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 We
have all seen cats outdoors in our neighborhoods, around businesses or
restaurants,
in the country, and yes, by the side of the road after being
hit by a car.
Are they someone's cats?
Strays?
Ferals?
 The answer may be any of the above. In Tulsa, it is against the City Ordinance
to let your cat outside to "roam". Cats, as well as dogs, are
to "maintained on your property". For cats, this pretty much means "kept indoors",
as we all know that a fenced yard certainly isn't going to
"contain" a cat.
 However,
there are A LOT of people in our community that don't keep their
cats indoors. We hear a
lot at the City Shelter, "well, he always stays in the
backyard," or, "she always comes home in the evenings"
- mind you, those comments from people at the shelter looking for
their LOST cat!!
 It is
also a City ordinance in Tulsa that your pet must be spayed or neutered. This Ordinance is also not followed
by A LOT of people in our community. This
means that people may let their cats outdoors and may not have them sterilized - a recipe for disaster!!
 Those cats you see outdoors may very well be someone's pet who "always
stays in the backyard", or they may be a product of someone's unsterilized
pet who "always comes home at night". If they are the product of someone's unsterlized cat, they may
be a friendly "stray" who just has no real home, or they may
be truly "feral" or wild, descendents of someone's pet who
was never socialized with humans.
 However
they got to their current situation, they are causing problems for our
community through destruction of many native birds, causing
disturbances to citizens (howling at night when in heat or fighting),
reproducing at an alarming rate (a female cat and her offspring can
produce 720,000 kittens in 7 years), and they are costing the taxpayers money through the animal control
efforts to trap and euthanize these cats.
 The
current methods of dealing with these stray and/or feral cats has been
proven
in other areas of the country to fail at the goal of getting these
cats "off the streets". They can reproduce far faster than they are trapped,
poisoned, shot, etc.
 However,
one method has proven to control the population
explosion of these cats . . . TNR,
which stands for Trap, Neuter
and Release. By using
this method, the sterilized cats are returned to their
original location (if wild or unsociable) or adopted to new homes (if
sociable). The remaining
cats in the colony then are not reproducing and
for the most part will keep new cats from entering the colony. This program
also assures that the cats have a food source and are watched for any
illnesses or injuries. A
much more compassionate, humane way of dealing
with the cats, too, don't you think?
The TNR program not only has a much happier ending for the cats (i.e. they
aren't
poisoned, shot or trapped and taken to a shelter to be destroyed), but
can eventually save the taxpayers A LOT of money by eliminating the
need for animal control to buy more traps, spend man hours dealing
with the cats and housing/destroying them.
 Their
numbers kept in control by humane measures, they can also benefit us by
helping keep mouse/rat populations under control (since they are
natural predators of these little creatures).
Our TNR program is called "The Catastopic Program" and we hope
this program will be able to help stop the catastrophic reproducing of
wild/stray cats. In 2001, nearly 150 feral
(wild and/or stray) cats were trapped, tested for FIV/FeLV,
spayed/neutered and then released back to the area where they
were trapped (if sociable, PAWS makes every effort to place them
into an adoption program).
 These
returned, sterilized cats have some caring people who have agreed to
continue to provide them with food, and help to "maintain the
colony."
Let us know if you know of a colony of cats in need of our help!
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