The Cat Chose Us

Let me make this clear from the start – I’m a dog person. I don’t hate cats. I just prefer dogs in every way. The real drawback to cats is the whole little thing and I know I’d be the one responsible for cleaning it. Plus, we are both allergic to cats. These are among the reasons we’ve had four dogs and zero cats.

Monday night, it was raining heavily and this orange cat appeared at our front door. I thought it was the neighbor’s cat since they have a male orange cat that likes to roam and he’s been a visitor to our place before. So I sent them an email in case they were worried and waited for a break in the rain to walk the cat over.

It was not their cat but they thought they knew someone in the neighborhood who was taking care of it so they took the cat over to that house and all seemed right in the world.

Then, I got up on Tuesday morning and the cat was back sleeping right outside our front door. I got a email from the neighbors saying the people who they thought were taking care of the cat were not home. Still figured the cat would move on because it clearly acted like a cat that had been a pet before. Nope. Wednesday the cat was still around and then we saw it eating some peanuts that had fallen from the bird feeder in the back yard.

So we had a hungry cat that didn’t seem to be in a hurry to leave us. Feeding it would likely guarantee that it would stick around but ignoring a hungry animal is just not something we could do so we went out on Wednesday to buy some food. The cat seemed pleased with the meal.

I sent a photo and an email to the neighborhood. Got one lady who thought it might be a cat that ran away several weeks ago but that was not the case. A few people thought they had seen it around (although they could be confusing it with my neighbor’s cat) but nobody claimed it.

This cat has an ear tip removed and I guess there are organizations that do this to reduce the population of strays. They’ll trap the stray, get it spayed or neutered and then clip off the tip of the ear so that if it gets trapped again, they’ll know it has already been dealt with. They release the cats back to where they were trapped.

I have mixed feelings on this. If the cat is truly feral, then adoption isn’t an option. You could argue that this is better than killing the cat but a life outside fending for itself may not be a much better option. We’ve got coyotes around and they’ve taken cats before. Plus it can get really cold in the winter so the cat has to find food, water and shelter. I know strays can be resourceful but it seems like a hard life.

Especially for this cat which is super friendly and seems to enjoy nuzzling my legs while purring loudly.

So we have a dilemma. Our next steps would be to post on some “cat found” sites and see if it is chipped. My guess is both will be dead ends. I do have cat loving friends and family so maybe an appeal there will be successful. Although I’m not sure he’s ready to be a totally indoor cat and would he just try to find his way back here if left outside.

One of our dogs was a stray who showed up in our backyard one day and he turned out to be a great dog. Could we live with the allergies? Maybe. We have moved from the “we can’t possibly take him in” to “well maybe if we did such and such, it would be OK”. I suppose we could always just keep offering food and water and shelter in the winter even if we don’t try to bring him inside. That may be where things end up although it would still create complications when we take a vacation.

One the one hand, cats are more work than I’d like so I’d love to find a place for him. On the other hand, he did seem to choose us so maybe that is a sign that we should respect. Guess we’ll see how it turns out.