Fall 2015

Time does fly whether you are having fun, or not!  We have been so busy............
Our focus remains on stabilizing community cat colonies, feral and abandoned cats mostly unspayed or unneutered and uncared for.  We are unique in our efforts; we do not obtain adoptable cats from shelters, but work with the ignored uncontrolled colonies.  We maintain a nightly, now early morning route, to 20 sites for observation and supplemental feeding of colonies we have previously stabilized in a program of Trap, Neuter, and Return.

We began our work with colonies in community parks.  We have recently worked in trailer parks where colony cats live under the trailers and eat from scraps on trailer porches; there is no problem until the park managers realize the population has grown to out of control numbers and desperate measures are contemplated.  Commercial sites find cats living in the landscaping and eating from trash containers of fast food restaurants and grocery stores.  Residential problems result from home owners feeding a cat or two without the understanding that two can become 7 to 12 in a nine week gestation period.

This problem is huge as there are uncontrolled cat populations wherever they can even barely survive.  Community agencies do not acknowledge the problem, their resources do not seem to be sufficient for its scope, where night time trapping is of no interest to their staffing requirements.  Unfortunately the local animal control response to the problem is a suggestion that people lquit feeding cats and they will go away, which is not at all likely.  The uncontrolled cat population cannot be ignored.

Our current project is at a trucking company with large parking areas occupied by lots of feral cats and kittens.  Staff at the site have been feeding them, and they are willing to continue if the population size can be reduced.  There are many small kittens there, most of which are candidates for taming and adoption.  The kittens are cute, many are Siamese.  At this time of year there is an overabundance of kittens available for adoption, but we are hopeful that the character and qualities of these kittens will be favored for family adoptions, instead of their remaining with the less satisfactory life of a community colony living at the trucking company.

We could use your help in these endeavors.  Spay and neuters for ferals cost nearly $50 each including tests and rabies vaccinations.  When you deal with 7 adults and 15 kittens the costs become very significant.  The trucking company has agreed to support much of this current effort, but the expenses we have with all that we have been doing are not matched by our income and we struggle to survive.

Stillwater Cat Haven, Joan and Don Neptune
P.O. Box 278, Anderson CA 96007
(530) 365-4861