Feral Cats You've probably heard about "feral" cats in the news lately--maybe related to the recent debate in Wisconsin over legalizing the shooting of "feral and free roaming" cats. So, what is a feral cat? Alley Cat Allies, the national feral cat resource (www.alleycat.org) defines a feral cat as "either a cat who has lived his whole life with little or no human contact and is not socialized, or a stray cat who was lost or abandoned and has lived away from human contact long enough to revert to a wild state. Feral cats avoid human contact and cannot be touched by strangers." Alley Cat Allies explains the difference between feral and stray cats: "A stray cat is a domestic cat who has been abandoned or has strayed from home and become lost... because stray cats once knew human companionship, they can usually be re-socialized or re-homed. Adult feral cats usually cannot be socialized and are most content living outside. Feral kittens up to 8 or 10 weeks of age can often be tamed and placed in homes." (used by permission from Alley Cat Allies). It is estimated that there are over one million feral and stray cats living in Central Ohio! Feral cats live everywhere: in cities and towns, suburban communities, on college campuses and in rural areas. Feral cats live in groups or "colonies" which tend to gather around a food source. Unspayed female cats living in the colonies continue to produce litters of kittens who grow up feral and continue the cycle of breeding and reproduction. Unneutered "tom cat" roam, fight and often suffer from wounds and fatal diseases. Observation shows that about half of all kittens born into feral colonies die within their first year. Feral cats are often rounded up and killed--most often using inhumane methods. Millions of feral cars are killed in shelters each year because they are unadoptable. Long-term studies have shown that removing and killing feral cats does not reduce the population, but creates a "vacuum effect". New cats move in around the food source and the breeding cycle begins again. It's a bleak pictures--but reality for thousands and thousands of feral cats living in Central Ohio and around the country. Is there anything compassionate people can do to help reduce the suffering and useless killing of feral cats? There is a solution! TRAP/NEUTER/RETURN (TNR) is the most widely-used and effective method of controlling and helping feral cats. TNR has been used successfully in Europe for decades. Since Alley Cat Allies' inception in the late 1980s, hundreds of organizations around the U.S. have formed to implement TNR programs and address the issues in communities like ours. TNR is a proven procedure in which entire colonies of free-roaming cats are trapped using humane traps, spayed/neutered by participating veterinarians, evaluated and vaccinated. Young kittens and tame cats from the colonies can be placed into adoption programs or shelters. Feral cars and older kittens too wild to be adopted are returned to the colony after spay/neuter, where they live out their lives without breeding. Colony "caretakers" monitor the cats and check for new arrivals or illness. Recent studies show that spayed/neutered feral cats who live in managed colonies have almost the same life span and contract diseases at about the same rate as pet cats. TNR is a humane, effective solution to the problem of cat overpopulation. Fewer unwanted litters mean fewer kittens and adult cats who end up being euthanized. It's simple--stopping the breeding means reducing the number of cats killed! Many organization and individuals in Central Ohio advocate and use TNR to help feral and free roaming cats. For more information or help with feral cats, please contact one of the groups listed below. It should be noted that some OH counties have laws and regulations regarding the trapping of animals. Any one of these groups should be able to tell you find out what they are. Alley Cat Allies: Visit www.alleycat.org Capital Area Humane Society's Feral Cat Assistance Program: Visit www.cahs-pets.org or call (614) 777-7387 ext. 296 The Humane Society of the United States: Visit www.humanesociety.org/feralcats PetPromise's City Kitty Program: Visit www.petpromise.org/feral.html Colony Cats Visit www.colonycats.org or call (614) 570-0471 Written by Nancy Heller of Cat Assistance Team of Central Ohio. This article originally appeared in Animal Outreach's quarterly publication, the Animal Insider, Summer 2005 Issue.