The Life of a Feral Cat Caretaker

I am allergic to cats and most animals.  I have asthma and eczema plus two kids on the Autism Spectrum.  We live in Los Angeles.  Down the street is a neighbor who has about 20 or more cats in her yard.  My son Nicholas is 11 and knows about feral cats, strays and all the cat breeds. 

Nicholas has about a dozen books on cats because when he grows up and moves out he wants 2, 4 or 13 cats - it all depends on the day you ask him or he volunteers this information.

In May a black cat started hanging around my front door.  When I would come home from errands while kids were at school I would be confronted with a cat at my door.  Well the cat would run, but I wondered why it was here.

The neighbor said she thought the cat had kittens and was nursing.  I did not know that much about cats by just looking at one, but my son and neighbor can tell you if a cat is a male or female. 

The summer season brings out the gopher in the front yard and he just tears it up, large holes all over and he goes from 7 am till 1 am sometimes and enters through the walls and scratches around th ceilings.  One time I got an umbrella and poked the ceiling at 1 am until he left.

I have flooded the holes with the hose and then a few weeks later a gopher is back.  During the summer we also have lizards as visitors. They hang near the front door entrance and if you are not fast they come inside and drive me out of my mind. 

One year I cut one in half with the broom and did not know which side to follow as it went in opposite directions. I scream and yell at the top of my lungs and most often they are sunning themselves near the dumpster as I go to throw out another diaper.

The neighbor suggested I feed the cat and then I would no longer have the gopher or lizards. She said her cats kill the lizards and she finds dead gophers.

The thought of a dead gopher did not appeal to me, but having to deal with a lizard entering my home gives me the chills so I went and got a box of friskies.

My high functioning son Nicholas started writing in a little cat notebook a diary of when we saw the cat, and what she was doing all the time.  One day he told me that he saw kittens and sure enough there were three of them.

Soon we realized who the father cat was.  His brother lives as an indoor/outdoor cat across the street - ever since he got fixed and went indoors for one night.  Their mother lives over there and the mother to the mother cat in my yard lives there.

My son and I named the cats.  Sheera is the Mother, Stevie is the father, Crackers if the female kitten, Blackie is a male black kitten and my favorite is chuckles a gray striped male kitten.  We both seem to like Stevie the best, as he is a handsome cat and has never hissed at us.

Soon I start doing google searches on feral cats and buying canned food.  Then the flies start to be a problem in the back porch and then the maggots in the garbage can.  I start buying a can of RAID each week and spray all over the front and back areas.  Now I have to hose the inside of my dumpster each week.

Nicholas and I would hang outside in the front yard looking at the kittens and then the back neighbor said that there was a flea infestation. He has a cat and a dog.  They sprayed but Nicholas still found a flea here and there on his leg.

Then he would run into the house saying he hated the cats and hop in the shower.  I did not see any fleas but now have the bites all over my ankles and legs to show that I was bitten several times.  I did a google search and compared my leg bites to others and found a six year old girl had worse looking bites and I felt better.

I learned that vicks vapo rub works on getting the fleas off your skin and as a repellant.  I went to the store and bought that.  Soon the paper plates were a pain for the food, so I got some bowls at Ross.  This seemed to attract the ants and I spent time in the yard hosing out the bowls and realized I was a target for the fleas.

I went to foam plates and find these are a bit better for the food, yet the cats have a hard time as they move about when they lick the contents.  Nicholas has not been getting his ten dollar a week allowance since I spend that much and more on cat food. 

For a few weeks we were buying toys and treats, but that stopped.  Nicholas has cat calendars, notebooks and folders with cats.  He wanted to show these cats these items and I had to explain that the cats don't care about looking at another cat in a picture.

I went from being irritated by lizards and gophers to having to spend money on cat food, foam plates, raid and dealing with cat crap in my yard, smelly front yard, flea infestation, ants, flies and maggots in my garbage can.  Not to mention what opening cat food cans is doing to the cuts on my fingers from my eczema.  I have bandaids on many fingers and a few times have had my finger stuck in the pull top tab of the can.

I want the lizard and gopher back.  Yep they are cute cats but what a pain it is to be a feral cat caretaker.  I want to be relieved of my duties.  The mother cat has dug down into the tree stump and it has to stop.  She needs to find another place to crap.

If I stop feeding them will they leave?  Oh and I am also spending money on photographs as my son keeps taking pictures of these cats.

There was this large gray cat we named Butch that came to the food late at night and he was a scaredy cat but very nice looking.  We have not seen him for sometime now, but I did come across a possum at 11 pm the other night who would not leave.  Chuckles and Sheera were close by watching this creature eat their food.  I opened the front door and stomped my hand on it and it finally left.

This has been a learning experience for my son.  Why he would want to have a cat after all this is beyond me - well I am doing all the stinking work. 

The neighbor suggested I get a litter box and have the cats go in there.  No way am I going to add that to my list of things I am doing. 

Oh yeah these cats are so cute, but oh the work involved and the money and the time.  I am sick of it.........