Feral Cat Q.

Here's a question for anyone who knows anything about ferals--

Will the offspring of a feral cat *always* be wild WRT human contact?
That is to ask, if a stray kitten can be handled by humans, can you
always assume that it's been socialized by humans before? Or are there
feral kittens who allow themselves to be caught/handled?

Thanks

Sherry

wrote in message
oups.com...
Here's a question for anyone who knows anything about ferals--

Will the offspring of a feral cat *always* be wild WRT human contact?
That is to ask, if a stray kitten can be handled by humans, can you
always assume that it's been socialized by humans before? Or are there
feral kittens who allow themselves to be caught/handled?

Thanks

Sherry


I think it all depends on what age they were caught and seperated from their
mother. I've seen little 3-4 week old bitties hiss, but they come around
much easier with lots of handling. Kittens caught after 6 weeks take more
time to come around, but they will eventually. Many times they will stay on
the shy/skittish side.

-Kelly

On Sat 30 Jul 2005 10:14:48a, wrote in rec.pets.cats.health+behav
roups.com):

Here's a question for anyone who knows anything about ferals--

Will the offspring of a feral cat *always* be wild WRT human
contact? That is to ask, if a stray kitten can be handled by
humans, can you always assume that it's been socialized by
humans before? Or are there feral kittens who allow themselves
to be caught/handled?

Good question Sherry. I wish I knew more about Bonnie's history
before I found her, but she had to have had no contact from humans.
She didn't act like she'd been abused, but just overall in fear of
people - but she was much older than a little kitten. The time I
had to go round up a few litters of kittens in the backyard of an
elderly woman's house, the momcats were definite influences in how
difficult it was to trap/catch them. They were frantically trying
to keep me from getting near the kittens by constant meowing at
them to "come here now".



--
Cheryl

"The clever cat eats cheese and breathes down rat holes with baited
breath."
- W.C. Fields

wrote in message
oups.com...
Here's a question for anyone who knows anything about ferals--

Will the offspring of a feral cat *always* be wild WRT human contact?
That is to ask, if a stray kitten can be handled by humans, can you
always assume that it's been socialized by humans before? Or are there
feral kittens who allow themselves to be caught/handled?

Thanks

Sherry

That's a good question for Megan, actually.

But I'd say not. We get livetrapped kittens in all the time, and most of
them
come around within their 7 day stray period. The percentage rate is higher
for the younger ones, though. Smaller groups usually come around faster,
too. Bigger groups seem like the others reinforce the fear and feral
activity.
MOST of the 'feral' kittens we get in are handleable.

Kalyahna wrote:
wrote in message
oups.com...
Here's a question for anyone who knows anything about ferals--

Will the offspring of a feral cat *always* be wild WRT human contact?
That is to ask, if a stray kitten can be handled by humans, can you
always assume that it's been socialized by humans before? Or are there
feral kittens who allow themselves to be caught/handled?

Thanks

Sherry

That's a good question for Megan, actually.

But I'd say not. We get livetrapped kittens in all the time, and most of
them
come around within their 7 day stray period. The percentage rate is higher
for the younger ones, though. Smaller groups usually come around faster,
too. Bigger groups seem like the others reinforce the fear and feral
activity.
MOST of the 'feral' kittens we get in are handleable.

Do you mean handleable as in, rubbing and purring all over you?
For a kitten to behave that way, does it usually mean it has been
socialized by humans before?
Wish Arjun was around. He's such a good resource ferals.

Sherry

On 30 Jul 2005 07:14:48 -0700, wrote:

| Here's a question for anyone who knows anything about ferals--
|
| Will the offspring of a feral cat *always* be wild WRT human contact?

In general, no. It depends on how early you catch them. The basic
factor here is that kittens are usually born fearless. They just
don't know any better. Fear and caution they learn from their mom.
Thus, there's a big difference between a feral litter born "outside"
and one born in a fostering situation.

In the latter case, the human contact is earlier, and the earlier the
contact happens, the more easily is the socialization accomplished. In
the former case, one quite often doesn't even get to see the litter
until they've had the benefit of early "training" in a human-free
environment. It can be overcome, because the kittens are still young,
but even so, it's better that such early training were different.

| That is to ask, if a stray kitten can be handled by humans, can you
| always assume that it's been socialized by humans before? Or are there
| feral kittens who allow themselves to be caught/handled?

Yes, there are. Personality is a factor too. The assumption isn't
really valid, one has to treat each case on its own terms. If you saw
my Marie (but ignored her eartip!) you would never believe that she
was a feral for the first five months of her life. calvin and Katrina
took to human contact readily even though they were about 10 weeks old
when I caught them. On the other hand, I've seen 6-week old kittens
hiss, scratch and (try to) bite.

What's the real issue here? Found a kitten from an apparently feral
situation who is too friendly?

Arjun Ray wrote:
On 30 Jul 2005 07:14:48 -0700, wrote:

| Here's a question for anyone who knows anything about ferals--
|
| Will the offspring of a feral cat *always* be wild WRT human contact?

In general, no. It depends on how early you catch them. The basic
factor here is that kittens are usually born fearless. They just
don't know any better. Fear and caution they learn from their mom.
Thus, there's a big difference between a feral litter born "outside"
and one born in a fostering situation.

In the latter case, the human contact is earlier, and the earlier the
contact happens, the more easily is the socialization accomplished. In
the former case, one quite often doesn't even get to see the litter
until they've had the benefit of early "training" in a human-free
environment. It can be overcome, because the kittens are still young,
but even so, it's better that such early training were different.

| That is to ask, if a stray kitten can be handled by humans, can you
| always assume that it's been socialized by humans before? Or are there
| feral kittens who allow themselves to be caught/handled?

Yes, there are. Personality is a factor too. The assumption isn't
really valid, one has to treat each case on its own terms. If you saw
my Marie (but ignored her eartip!) you would never believe that she
was a feral for the first five months of her life. calvin and Katrina
took to human contact readily even though they were about 10 weeks old
when I caught them. On the other hand, I've seen 6-week old kittens
hiss, scratch and (try to) bite.

What's the real issue here? Found a kitten from an apparently feral
situation who is too friendly?

Yes, you guessed it. I actually found it under my car late yesterday
and can't figure out how it got there. It was *very* skittish and wary,
but in the last 24 hours has come around a lot. We're very isolated. If
there are any feral cats around, I haven't seen them. I have about
decided that either someone dumped it on purpose, or, I know it's
remotely possible I carried it home in the undercarriage of the car
from somewhere. It's about 4-5 months old. Here's a pic.
http://members.aol.com/jjrich0523/straykitty.jpg

Sherry

On 30 Jul 2005 23:46:19 -0700, wrote:
| Arjun Ray wrote:

| What's the real issue here? Found a kitten from an apparently feral
| situation who is too friendly?
|
| Yes, you guessed it. I actually found it under my car late yesterday
| and can't figure out how it got there. It was *very* skittish and wary,
| but in the last 24 hours has come around a lot. We're very isolated. If
| there are any feral cats around, I haven't seen them. I have about
| decided that either someone dumped it on purpose,

That's my guess. Don't you already have a "cat lady" reputation?

It may not be feral at all for it come to around so fast. Hmm, big
ears, just like Calvin and Katrina had. :-)

wrote
Yes, you guessed it. I actually found it under my car late yesterday
and can't figure out how it got there. It was *very* skittish and wary,
but in the last 24 hours has come around a lot. We're very isolated. If
there are any feral cats around, I haven't seen them. I have about
decided that either someone dumped it on purpose, or, I know it's
remotely possible I carried it home in the undercarriage of the car
from somewhere. It's about 4-5 months old. Here's a pic.
http://members.aol.com/jjrich0523/straykitty.jpg

Sherry


Awww... poor little guy! I hope everything turns out OK for him.
PS - Arjun, good to see you again! I know you don't really know me, but
I've always appreciated your posts and you are such a great source of info
regarding TNR and ferals. Keep up the good work!

-Kelly

wrote in message
oups.com...
Here's a question for anyone who knows anything about ferals--

Will the offspring of a feral cat *always* be wild WRT human contact?


It depends on two things: how early the kitten was exposed to human contact.
Feral kittens 3 months old are fairly easy to tame and accept human
handling happily. But the age at which kittens will adapt to human handling
varies among cats. I have two former ferals that I trapped at 6 and 8
months. Both are completely socialized- although one took a little longer.
The eight-month-old took longer to come around than the six-month old, and
the six-month old took longer than three-month old ferals I've trapped and
socialized.

Another factor is the mother. The kitten's mother has a strong influence on
her kittens' attitude towards people- a friendly mother is more likely to
have friendly kittens- this is probably a result of learning through
observation rather than genetics.

In my experience, kittens born to feral mothers from a managed colony tend
to be much more friendly and easier to adapt to human contact than feral
kittens born to mothers with no human contact.


That is to ask, if a stray kitten can be handled by humans, can you
always assume that it's been socialized by humans before? Or are there
feral kittens who allow themselves to be caught/handled?



The terms 'stray' and 'feral' are not interchangeable. A friendly feral
kitten could have had a friendly mother and a stray kitten could have had an
unfriendly mother. In a cases like this it would tough to tell the
difference without knowing the mothers' history.

I'm not sure if I answered your question. ;-/

Phil