Feral #39

We have had our share of interesting catches, and this one is no exception. We had to convince this cat that a regular cat-carrier (not a trap) was an upscale place to eat!

"Scruffy Tuxedo" aka "Charlie Chaplin" aka "Fancy Man"

 

This beefy male has been around for some time. We originally thought that he was a long haired cat, but it turns out that he is just very large. A staggering 14 pound feral (around twice as big as most of the cats). We had our suspicions about him fitting into the traps when he first started coming into the yard. The last couple of weeks of watching him figure out how the trap worked proved it. He would get about half way in before his sides hit the walls which caused him to back out. We spent a lot of time thinking of alternative ways to get him, and our success comes in a most surprising way.

We spent our evenings putting food just inside the entrance of the trap and then staying close by. After awhile, he decided that we were not dangerous and would let us get close. We started putting food into a carrier and letting him eat while we sat there with him. We thought about different ways to secure the door after he went in and figured just being friendly would allow us to close the door by hand. Each night, we would move the food further and further into the carrier until he would go all the way in on his own. That's when we made the appointment. On the night of trapping, we thought we'd treat him with the wet food that we have. He wanted none of it. Only after we switched back to the regular crunchy food did he go into the carrier. What a snob! We gently closed the door of the carrier behind him, and now he will probably never trust us again. Lucky for us, we got what we wanted from him (his reproductive organs).  He is also the only cat to walk out of the carrier and away from us in a dignified way at release time; most cats run.