By Jennifer Herne, LVT

Welcome to the second part of our discussion on community cats. How do you help them? Most people say by feeding them, but this sometimes creates more problems. Sometimes our best intentions may create more problems. There are so many cats here in Akwesasne, and everywhere for that matter, because owners aren't properly educated about preventing litters of kittens and why spaying and neutering is so important. The single most important thing you can do as a cat owner is to get your cat, male OR female, fixed. This should be done before the cat is 6 months of age. You shouldn't wait until the cat has a heat or starts spraying. Usually at this time, most owners toss the cats outside because a cat yowling in heat or urine marking everything in the home is unwanted and annoying behavior. As a responsible pet owner you should be preventing this unwanted behavior.

So, community cat caretakers, once you begin feeding your cats, you must start vaccinating and spaying or neutering all of your colony, or the number of cats you have will soon be very alarming and unmanageable. A high number of cats in a colony means higher risk for sick and injured cats due to fighting among the males. This is another important reason why you need to spay and neuter, it reduces fighting.

I was shocked and saddened to hear so many cats yowling and fighting in a district of Akwesasne one night. I thought to myself why is this happening and why is it accepted by our community? Why isn't anyone doing anything about it? I was very disappointed that this was happening and continuing to happen. I am sure that people don't enjoy listening to this and I also felt bad for these cats who didn't ask to be put in such a situation. Humans created this situation, not the cats.

There are programs to help spay and neuter cats at a lower cost than traditional veterinary costs. These programs are not free, but are very low cost. If you feed cats and truly want to help cats, which is why you are feeding them in the first place, you want to help. You should spay/neuter these cats and vaccinate them as well. Feral cats can potentially be a source of rabies if they are left unvaccinated. They are exposed to wildlife and we have had rabies in our area. When you buy that gigantic bag of cat food or throw out your food garbage on the ground, take a minute and think about how your actions are affecting your community. If you truly want to help cats, get them spayed/neutered and vaccinated. They can be placed back into the colony and will do just fine when released. They don't need to be turned into a housecat after you trap, neuter and release. We can direct you to the proper place for help and we have lots of resources for you to read, stop by and pick them up, information is free!