So after buying my house 5 years ago I noticed there was a crazy cat lady down the street that feeds a bunch of inbred strays. For the most part they stayed over towards her house and I would rarely see one. This changed after the tore down a barn that they were apparently living in and the neighbor 2 houses down also started feeding them. Last night I counted a group of 7 of them hanging out in my driveway.
Now, I know this thread is probably going to end up with a bunch of shoot them comments but 1. I’m not completely heartless. 2. I live in a rural area but houses are close. and 3. I don’t want someone to fuck with my dogs for screwing with “their” cats.
With that said…what are my options? The neighbor looked into it a few years back and the only option the SPCA gave was to bring them in, pay them $50 to fix them, and take them back. I have started shooting them with a low powered BB gun (daisy lever from when I was 10) just to keep them away but they don’t seem to be getting the idea.
I’ve thought about stepping it up with a pellet gun but it wouldn’t kill them quickly if at all. I’ve heard about subsonic/quiet ammo for 22s but I don’t want to end up in jail for animal cruelty as I’m sure the shots are still rather audible. I’ve thought about trapping them, driving them away, and leaving them but again…if my weird cat-guy neighbor gets pissed I don’t want him to mess with my dogs or turn me in for something stupid.
With the way they ripped up my porch lattice this winter I assume they’d be able to get out of it.
I’ve got one of them to keep them away from one flower bed they kept crapping in. My yard is fairly big and odd shaped so it’d be a bitch to run hoses to cover everything. There is one spot they normally seem to cross but unfortunately it’s in my driveway so the cars would get blasted every time I left. They do have ones with water tanks but they’re $170 a piece and I’d need a few.
I’ve tried calling the animal control officer multiple times. It’s her home number and she never answers or calls back so I’m assuming it’s a no go. I guess I could try with someone else in the town though but I doubt they’d be willing to spend any money on the issue.
What I should have done was called the SPCA police when it was -10 this winter and all the cats were on the ladies porch. I’m assuming that would be enough for them to take them away.
---------- Post added at 11:33 AM ---------- Previous post was at 11:32 AM ----------
You say that but they really are a pain in the ass. They drive the dogs crazy as they sit right out side the edge of their wireless fence when the dogs are out, shit all over, scratch up the corner of my garage, tear up the lattice on my porch, and piss all over stuff.
animal control for a town usually only picks up nuisance animals or dead animals…so they don’t really give a shit about some stray cats or dogs a neighbor is harboring. There’s not a whole lot you can do except try other town departments or SPCA. Try property maintenance department…if you have outdoor animals they are supposed to be contained to your property either by leash or fence.
The issue is the woman feeding the stray cats. I would report her to the town/city/village/cat utopia you live in. Get photos of the food dishes outside with the cats eating out of it.
Strays carry disease. They could harm you, your dogs, neighborhood kids, etc.
It sucks because some heartless fuck let their cat go and this is the result most of the time.
I <3 cats but that crazy cat lady is not helping the situation. Good luck.
I would call the town/spca and you may want to leave out the part of shooting them with a bb gun, there are alot of tree hugging animal lovers that would probably find to be animal abuse.