Abandoned v Street Cats
I’ve posted before about how sorry I feel for the abandoned pets, and how vulnerable I think they are out on the streets. This is why I get very frustrated when people tell us not to feed the stray animals here, because they can fend for themselves.
Genuine street cats know how to forage and hunt for food, and they are comfortable out in the wild because that is all they have ever known. Abandoned pets I imagine, find the switch vey stressful; they are suddenly forced to compete with other more street-wise animals and their natural instincts are not particularly tuned to fend for themselves. I also think they must miss the human contact and affection.
Kasper, featured in my last post is a prime example. Before we rescued him we had been feeding him out on the street, alongside Mimi and Monty for several months. At the beginning he was aggressive and confident, but after 4 months he was looking sad, thin, dirty and bedraggled and was seen crying at night. This was despite the fact that he had access to the same food from us as Monty and Mimi.
Monty and Mimi meanwhile continue to thrive, even more so now their erstwhile tormentor is off the street. SO why are these 2 doing so well, with good coats and weights, whilst poor Kasper was going slowly downhill? I put this down to stress and being unhappy with his environment. I think Kasper WAS lonely and a little bit scared, and sad cats often don’t even clean themselves properly.
Monty and Mimi LIKE being outside whilst Poor Kasper is basically an indoor cat who found the streets a hostile and uncomfortable place. In their basic feelings and requirements, I believe animals are very similar to humans, and being dumped into an alien world in not what any of us would welcome. SO for those who regard all the stray animals as basically a nuisance, I would say again that maybe it is time to have a heart, at least for the tame ones who really don’t belong on the streets, and really do need our help.
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I met a guy off a boat very early the other morning whilst I was feeding a number of stray cats -he was a cat lover himself and said what a pleasure it was to see how healthy and well fed all the Marina cats seemed to be and what a contrast it was to other Ports where the stray cats are very thin and unhealthy.I told h im about Almerimar Strays and how we are trying to reduce the numbers by slowly castrating and steralising and he was very impressed with what we are trying to do.
That’s great to hear Pam. There are some lovely people out there.
Great article. Have said before it is great to see them so happy when they find their new homes in Germany, and looking at our three it doesn’t seem that hard adjusting from the streets to the comfort of the home