The Time Capsule | Roy Marshall
People who know more about it than I do say feral cats are a problem that, in places, has reached epidemic proportions.
What I do know is that late on the afternoon of July 4, someone contributed by dumping a litter about half of a mile from our home. A witness told me a couple of days ago that she’d seen it happen. By that time, I’d already dealt with two of the victims.
On about the 20th of that month – 16 days after the litter was left by the road – Wife asked me to get rid of what she thought was a dead creature in the back yard. I found an emaciated kitten, covered with lesions and barely breathing.
We know what swarms of flies do to open wounds, and I need not describe the sight. The pathetic thing had patches of bare skin, ticks clinging to its ears and around all-but-lifeless eyes, and was probably infested with other vermin as well. Some readers will say I should have taken it to a vet to be humanely euthanized. Maybe so, but that would have prolonged the ordeal, and I chose a quicker way.
That evening in the garage I caught a glimpse of movement and, minutes later, heard something under the work bench. Suspecting what was hiding in the dark crevice behind several paint cans, I applied a leaf blower.
A kitten, practically weightless, tumbled out. The tiny thing looked at me through eyes too big for its wasted body, moved its mouth as if to meow, but no sound emerged. Truly, if the woman who ditched them had been standing before me, I’d have slapped her then and dealt with consequences later.
Although the process has been slow and costly, and health issues are not entirely resolved, we have a happy garage dweller that thinks I walk on water (or milk). She has a home, and for this the woman who dumped her would no doubt be pleased. That person should think instead of the ones that didn’t survive; babies without their mother, in a strange place, no food or water, day after day of mid-July heat, biting insects, a slow and painful death. There has to be a special place in the hereafter for people so cruel and irresponsible.
There are alternatives, but taking unwanted cats to the Montgomery County Animal Rescue is not one of them. Jan Black, who was director and pretty much do-everything worker, said the place operated on donations and volunteer help and was forced to close because there wasn’t enough community support. She and others remain active, working with the Clarinda Correctional Facility’s animal program.
Black said cats are difficult to place. She remembers a very nice one that was at the shelter for five years. “People rarely go to an animal rescue for a cat,” she said. More often, cats come to them. “They’re breeding at six months, may have three litters a year. They can roam and fend for themselves, and the number of feral ones is a problem.” Black suggested that free-ranging cats do provide a degree of rodent control.
The other side of that coin is that they do not care if their next meal is a Norway rat or a Baltimore oriole.
Some think the answer is a Trap-Neuter-Release (TNR) program, which was used for a time in Randolph and considered (and shelved) by Red Oak’s City Council. This program has the cat, after being trapped and neutered, returned to its “living area.” Animal kindness advocates favor this approach. Opponents say it puts a few garden-digging, garbage-can-raiding, bird-killing machines back on the streets.
People accepting responsibility for themselves and their pets is the long-term remedy, so we can expect the problem to be around for a while.
Roy Marshall is a local historian and columnist for the Red Oak Express. He can be contacted at news@redoakexpress.com.