Fur flies over Bluffers Park cat colony
CARLOS OSORIO/TORONTO STAR
Caregiver Robert Brydges feeds the Bluffers Park gang on June 18, 2009. He says there hasn’t been a problem with the colony of feral cats until now.
Jack Lakey
Staff Reporter
A group of area residents who have spent years looking after feral cats in Bluffers Park say they're worried the city will remove the colony after a dog owner complained that the kitties beat up on their bull terrier.
Robert Brydges, one of several people who care for 20 to 30 feral cats living in the park, sent us an email saying Toronto Animal Services initially demanded that the wild cats be licensed, then said they would have to be removed, or else animal services officers would trap the cats themselves and get rid of them.
But city officials claim there's no such plan.
Eletta Purdy, Toronto's manager of animal services, says any suggestion that the city will clear out the cats is due to "information that has been misconstrued."
She is planning a meeting with local residents, animal services and park officials to hammer out a humane solution.
We've been writing about feral cats since last winter, and have visited several colonies.
But never have we seen a colony as plump, healthy, well-groomed and happy as the Bluffers Park gang.
Almost all the cats have previously been taken by the caregivers to a vet to be spayed or neutered and given vaccinations and a checkup, paid for by an elderly benefactor in the neighbourhood.
Brydges, who's cared for them since 2004, said there's never been a problem with the cats until the owner of a boat moored in the park, at the foot of Brimley Rd., complained to animal services that four cats launched an unprovoked attack on her pooch, resulting in a scratched snout.
The caregivers have a different story, saying the dog used to run around unleashed and once attacked another dog, adding that one of them witnessed the woman encouraging the dog to menace the cats while it was on a leash.
The demand to license the cats – even though nobody owns them – has left all of the caregivers baffled.
And they are not quite sure what to do with the pile of licence applications animal services officer Ann Brooks left with the park marina.
They're not about to fill them in.
Purdy said the cats are technically required to be licensed, but there are hundreds of thousands of feral cats in Toronto, we noted, none of which are licensed.
So why would such a condition be imposed for the Buffers Park cats?
She didn't have a good answer, but said they are acting on a complaint about cats attacking a dog, which is a serious public safety concern, adding, "What if a child had been attacked?"
Brydges said he recently went to the animal services centre on Progress Ave. and asked to speak to a supervisor to plead the kitties' case, but she wouldn't meet with him.
He says he spoke with another officer who said animal services had the authority to require the cats be licensed and could also remove them, if necessary.
The officer disappeared for a few minutes, then returned and said the colony had become a "health issue" and that licensing would no longer be required because the kitties had to be removed, said Brydges.
Purdy later denied that they threatened to remove the cats, insisting "that would not be something that we would ever normally say."
We'll keep you posted.
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