dgk wrote:
On Tue, 04 Sep 2012 19:24:44 -0400, Brooklyn1 Gravesend1 wrote:

"Bill Graham" wrote:

Well, to bring the discussion back to cats, I take in strays and
feed them and water them, and offer them a warm place to sleep in
the Winter time. What I don't do is imprison them. They were free
when they came to me, and they remain free while they are with me.
Part of the reason they choose to stay with me is the fact that the
door is always open. Both for me and for them. Slavery ended (or
should have ended) back in the 19th century, both for animals and
men.

Tell the truth, **** for brains... you're another of those lazy cheap
*******s who can't exert themselves to deal with litter and pay for
it... you don't take the cat to a vet and you feed it the cheapest
crap food you can find because this isn't the first time you made
believe you are caring for an animal because you know there's no
reason to make any investment in yet another cat that you'll find
flattened in the road. I've met lots of fake do-gooders like you...
I don't believe a word you said, you don't feed any cat, you're just
trolling.


Maybe he can't afford litter? Maybe he can't afford to take cats to
the vet? I don't know. We all do what we can, that's why we're on
these groups.

I have four cats. I can keep them totally safe, locked in a small
room. Should I do that? If I give them the run of the house, maybe
they'll chew on a wire and get electrocuted. Maybe they'll eat a stray
rubber band and die of a perorated colon. Maybe find a string and eat
that, tying up their intestines. No, I'd better keep them locked in a
small room with nothing that can possible hurt them. Food bowls,
water, litterbox. No cat tree because they might jump off it and break
a leg. If I let them have the run of the house, maybe they'll break a
screen in the window and get out. That actually happend once - they
didn't get out but they could have.

I can't take any more in although I'd like to. Maybe just one more.
And maybe just one more after that. Perhaps stop at 15? 20? That's
called hoarding or collecting. Am I bad for taking care of a few
outside cats but not taking them inside? I've built them shelters, I
feed them, I've had them fixed. And yes, they stand a pretty good
chance of getting run over. I dread that happening, particularly to
the one we call Baby, but I can't fix all the problems in the world. I
can't take in every cat and keep it safe. I'd love to. If I take in
Baby, how about that new grey one that showed up, Buddy? Maybe we
should turn them into some agency where they might get adopted if
sociable enough or, far more likely, killed?

And I do feed the outside cats Friskees or 9Lives or something cheaper
than what I feed the indoor ones. It costs a lot of money, and my
spoiled cats don't even like the good food that they get. For that
matter, they don't like Friskees. They're spoiled. Sure, why buy food
that MIGHT be better for them in the long run when they're likely to
die of some accident before I could find them and get them to a vet?

So we all do what we can. Some of us believe that the quality of the
cat's life, the ability to hunt and to roam is more important than
keeping them in a safe sterile box. I'm the rare third option. Mine go
into a fenced in yard where they can dig and lie in the earth or hide
under bushes as they will. There is some risk, but they love it.
Should I make them stay inside? You think so. I think not. We both
love our cats.

I don't know where anyone got the idea that I can't afford to keep my five
cats in good health. I retired in 1996 with almost a million dollars. Today,
at 77, I am still worth a half million. Our cats get the best of medical
care from a roving vet who sees all of them about once every six months, and
we have had two of them get life saving operations at about 800 dollars
each. Just because they are "outside cats" who have front and rear cat doors
they can use at any time of the day or night, doesn't mean that they are not
well cared for at all.