Since June I’ve been staying with family who lives in Croatia. I have 2 rescue cats at home that I miss terribly, so when I found out there was a feral/stray cat population that lives near the apartments, I established a routine of checking on them.
They seem to hang out around the area between the two buildings, one side borders scrub land and a construction site, the other side leads into a outdoor parking area. You can usually find them sleeping under cars for shade, near the garbage cans, or just chilling on the concrete.
I’m not the only one in the building who feeds them, but I’m the only one who stays afterwards and visits them consistently. I usually refill the bowls I’ve left for them with fresh water and dole out leftover meat scraps and cat food for them. Other people just leave wet/dry food in a pile, which I’m glad for, but I like to sit and watch them after I give out the food. I don’t really try to interact with them unless the more affectionate ones want scratches, and I never hand-feed them. A few of them are clearly used to humans and are friendly, the others I just observe from a distance. I’ve been taking pictures of them so hopefully at some point I can identify them from memory. The most I’ve seen at once is 10 adult cats and 4 kittens, on average I see around 5 adults and 2 kittens.
Which brings me to the crux of the issue. My sister is 8 and comes with me sometimes to check on them, and she’s gotten attached to one of the kittens. He/She (not sure about the gender) is an orange tabby, maybe around 8 weeks or so and is friendly 95% of the time. He/she is skinny, eyes are a bit teary (he lets me lightly wipe them out), and a couple weeks ago there was some yellow goo around his eyes but that seems to be gone now. He can’t vocalize very well compared to his siblings and seems to struggle meowing. I can’t find any conclusive research on mutism in cats so I’m not sure if that’s actually a sign of trauma/illness.
Honestly, when I first started visiting them, I wanted to help them all, but after reading up on feral cats, I’ve realized that sometimes human interference isn’t what’s best for them. They have their own way of doing things and there are definitely signs to look for when they genuinely need help that I now know about.
I know for nature the morality of “oh I’m taking this kitten away from its mother” isn’t quite that simple. But the attitude towards cats here was really shocking to me when I first arrived. Most people still consider cats nuisances, and it’s very common to see news articles about cars running cats over and people not helping while the creature is bleeding out/in pain. I talked to an english-speaking lady in the building, and she said vets here aren’t interested in helping establish trap-neuter-release programs. At least 3 of the cats are visibly pregnant, so the cycle will continue, and I don’t know if taking in this kitten will help anything, or if it’s ill-advised.
I guess I’m just asking for opinions and any advice y’all may have, thank-you!
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from Pets https://www.reddit.com/r/Pets/comments/cdxmmf/feral_kitten_vs_adoption/
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