's babies, but as soon as we set the trap on the table next to her she tried getting to them. We placed mama in a small dog cage with litter box, food, and water (and a blanket of course). She is not as feral as I thought. Dave and I were able to pet her, flea treat her, and deworm her. We are not sure how she would be if we picked her up, so we just put the trap inside the door of the cage and let her relocate to the cage. The kittens are actually really sweet, as you can see. They are very scared, but do not mind human contact. I dewormed them and flea treated them as well. For tonight they will stay in my garage. I want to be sure the fleas are dead before I bring them in the house. I will bring them in tomorrow and put the family in a larger cage. Paws does not take in ferals for surgery on Sundays or Mondays, so they will go in on Tuesday morning for surgery, shots, chipping, and testing. We are going to work with all three of them in hopes we can make them fully trust people and them adopt them out.

I have reset the traps. I am hoping the morning brings fresh faces to get off the street. I will post more as soon as I can. :)

OH, they are so beautiful! Good news about Momcat maybe being a little more social that was thought.

The orangie reminds me of lvpets2002 Bump TeeBoo and Skid.

The black guy - how handsome! And those whiskers!

Way to go - I hope you get the whole family. :)

Look at those eyes on all 3 of them! Simply precious. :)

Oh those sweet faces!! The momma just breaks my heart. Hope she will allow herself to be socialized. The tuxie boy is a heart throb! So handsome!! He should get snatched up in a jiffy!

I'm glad that you've been able to trap the mother and 2 of her babies. All 3 are adorable and hopefully they'll all be able to find new loving forever homes.:) Good luck with trapping the other kittens.:)

Great job!!

One suggestion though. Since Mama is quite feral, you might want to consider separating the kittens from the mama, in an effort to socialize them. They're old enough to be away from Mama.

Just a thought. They're beautiful!!!

What wonderful news! I am so happy that mama is less feral and just very scared! Keep working with her and pet her every chance you get! I agree that it would probably be best to separate the kittens from her. If they sense that she is scared, then they will be as well!

Kim

Woo Hoo!!! Job well done and good luck on capturing the remainder kittens. You're my hero!

Bless you and thank you very much for helping this beautiful kitty family. Mommycat has gorgeous markings and the babies are beyond adorable. I'm wondering if mommycat seemed so mean because she was separated from her babies?