Feral Cats

You'll get a video here soon....if it's not here already....

Our Problem

The problem of feral cats is ours. Sometimes you read stories about people complaining about feral cats. Or, when reading blogs or comments on blogs, people making derogatory remarks about feral cats and how they spread disease and upset the neighborhood etc. There is no point moaning about feral cats as if we are blaming the cats for the problem. The problem is ours as much as is obesity or bad debt or any other human condition. Except we are hurting cats instead of ourselves. We are, in effect often killing them, if we fail to take full responsibility for our feline companions.

Steve Wozniak

What prompted me to build this page was a news item (via Business Wire) about Steve Wozniak (Apple founder with Steve Jobs) who has teamed up with Humane Society Silicon Valley (HSSV) to heighten awareness of the feral cat problem in the Santa Clara county. He did this by presenting a video now on YouTube. It's very good.

Trap, neuter, return

Of course the problem is nationwide and indeed worldwide. It has been said by people wiser than me that the measure of how civilized we are is how we treat the vulnerable and less fortunate than ourselves. The vulnerable includes animals and that includes cats and cats includes feral cats (they were once pets). It has been found that the most human way to deal with feral cats is to trap, neuter and return (TNR). "Return" in this context means to rehome tame kittens/cats and to return the truly feral cats to the wild of the urban jungle.

Proactivity

Remember this is how best to react to the problem. Even better is the proactive step to ensure that your cat is neutered and that you take full responsibility for your cat throughout her/his life. That would be the end of feral cats in the West if we all did that.

Even if you look at feral cats from a commercial standpoint (the standpoint that seems to carry the most weight) it pays to carry out the TNR policy as it is apparently more expensive to euthanize feral cats.

Cat Breeders

This problem of feral cats begs the question of whether cat breeders are to blame or partly to blame for the feral cat "crisis". Certainly a substantial number of people think so, including it seems the owners of the website business Craigslist (it is a business even though it's a .org website) who forbid cat breeder classified adverts. I can see the argument. Cat breeders produce a desirable "product". Consumer society responds and buys. More cats are breed. Irresponsible owners abandon or neglect their "purchase". Feral cat results. But the Humane Society Silicon Valley's work with feral cats tells us that the problem is one of neutering and neglect. In other words it is not the cat breeder (the seller) who is causing the problem, but the "buyer", the customer and pet owner.

Education

So, to tackle to problem from the other end means education and more education and this article is one very tiny effort in that direction.

Visit: Humane Society Silicon Valley to learn more. This is a really worthy organization that has been around for 78 years, well before Silicon valley became perhaps one of the richest places on earth.

Is there are connection with the wealth of Silicon Valley and the 125,000 feral cat population there? I really don't think so. You probably see more feral cats in poor areas due to lack of education and the difficulties in the humans managing their own lives leaving little time, effort and knowledge to care for a cat.

Source:
Business Wire
HSSV
YouTube

Feral cats to home page