TNR Handbook - Neighborhood Cats

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The Neighborhood Cats TNR Handbook should rest against one another at their very tips. Even with adult cats, the Tru-catch trigger should be set fairly near the ends of the bars or else too much weight is required to set it off. One kitten will often follow another into a trap. This creates the danger one will step on the trip plate while another is at the front door, possibly causing injury, though usually the kitten at the front door is scared away. The way to eliminate this risk and maximize the chance of trapping multiple kittens at once is to not set the trap in the normal way with the trigger. Instead take a full soda or water bottle a little less than the height of the trap (a one liter bottle of Poland Spring is perfect) and tie a string tightly around the base. Open the front door of the trap and prop a corner of the door on top of the bottle. Unwind the string until you’re a comfortable distance away, then pull the string taut. Wait until the kittens are well into the trap, then yank the string, pulling away the bottle and shutting the front door. Two words of warning about this technique: first, don’t wait too long for multiple kittens to show up. If one or two are in and no one else is hovering close by, go ahead and catch those or else they’re liable to walk out on you. Second, practice pulling the string and shutting the door at least once before you attempt it live. If you don’t know the feel of it and how much force is needed when you pull, it’s easy to do it wrong and only succeed in startling the kittens away. The string and bottle method is also useful when you’re not yet ready to trap any adults, but are after the kittens because you want to get them while they’re still young enough to be easily socialized. If you can’t use the string and bottle method for some reason and have to set the trap with the trigger, there are a couple of ways still to try to catch only kittens. One is to use a very small trap, such as a chipmunk or squirrel trap that only a kitten can fit into. However, in our experience, these traps can be problematic. Often the trigger mechanism is very sensitive and goes off too easily, such as when a kitten brushes against the side of the trap. Also, you might be surprised how small of a space an adult cat can squeeze into. Nonetheless, some trappers do swear by their “kitten” traps once they’ve found the ideal one. The second technique involves using the normal 36-inch long box trap and building a doorway out of cardboard which only a small kitten can pass through. Cut out a rectangular piece of cardboard the height and width of the trap. In one corner, cut out an opening 3” x 3”. The opening will be the kittens’ doorway which only they will be able to fit through. Then place the cardboard inside the trap a few inches in front of the trip plate, positioning the cardboard to block further access towards the rear of the trap except for the doorway in one of the lower corners. To prevent an adult cat from simply pushing the cardboard out of Cardboard kitten doorway 51
The Neighborhood Cats TNR Handbook the way, poke holes in each corner of the cardboard and attach to the trap with twist ties. Place bait in the trap and set it as you would normally. Never try to pick up kittens with your bare hands unless they are less than four weeks old or are accustomed to being handled by people. If you want to pick them up, use gloves with a protective material like Kevlar. Otherwise, those little fangs are very sharp and liable to leave their mark on your fingers. Nursing mothers What action to take when there is a nursing (lactating) mother in the colony depends in large part on how old the kittens are and whether you know where the litter is located. Litters of unknown age and unknown location In colonies that are not well known to the caretakers prior to the trapping, it is often discovered after a female cat is trapped that she’s lactating and may have kittens somewhere in the territory. One way to see if a female might be nursing is to lift the trap high off the ground and look up from below at the female’s belly. If the nipples are noticeably distended, there’s a chance she has a litter. If it’s clear she is lactating, and sometimes it takes an experienced person to judge this, and you don’t know how old the kittens are or where they are located, then you have a difficult choice to make. You could let the cat go, knowing you may never catch her again and she may go on to have numerous more litters. Or you could get her spayed as quickly as possible, release her after 24 hours if she’s alert, and hope any kittens survive in her absence. When making this decision, there are several factors to consider. Feral kittens naturally have a high mortality rate, often 50 percent or more, unless the colony is managed and living in good circumstances. So the kittens may or may not still be alive when you have the mom in a trap. Second, kittens older than two weeks can survive for at least one day without the mother while newborns could die within hours. If you can get the mom spayed and released within 24 hours, then there’s a reasonable chance the kittens will survive unless they are less than two weeks old. Some caretakers believe it is wrong to ever take the risk there are kittens who will die in the absence of their mother. Others believe the responsible thing to do is get the mom spayed while you can and end her procreation. What might be the determinative factor for you is the circumstances of the TNR project. On one extreme, you may be working in a remote industrial area with a large number of feral cats who you may or may not ever see again after you trap them. In that case, if your policy is to immediately release all lactating females without spaying them, there’s a good chance you won’t fix enough of the population to get the situation under control and the project will fail. On the other extreme, if the nursing mom is a regular in your small backyard colony and you’re certain she’ll be back and it won’t be too hard to capture her again, then you might decide to let her go. 52
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The Neighborhood Cats TNR Handbook
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Contents The Neighborhood Cats TNR
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Page 7 and 8: Foreword The Neighborhood Cats TNR
Page 9 and 10: The Neighborhood Cats TNR Handbook
Page 35 and 36: 6. Winter Shelter The Neighborhood
Page 45 and 46: 8. Trapping The Neighborhood Cats T
Page 47 and 48: This is easily gotten around by tap
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Page 63 and 64: • Hard-to-catch cats The Neighbor
Page 69 and 70: • Directions for use by Laura Bur
Page 73 and 74: 10. Caring for Cats in Traps The Ne
Page 91 and 92: 13. Return to the Colony The Neighb
Page 93 and 94: 14. Relocation & Sanctuaries • Re
Page 107 and 108: 16. Feral Cat Resources Neighborhoo
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TNR Handbook - Neighborhood Cats

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