Feral cats...

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Bo Diddley

Bo Diddley

Well-Known Member
We have noticed a significant rise in the number of feral cats over the last couple of years.
Part of our patch is next to a sprawling market town that has seen plenty of new low-cost development on our side, I guess that cats are fairly cheap to purchase as a pet and when folks get bored they start to care less for them, then those cats start to wander a little more and many are ending up around an outdoor pig unit on our patch. The second-generation ferals that survive are as wild as any fox. One tiny little thing was crossing a harvested sugarbeet field a week ago, I'd guess 100 yards away, it winded me and was off like Usain Bolt. A lot of the kittens seem to suffer with what I think is "Cat Flue", really bunged-up runny eyes...
 
shakey jake said:
people get very excited about cats, what ever you do i would keep quiet about it. the poxy things should licensed but too many weirdos like them
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Yeah, the three chaps on the unit like having them there, they have massive straw stacks and the guys think they keep the rats down, but in reality, I have never seen a rat through the thermal in all the time I have spent around there, the unit is outdoor on an old runway with open fields all around, and my experience of cats & rats is that cats are not very keen on big adult rats, I shoot plenty of rats on another unit, the owner's daughter-in-law rescues cats and there are plenty kicking about the pigs looking at the rats all night long... the only ones I ever see them tackle are the ones I've just shot with the air rifle.
We only trim the ferals up when they arrive in the middle of the farm.
 
When I was helping another keeper on a local shoot we put up four trail cams to see what foxes there were about. We saw half a dozen feral cats on these cameras, three of which we never ever saw in the flesh. They were truly wild feral cats, at least a mile from any house. Some of these cats would hunt pheasants in the penns, particularly when they were first released.
 
I have had a couple of feral of of the rescue lot. only due to having chickens and at times pigs.... going by the amount of heads/bits of guts I can certainly say that those took down so decent size rats.
mine however are neutered so no extra little ones about...... only one at moment due to cars hitting them.
 
if your ground is simply just a short drive few miles from a town then don't be surprised to have feral cats.... amount we had that been driven out and dumped quickly in laybys . field entrance etc !

i like cats had 2 tha tlasted for 21 yr s& 23 yrs respectively but have no issue with controlling ferals on farm yards etc due to sh!tting in pig feed troughs etc...

vermin ...wrong place ..needs controlling

Paul
 
There'll always be feral cats. They are "outside" pets, except for those kept inside all their lives (which can't be good). They mostly stick close to the "owners" for food and comfort, often cultivating more than one "owner". But they do like their freedom and so it goes...

Anyway, according to the papers the country is full of lions, tigers and bears. Oh my!
 
im having a cat themed issue at the in May i set a vermin trap in one of my sheds in our garden after finding a huge rats nest,i live on the outside edge of the village,a neighbour's cat found its way into shed got caught in trap which was set as per rules as best i could,cat broke free with trap ,now neighbour has taken me to small claims over the £5600 vet bill,i used a trap i believed was ok but RSPCA cautioned me over inhumane trap .
JB
 
gs jon said:
im having a cat themed issue at the in May i set a vermin trap in one of my sheds in our garden after finding a huge rats nest,i live on the outside edge of the village,a neighbour's cat found its way into shed got caught in trap which was set as per rules as best i could,cat broke free with trap ,now neighbour has taken me to small claims over the £5600 vet bill,i used a trap i believed was ok but RSPCA cautioned me over inhumane trap .
JB
Click to expand...
What was the trap?
How did the cat gain access?
How do they know its your trap?
 
the sheds im pulling down so holes in wall,the trap was one recommended by our vet yrs ago when father had ponys a smooth jawed vermin trap which i believed was not a gin,by it took rspca weeks to decide and deemed it gin type but on my caution its stated just as an inhumane trap
 
gs jon said:
the sheds im pulling down so holes in wall,the trap was one recommended by our vet yrs ago when father had ponys a smooth jawed vermin trap which i believed was not a gin,by it took rspca weeks to decide and deemed it gin type but on my caution its stated just as an inhumane trap
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It sounds like it was a fenn trap that are legal to set in tunnels if there is not risk of catching stoats. However they must be set in a tunnels to avoid catching non intended species such as cats! Sounds like you set it illegally and therefore will correctly be prosecuted.
 
gs jon said:
im having a cat themed issue at the in May i set a vermin trap in one of my sheds in our garden after finding a huge rats nest,i live on the outside edge of the village,a neighbour's cat found its way into shed got caught in trap which was set as per rules as best i could,cat broke free with trap ,now neighbour has taken me to small claims over the £5600 vet bill,i used a trap i believed was ok but RSPCA cautioned me over inhumane trap .
JB
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That’s ridiculous, you can buy a brand new cat for £50. That surely should be the limit of your liability?
 
WalkedUp said:
That’s ridiculous, you can buy a brand new cat for £50. That surely should be the limit of your liability?
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You're not serious surely? You can buy a brand new dog for £100 but if one of my dogs suffered injuries through someone's incompetence I wouldn't accept £100, would you?
 
baguio said:
You're not serious surely? You can buy a brand new dog for £100 but if one of my dogs suffered injuries through someone's incompetence I wouldn't accept £100, would you?
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Apologies, my cat-despising tongue was firmly within my cheek. A working dog costs a lot more than £100, but without derailing this thread if someone replaced my old dog with a younger, better trained dog then I would consider that fair compensation. The money spent on the cat seems rather disproportionate to the value of a cat.
 
baguio said:
It sounds like it was a fenn trap that are legal to set in tunnels if there is not risk of catching stoats. However they must be set in a tunnels to avoid catching non intended species such as cats! Sounds like you set it illegally and therefore will correctly be prosecuted.
Click to expand...
it was set under a bench with boards as a tunnel,the rspca agreed i had done what i could to just target rats,but as i unwittingly used the wrong trap,they did not prosecute,cats protection league agree if a a cat gets injured on your property and it was not malicious towards cat its the cat owners responsibility
 
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