COMMUNITY CATS

Frequently Asked Questions

  • A community cat is an unowned cat that lives outdoors! They are not someone’s pet and they don’t need to be! Cats have been outdoors and have survived in the wild for a very long time. They tend to be not socialized, meaning they are scared of and sometimes not friendly to people. They would be very unhappy indoors. They live very happy lives with other community cats, typically congregating into what are called “colonies.” Alley Cat provides more info that can be found here.

    They do not need to be moved and certainly don’t need to be taken to the pound (they are often euthanized for no reason).

  • Feral cats (community cats) are not socialized to people and can only live outdoors. Stray cats, on the other hand, may live outdoors but are socialized to people. This means they are friendly around people and may be able to be adopted into homes. Alley Cat has a great resource here.

  • TNR stands for trap-neuter-return. It is a science-backed, humane, and very effective method of controlling the cat population as well as optimizing the health of the outdoor cats.

    A classic way to tell a cat has been TNR’d is they will have been ear tipped, meaning a large chunk of their ear will have been removed so that people can tell from a distance this cat has been spayed/neutered. Often, TNR programs will also provide the core vaccines (rabies and distemper) during surgery. You can read more here.

  • Not every outdoor cat needs to be adopted into a home. In fact, as mentioned previously, feral/community cats would be extremely unhappy indoors and are not socialized to be with people. Sometimes, cats get out of their home and there are things to do to see if you can help them find their way home. If the cat is friendly but doesn’t have an indoor home, they may be a candidate for adoption.

    However, even friendly stray cats can live happy lives outside. A great option for them is to get them humanely trapped, spayed or neutered, vaccinated, and returned to their outdoor home so they can live with their colony. TNR resources locally can be found here.

  • Please check out this link for humane deterrents.

Notice the right ear of this community cat is ‘tipped,’ meaning it has underwent TNR.

You found an outdoor cat - what now?

Thank you for taking the time to educate yourself on what to do if you find an outdoor cat. Sometimes, our first instinct isn’t actually in the best interest of cats in our area. You are being a great steward by learning more about what will actually be helpful to the cats you encounter out and about. AlleyCats has a great decision tree that helps in figuring out what to do!