I'm Torn: Is it okay to feed a feral/stray cat???

I feed the strays in my neighborhood. It seems that there are more with the economy being so bad. I think people are abandoning them.

Anyways, I make a Chicken Soup for them. 3-5 pounds of chicken and Brown Rice makes 15-20 pounds of wet food.

I buy chicken on Sale - usually leg quarters are the cheapest. I also get a tub of chicken livers and use 1/4 or 1/5 of that (freeze the rest divided in bags). Or a whole chicken when on sale. I usually spend about $3 this way.

Rinse chicken pieces - put in big pot with about 1 pound of rinsed Brown Rice. I also add a few blades of Wheat Grass (chop fine with Kitchen Shears) for extra nutition. Cook one hour.

Remove Chicken pieces onto plate - to help cool quicker. Take Stick Blender and whip up the liquid with rice - makes like a gravy. Debone chicken, add and further use Stick Blender - until all blended - once chilled this makes a wonderful Pate.

I add a capsule of Probiotics to the whole mixture - which helps keep many Viruses in check. I have saved extra large Mayonaisse Jars (64 oz) - and add a couple of heaping tablespoons of Food Grade (only!) Diatomatious Earth (for Parasites) on bottom - and fill these with the Soup - stirring till all in blended in.

I go through 1 of these jarfulls a day - for all the kitties I feed (plus Dry Food). But this mixture can be packaged and frozen (then thawed as needed) for lesser amounts of kitties.

The strays have gorgeous shiny coats and are very healthy from this. They just love their Chicken Soup and it costs me very little to provide this for them.

I feed the strays in my neighborhood. It seems that there are more with the economy being so bad. I think people are abandoning them.

Anyways, I make a Chicken Soup for them. 3-5 pounds of chicken and Brown Rice makes 15-20 pounds of wet food.

I buy chicken on Sale - usually leg quarters are the cheapest. I also get a tub of chicken livers and use 1/4 or 1/5 of that (freeze the rest divided in bags). Or a whole chicken when on sale. I usually spend about $3 this way.

Rinse chicken pieces - put in big pot with about 1 pound of rinsed Brown Rice. I also add a few blades of Wheat Grass (chop fine with Kitchen Shears) for extra nutition. Cook one hour.

Remove Chicken pieces onto plate - to help cool quicker. Take Stick Blender and whip up the liquid with rice - makes like a gravy. Debone chicken, add and further use Stick Blender - until all blended - once chilled this makes a wonderful Pate.

I add a capsule of Probiotics to the whole mixture - which helps keep many Viruses in check. I have saved extra large Mayonaisse Jars (64 oz) - and add a couple of heaping tablespoons of Food Grade (only!) Diatomatious Earth (for Parasites) on bottom - and fill these with the Soup - stirring till all in blended in.

I go through 1 of these jarfulls a day - for all the kitties I feed (plus Dry Food). But this mixture can be packaged and frozen (then thawed as needed) for lesser amounts of kitties.

The strays have gorgeous shiny coats and are very healthy from this. They just love their Chicken Soup and it costs me very little to provide this for them.

Great advice and recipe, thanks!

There are a few cats that roam the neighborhood, and once in a while I'll throw a big scoop of cat food down for them.

I usually do this when I walk my dog at night.

I'll see one of them and feel so damn guilty that they have to live outside in the cold and scavange for food...so I carry cat food with me and the'll eat it like it's their last meal.

It breaks my heart.

Serious questions: Do you think stray cats are happier outside? And, should I be feeding them?

Empathy f@#king sucks!

If you could please put a couple of containers for water there and carry a water bottle to refill them, they need clean water as much as they need food.

I fed a feral stray cat for over two years before I finally adopted her. I went down the block twice a day for all that time. It was a whole year before I could even touch her at all. She got so she would let me brush her while she was eating, but it was all on her terms. She needed brushing so badly, she had a lot of severe skin problems.

Just after Christmas last year she turned up sick and about broke my heart, so I managed to capture her , I don't think I could have done that before, she was really weak. Ran up a bunch of vet bills, got her cleaned up, she has been inside here for almost a year, and is extremely contented even in my tiny apartment. She basically lives under the daybed and comes out to eat and do what she has to, then goes back under the daybed. But she lies under there and purrs -

She won't let me touch her at all and runs under the couch every time I get up and walk across the room. But she finally worked out her problems with her skin and coat, that was a long process, she had a lot of severe itching for a long time, it seems like it's healed.

Maybe someday she'll let me pet her! A couple of months ago I felt so sorry for her itching, I thought I'd put my foot down and make her let me brush her, so I withheld food for a couple of days, I offered it too her (salmon!) about five times a day under the conditions that she come right up to me to get it, like she used to when she was outside, but she wasn't having any. I caved after 48 hours. Coaxing wasn't working, she stood her ground.

She's come a long way. Oh by the way she doesn't have any teeth. I knew that all along. She was starving to death when I started feeding her, they must have all fallen out when she was starving. I think she's probably been abandoned like ten times.

If you could please put a couple of containers for water there and carry a water bottle to refill them, they need clean water as much as they need food.

She's come a long way. Oh by the way she doesn't have any teeth. I knew that all along. She was starving to death when I started feeding her, they must have all fallen out when she was starving. I think she's probably been abandoned like ten times.

it is a tough position...like i have 60$ a month to spend on creatures humans have driven off their territory. i see it as my tough position responsibility, and i have been doing it for years and years and i still feel the same.

Good cats are spayed/neutered cats, since they aren't bringing more unwanted/feral/stray cats into the world.

That's why as hard as it is, you should not be feeding strays. They'll breed like crazy.

If there is any other way such as calling animal control, that would be much preferable. At least they can end the suffering of the cat.

Throwing down a scoop of of food only makes you feel better.

If you really want to care, practice what is called CNR: capture, neuter, release. Of course that envolves committment and expense.

Easier to throw down that scoop of food and let them breed more misery.

If you really want to care, practice what is called CNR: capture, neuter, release.

This is the best suggestion, OP. Here's an organization that knows all about trap, neuter, release:

[link to www.alleycat.org]

You might be able to get some neighbors to help work something out with the area vets about starting such a program. At the very least, Alley Cat Allies can send you blueprints to build cat shelters that even your area boy and girl scouts could build so that they'll have a warmer place this winter.

The VERY LAST thing you want to do is to take a feral cat to the Humane Society. They are feral and have never been socialized. Therefore - they are un-adoptable - which means they WILL have to be put down.

There's a myth that killing neighborhood feral cats will "get rid of the problem", but when cats die, more stray cats join the "pack". By maintaining the colony, you are keeping other strays OUT of the colony. The only way to reduce the population is to trap the colony dwellers, spay and neuter them, and return them TO THE COLONY. This has been proven OVER and OVER again so don't let anyone tell you that killing cats is the answer.

Thanks for caring for the babies, OP (all cats are "babies" to Kat Mama, LOL!).

Throwing down a scoop of of food only makes you feel better.

If you really want to care, practice what is called CNR: capture, neuter, release. Of course that envolves committment and expense.

Easier to throw down that scoop of food and let them breed more misery.

catch,neuter,release? fishermen have been doing that for years. thats why there are more fishermen than fish these days.
catch? a feral cat will rip you to threads if you're not careful.and what about the spread of rabies from non vaccinated animals? neuter? how about you walk around in public homeless or something and we catch you and neuter you? ethical treatment. hah! maybe you should circumcise them too. release? if you're going to decide to mess with the fate of another being and alter its future, then you are responsible for it for the rest of its life. thats like the crap that goes down in a dictatorship. the kindest thing would be to kill it and put it out of your misery and then make laws about people who aren't responsible for the animals that they buy and then let run loose. if you are going to catch an animal, either keep and care for it or eat it. cats breed like rabbits and can overrun a neighborhood quickly this ain't the jungle where they would have predators to control their population. i hate coming out in the morning and finding cat prints all over my shiny black car that i spent two hours waxing. all because the bunch down the road brings in stray cats and turns them loose. same thing with their dogs too. how would you like to come out and find animal poop in your yard? or driveway? or back porch? hmmm.... mayhap i might go euthanize the whole clan methinks.....and before you get to thinking that i'm a big bad bogeyman, yes i hate cats, however i cannot stand to see an animal starve.
the last starving stray that came through my yard was a cat. and i offered it food because it was clearly starving. just a skellington really. after feeding it, it became my responsibility,so i kept it, it stays inside and safe at night it has had vet attention and care. it now has a good home. so, we are the stewards of the Lords animals. we must do what is responsible.

catch me neuter me and release me? just shoot me instead.

You might be feeding the stray cats but what you are also doing is setting up a feeding station for racoons, skunks, possums, rats, etc.
For the last ten years a woman used to come to our nighborhood to feed the strays, we had every manner of pest roaming the neighborhood at night to the point people's dogs were getting sprayed by the skunks. The last straw that got everybody on board with us (yes, we were the lone assholes that had a problem with the feeding station from the beginning) was the daytime confrontation between one of the neighborhood toddlers and a raccoon. The kid wasn't hurt but everybody finally got together and made her stop.
And guess what? No more nocturnal pests.

I have read that it is good to have an few feral cats around because they help to keep the mice and rat population down.

However it is also good to try to capture and spade or neuter as many as possible because they will breed too fast and decimate the bird population which catch insects.

I feed the strays in my neighborhood. It seems that there are more with the economy being so bad. I think people are abandoning them.

Anyways, I make a Chicken Soup for them. 3-5 pounds of chicken and Brown Rice makes 15-20 pounds of wet food.

I buy chicken on Sale - usually leg quarters are the cheapest. I also get a tub of chicken livers and use 1/4 or 1/5 of that (freeze the rest divided in bags). Or a whole chicken when on sale. I usually spend about $3 this way.

Rinse chicken pieces - put in big pot with about 1 pound of rinsed Brown Rice. I also add a few blades of Wheat Grass (chop fine with Kitchen Shears) for extra nutition. Cook one hour.

Remove Chicken pieces onto plate - to help cool quicker. Take Stick Blender and whip up the liquid with rice - makes like a gravy. Debone chicken, add and further use Stick Blender - until all blended - once chilled this makes a wonderful Pate.

I add a capsule of Probiotics to the whole mixture - which helps keep many Viruses in check. I have saved extra large Mayonaisse Jars (64 oz) - and add a couple of heaping tablespoons of Food Grade (only!) Diatomatious Earth (for Parasites) on bottom - and fill these with the Soup - stirring till all in blended in.

I go through 1 of these jarfulls a day - for all the kitties I feed (plus Dry Food). But this mixture can be packaged and frozen (then thawed as needed) for lesser amounts of kitties.

The strays have gorgeous shiny coats and are very healthy from this. They just love their Chicken Soup and it costs me very little to provide this for them.