Cat help please!

furbabymum

Songster
7 Years
May 6, 2012
1,336
79
188
Burns, Wyoming
We adopted 5 kittens from a neighbor when the mom was hit by a car. They were feral cats. We had them in a mudroom type thing secluded from the rest of the house until they were large enough to go outside. I've since moved them to the barn with our birds. We had 5. We are down to 3. While we did interact with the kittens it was only once a day to feed, water and clean the litter box. It appears that was enough to cause issues. When it's warm they come to the house and sit at the doors meowing their heads off. We can't let them inside. My husband is allergic and we have dogs that will kill them. In fact, that's how we lost one last night. I let the dogs out and lo and behold a cat was sitting on the dog bed. Instant death. The other death was a cat I ran over. I just... I don't know what to do to prevent that. Another one almost got hit today by my husband. We drive very slow because we know they are running under our cars but we can't just not drive to prevent this and that's where we are now. We bang on the cars to get them out. I take them back to the barn every time they come to the house. We would like to keep them for pest control. We have tons of pests. Oh I am feeding them in the barn and I moved their bedding there. I'm just at a loss.
 
Look into rehoming the kittens. Also place them in an enclosure large enough for them were they won't escape from. You can call local no kill shelters and see if they have any room available but only do this if you can't find anyone who wants to adopt. It is so necessary that you either find them homes before the females get in heat or fix them. You don't want more kittens on your hands. Good luck. Finding homes is easy. Place ads and flyers at your local vets and petshops and also in the paler.And on the internet.
 
I wouldn't suggest keeping these kittens for pest control. Especially if they keep coming to your house and you have cat killing dogs. It poses too high of a risk of losing them. If you do want to keep them you would have to get them fixed and train your dog's to not attack them.
 
If you specifically want a barn cat, look into local cat rescues. Many of them will give you a feral, fixed cat for FREE, because it is already wild and can't be adopted out as a pet, but can't stay at the dumpster where it grew up.
 
I'd prefer to train the cats to stay at the barn than to get rid of them. The dogs can't be trained to not kill them. Our cat killer is 11 and a weimaraner. There is no training that out of him. Plus he is behind a fence. It is only when they go into his fence that he can get them.

So far I'm taking them back to the barn every time they go into the garage and I'm feeding them only in the barn. My husband has sprayed them a few times with water when they've been at the door.

They will be fixed. We've got a lady in line to do that as soon as they are of age.

As much as I hate to keep cats (because of all the issues with doing it) we really need them. We've got some pretty large pest problems and we need these cats.
 
Rehome these cats. Buy some D-Con or get yourself a Rat Terrier. You hate to keep cats, and sorry but it shows. So why have them?

First off, these kittens would be dead without me. Dead. All of them. I have fed them milk and now kibble, kept them warm and cleaned up after them for months. Now I am concerned that they are going to die and I'm somehow the bad person here? They have 40 acres, a nice, warm barn with food and water. They have everything they need to live happy lives here while also helping me out with some issues. So what I want is to train them away from the house and certain death.
 
Thank you for saving these babies. Your a good person. Its good that your getting them fixed. Maybe to prevent them from coming you can give them no affectionate human contact. Now I dont mean hurt them but dont pet them and coddle them. They wont become fully not tame but they will learn not to yearn for your attention all the time. As of training them not to come to your house, I dont know.

If you really need a barn cat it would be easier to rehome these babies and pick one up from a shelter or rescue. A lot easier to take care of as well. A jack russell is also a very good way to get rid of mice but im going to assume you dont want another dog. You should look up jack russell mouser vids on youtube. I have guinea fowl and cats so my mice problems are very low.

Also I would like to mention, though it seems its beyond hope of training your high prey drive dog from killing them it isnt. I grew up with a greyhound who would kill any small animal that came near. My dad used dogs for hunting rather than guns so he brought her home and she immediately went after our game hen. We only had one chicken at the time and she was a pet so the dog going after her was a no no. My dad not only trained her not to attack the chicken but also the cats. He took her every other weekend in the winter to hunt for rabbits but she never even looked at the birds or cats in the wrong way; and its not that she only didnt attack them in front of us because the hen and the dog slept in the same room together.
 
I don't know about training them not to kill cats. He's been killing cats for quite some years and though it'll get me lots of e-rage we've not had a problem with it. I mean he's fenced. If he gets a cat then we just took some stupid out of the gene pool. I don't really blame him for the cat he got of ours either. He was in his fence.

I'm hoping the remaining cats are learning. They haven't been to the house lately. They've been staying in the barn. It's been warm as well so they could have come out, but didn't. I'm hoping it works out. We don't have a no-kill shelter in my area so I could give them to the shelter but they might be killed anyway. I hope we can just train them off.
 
TY for caring BUT cat husbandry calls for all pet cats(pet=barn,working,inside,outside,whatever) to be spayed/neutered and if you can't/won't afford it then you should not have the cats. This isn't mean it is a fact. Your neighbor is the true bad person. Most farms take better care of their food animals then they do their working cats/dogs(good animal husbandry for cat/dog is s/n) Again...just stating facts. The kits wouldn't have needed saved if the neighbor had followed this philosophy. I have worked with dogs and cats my whole life and am horrified at people that still think its cute to see kittens born at the farm. My farm practices proper animal care(and I know excellent purebred dog breeders-needs a ton of knowledge and care of any offspring that leave their homes) If you won't find a way to at least get the remaining cats fixed then its of no help. I personally hate dogs but go out of my way(and I am technically poor) to help any strays that show up. I have even helped trap stray dogs(who, again, I don't like) to send to rescues. Unfortunately there are just tooooo many kittens available to get the problem slowed down.
 

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