This thread has me laughing so hard. The question must be asked, at what point does the stray become a pet? Is it when you fix a sheltered place for it? When you feed it? Warming pads? When they tap on your door for food? My last cat was indoor/outdoor and insisted on being outside at night, so I left the garage door cracked and food on an old table for him. Of course all the strays in the area soon knew about the Open All Night Kitty Cafe. After a while they all had cozy boxes inside the garage to sleep in. I knew I had crossed the line when I made them all beds out of old sweaters for inside their boxes.
There is a story in the children's book, The Little Prince, . where a fox is talking to a boy (the prince) about "taming" things. "What must I do, to tame you?", asked the little prince. "You must be very patient," replied the fox. "First you will sit down at a little distance from me ... in the grass. I shall look at you out of the corner of my eye, and you will say nothing ... but you will sit a little closer to me, every day." That's what I did to catch my cat the first time, outdoors, when she was about 7-8 weeks old. She was living by herself behind a shed on the neighbor's property. I started by putting a dish of cat food at the corner of the shed, while I sat at the opposite end of my back yard and waited patiently until she came out and ate. Every day, I would move closer to the shed, and move the food dish closer to me. It took over 2 weeks before the food dish and I were close enough together, that I could reach over and grab her while she was eating, without standing up. She put up a terrible fight for such a small thing. I was scratches all over, and her needle-sharp baby teeth went completely through my thumbnail. But I didn't let go. Lack of patience was not an option. Living on a small lot bordered on 3 sides by automobile traffic, she would almost surely get hit by a car when she got old enough to venture out and about. The fox also tells the prince, "You become responsible, forever, for what you have tamed." .That was over 15 years ago.
We now have cats. 4 or maybe it’s 5 or 6. Dunno but we have cats. My chair on the porch has become a bed for one wayward yellow feline and the chair across from mine is a bed for yet another yellow cat. I know because when I open the door to the porch first thing in the morning, they high tail it out of the chairs and off the porch. Yvonne decided to buy some cat kibbles and I put a large dish of them out well before I go to bed at night and they do indeed scarf it down. She also provided a small bed that used to belong to the Poodle but I think they like the chairs better. A couple of nights ago, the two yellow ones decided to “sneak” by me whilst I was sitting on my chair and went for the food. I stayed still and watched as they gorged themselves to the point that I thought they ate more like dogs than cats. Hungry critters. Now, I keep food out just about all the time and the two yellow cats, a Calico and a new addition as of a few minutes ago, a large gray cat will go to the dish, eat without paying any attention to me, then jump off the porch to do whatever it is that cats do with their spare time. I do hope there is no conflict between the new cats and the squirrels that I also feed. Squirrels do not like cats but cats definitely love squirrels, for dinner.
Around here, when I was letting my cats out, they were about an even match for the squirrels, and no one got hurt. At first, they would do their predator chirp that cats do when they sense prey, but after they were knocked off of a tree by one of them or startled when a squirrel rushed them, they quit doing that. Now, they watch with interest but no longer seem to view the squirrels as prey. As for the ferals, well, we still have ferals and we still have squirrels.
We do not actually know if these are feral cats, just abandoned house cats, or even cats that have a home somewhere and just wander around. Many, many years ago, we used to have an elderly neighbor who started putting out food for stray cats in the evenings, and before too long, every cat in the neighborhood showed up at Ida’s house right at 8:30 when she put out the food for the cats. Most of these cats had homes, and they just came for the free buffet and then went back to wherever they lived, because you never saw them any other time except when Ida was feeding them. People move a lot in this part of town, so I think that some of the cats just didn’t get taken along when people moved, because we see them wandering though the yard or across the street; but there is no real way to know who has a home and who doesn’t. We just want to make sure that they have some food and a safe place to sleep if they need it.
I have a friend who takes strays in to get "fixed." Their ears get notched so one can tell which have already had the procedure done. We often wonder if the unfixed cats know to not waste their time with "Notchies."
The cats that I am feeding aren't actually feral, although they've been on their own for a few years now. I am nearly certain that they belonged to someone once, perhaps when they were cute little kittens. Rather than running when I talk to them, they stop and listen, and have let me touch them a few times. I don't like referring to them as strays either because that kind of puts the blame on them, while I am pretty sure they were either kicked out or, more likely, someone left them behind when they moved.
I was not criticizing. I only know that if they eat like they haven't in a long time they could be ferral and if there are two or more, there can eventually be multitudes. It has happened here.
Not a feral or a stray , this is a cat we took care of for 3 months in Adelaide 2 years ago …. The owner a lady , said he didn’t like being touched nor did he like beds ( he slept on a very cold laminex table ) and one day he took a liking to a shopping bag I had in the table so I said I’m going to get him a bed from cheap as chips ,which I did and also cut a small blanket of ours in half and sewed the ends ( it was mid winter ) She also had trouble with him peeing in most things inside , well while he was in our care he never peed on anything ( he was restricted to the back of the house ) He loved the bed I got for him and he slept in it most of the day and DH brushed him most days with one of those pimply brushing gloves and he’d roll from side to side while getting brushed never attempted to get away Think he was longing for company and his owner is a very busy retired lady who’s never home