Around August of 2018 we found a cat on our property. The cat had two kittens, which we believe were born here. We believe one kitten died, and the mother disappeared shortly after before we could capture it. However, we kept the surviving kitten and we've taken care of it, and by now she's an adult. We call her Squeaker or Mama Cat (which will make sense shortly), and she's mainly white but with black patches.
We couldn't get her fixed in time, and she had 6 kittens around July of 2019, which have all grown up. We took care of Mama Cat and her kittens for the first 12 weeks inside my father's workshop, sheltered from outside animals. We visited with them and held them every day. One was all black which we named Batman, two were black with small white stripes on their heads and chest which we call Sylvesters, two were grey tabbies with stripes, and one was like the tabbies but with a bunch of large white patches. We managed to find a home for the one with white patches after the recommended time. However, we couldn't find homes for the others. Eventually, my father kicked them out of the workshop and they started living in our yard. Sadly Batman disappeared early. We believe it was taken by an owl, but the others survived together. At least until recently, when the Sylvesters started getting territorial and driving the tabbies away.
All of the surviving cats are friendly to humans, particularly the Sylvesters. At least for outside cats. I don't know if they like being held, but they allow you to pet them and feed them. The tabbies and Mama Cat only seem to like being petted with the back of your hand down their back though, not on their heads. They all got along with each other up until recently, but within the past month or so the Sylvesters have decided they don't like the tabbies and have been driving them off into the woods and guarding the food from them. They still seem to like each other though, and this process seems to be driven by one Sylvester in particular but I'm not sure. We haven't seen both tabbies in awhile, and I fear one may have been killed or vanished for good. I saw that one a few times after it was drive off initially, but not in a while. However, the other tabby still comes around periodically, before it is driven off again. I saw it today and yesterday. We have coyotes around so I worry they will be eaten.
On April 21st Mama Cat had 4 more kittens, all various shades of black and white like their mother. My father doesn't want them living up in his workshop this time, so now they're being raised in an unused and unplugged refrigerator in the garage beneath it. The garage doesn't have a door and is exposed to the outside. They started opening their eyes recently, and like before me and my brothers visit with them and pet them to try and make sure they like humans and don't become feral.
I know we need to get all the cats fixed, but we don't have a lot of money and I don't know how to do that cheaply. We also don't have the money to keep feeding all of these cats. Ideally, my family would like to keep Mama Cat and the two Sylvesters since they all seem to get along. But we want to get rid of the new kittens and the two tabbies so they don't die. That would require capturing the tabbies though, as like I said they keep getting driven off into the woods. I understand that the kittens should stay with their mother for 12 weeks. I worry that keeping the kittens in a garage that's exposed to the wilderness for 12 weeks might result in some of them dying, so I'm willing to get rid of Mama Cat to keep the kittens safe. I also don't want to give them to kill shelters. I'm feeling pretty overwhelmed here, and I'm pretty sure I'm the only one in my family whose isn't willing to let these cats breed out of control and die to natural selection. So any advice on how to deal with this situation would be lovely.
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from Pets https://www.reddit.com/r/Pets/comments/gezk8g/looking_for_advice_outside_cat_problems_breeding/
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