Twenty Years Later...

 It was a beautiful fall morning without a cloud in the sky - in my part of the country and in New York City.

I was 29-years-old and asleep. Being a night owl at the time, I had been asleep for maybe three hours. When the phone rang, I was irritated. After all, we lived together and she knew my sleeping habits.

My irritation turned to concern when she said something happened at one of the towers. At the time, it wasn't a terrorist attack. Just something horrific. I turned on my TV in my room but eventually migrated to the front room. I was sitting on the couch watching when the second airplane hit the other tower.

At that moment, everything had changed. I looked outside the window. Everything had changed but nothing had changed outside. It was a quiet morning on Crystal Avenue in Lombard, Illinois. I couldn't understand it. I couldn't meld the two together.

I turned back to the horror on TV. Smoke, debris, papers falling from the sky like confetti. New Yorkers look up in horror with tears streaming down their face and hands over their mouths. I listened to the confusion, horror, and panic in their voices.

Unconfirmed reports of other attacks. The Pentagon reportedly had also been struck by a plane too and evacuations began at the White House, Capitol Building, and complex and other governmental buildings. Any significant buildings in every city were also evacuated. My cousin's wife worked in the Sears Tower and was sent home. My sister, who worked for the state of Illinois, was sent home. I got on the phone with my family to see if anyone was traveling. One of my cousins was flying from Texas to Florida.

Meanwhile, on the television people cried out in horror and grief as people above the impact points began to jump out. Their bodies were a tiny speck against the size of the building. What I thought was debris hitting the ground was their bodies. I flinched every time I heard it. So many were jumping that it wasn't safe for first responders and people evacuating the buildings had to take cover.

Truthfully, I don't know if I saw this in real-time or in the footage shown afterward. It all melted together in one horrible scene. It seems like one long nightmare. 

President Bush was at an elementary school reading to school children. Andy Card, the Chief of Staff, came up and whispered in his ear. His face betrayed no emotion and afterward continued reading. I remember being outraged that he didn't stop immediately. He needed to address the country! I now recognize that he was showing leadership. If he had walked out then and there, it would've caused panic and confusion. The visit was cut short, though. Stopping at military bases in Louisiana and Nebraska, he would return to the White House at 6:48 pm.

Despite the horrors, the World Trade Center towers remained standing. There was much debate over whether they would collapse (and the general consensus was they wouldn’t.) That ended when the south tower collapsed on itself. Thick smoke, dust, and debris having nowhere to go surged down streets and around corners with people trying to outrun it. Shortly after, the north tower also fell. People close to Ground Zero were seen walking from the scene covered in white dust in shock and grief.

During all of the chaos in New York and Washington D.C., there was a fourth plane that had been hijacked that had turned toward Washington D.C. The people on board, using cell phones available through the airline, found out what was going on. Todd Beamer and some other passengers decided to attack the cabin. They prayed and Todd said, “let’s roll.” They overcame the hijackers and crashed the plane in a field in Shawshank, Pennsylvania.

This one had a personal connection to it. Todd Beamer grew up in my hometown of Wheaton, Illinois. Though she had never known him, he attended Wheaton College around the same time my sister was attending. It is a small private Christian college with a close-knit community. Todd was married to his college sweetheart and had two young sons with a daughter on the way.

That is what I remember from that day 20 years ago. It didn’t happen in an organized way - or as organized as how I wrote it. Nor does what I wrote convey the emotion, chaos, shock, and grief that happened. The next few days and months were hard. I cried through all of the stories of the victims, our lost innocence, our vulnerability, our pain, and our grief. I cried. A lot. It was on my mind constantly as I went about the next few days, weeks, and months.

Every year since then, I still have that sense of surrealism and wonder how people could go about their day as if this wasn’t the anniversary of the largest terrorist attack on American soil. For years after, cable news aired the news reports as they happened on 9/11, documentaries, and painful remembrances. I felt compelled, as an American, to sit and watch it all. It was the least that I could do to honor those who died. As we got further and further away, they stopped.

I was also inspired by how we came together as a country. We were one. We were all Americans. Stores ran out of American flags. We stood as one. We didn’t shout about all the personal freedoms we had to give up when we had to take off our shoes and undergo physical and electronic screenings before boarding a plane. We understood it was for our safety. We adjusted to all the security measures that needed to be done in order to make our country a safer place to live. It would’ve destroyed other countries. The intent was to destroy the United States. Al-Qaeda failed...it only made us stronger. If the attack happened today, we would be destroyed. The first reaction would be one of pointing fingers and calls for resignation.

I do miss those days where we could all have different political differences but still recognize that we were one as Americans

Later that night on September 11, 2001, the CIA had determined that the attack was caused by Osama bin Laden and his terrorist organization al-Qaeda. This was not the first attack against the United States from them. In fact, it was not the first attack on the World Trade Center towers. On February 6, 1993, six people were killed when a car bomb explodes under the towers. On June 25, 1996, another car bomb killed 19 American soldiers and injured 400 others at a US military housing complex in the city of Khobar, Saudi Arabia. On August 7, 1998, truck bombs exploded at U.S. embassies in Nairobi and Dar es Salaam that took 224 lives, including 12 Americans. Bill Clinton named bin Laden as the biggest enemy of the United States and launched cruise missiles in Afghanistan and Sudan. But bin Laden wasn’t finished. On October 12, 2000, the warship of USS Cole, in the Aden harbor, Yemen, had a hole blown into the hull when suicide bombers in a boat pulled up next to her. We lost 17 sailors that day. 

Shortly after the 9/11 attacks, we declared war on Afghanistan, where al-Qaeda and bin Laden were being harbored by the Taliban. Instead of locating and neutralizing terrorists, we changed our mission to nation-building. We lost sight of the objective, stopped looking for bin Laden and allowed it to drag on for 20 years while hiding the corruption and failure. By the end of Bush’s second term, he had stopped looking for bin Laden altogether, despite the fact that there were dozens of more attacks carried out by them. Finally, on May 2, 2011, Obama announced that Osama bin Laden was killed in a Navy SEAL ambush at bin Laden’s compound in Abbottabad, Pakistan. The mastermind, Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, is still being held at Guantanamo Bay, and a trial has yet to start.

It led to the creation of the Department of Homeland Security with the mission to protect the United States within, at, and outside its borders. Many already existing agencies were absorbed under DHS and others were created. Today it is the umbrella agency for the United States Citizenship and Immigration Services, U.S. Customs and Border Protection, U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, Transportation Security Administration, United States Coast Guard (during times of peace,) United States Secret Service, Federal Emergency Management Agency, Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency, Federal Law Enforcement Training Centers, Federal Protective Service, Domestic Nuclear Detection Office,  and the Transportation Security Administration, among others. The TSA, in particular, was created and is chiefly concerned with air travel and employs screening officers in airports, armed Federal Air Marshals on planes, mobile teams of dog handlers, and explosives specialists.

The breakdowns and numbers:

~ The number of people who were pulled out alive after the World Trade Center collapse: 23 (including 15 rescue workers.) The last survivor was pulled out of the North Tower rubble 27 hours later. 

~ The number of people who have yet to be identified: 1,106 with two identified just in the summer of 2021. Around 40% remain unidentified. More than 22,000 body parts were recovered from the site. The work still continues...

~ The total number of people who died on September 11, 2001: 2,996. 

~ 265 people on the four planes (including the 19 terrorists.) American Airlines Flight 11 from Boston’s Logan Airport en route to Los Angeles had a crew of 11, 76 passengers, and five terrorists. It hit the north facade of the North Tower. United Airlines Flight 175 from Boston’s Logan Airport to Los Angeles had a crew of nine, 51 passengers and five terrorists, hit the southern facade of the South Tower. American Airlines Flight 77 departed Dulles International Airport en route to Los Angeles with a crew of six, 53 passengers and five terrorists hit the western facade of the Pentagon. United Airlines Flight 93 with a crew of seven, 33 passengers, and four terrorists crashed into the ground in Shanksville, Pennsylvania.

~ 2,606 at the World Trade Center (including 344 firefighters, 23 New York City police officers, 37 Port Authority officers, eight EMTs, and paramedics from private hospital units.) More specifically, an estimated 200 people died by jumping or falling, 1,402 people died in the North Tower at or above the floors of impact (floors 93-99) and in the South Tower, 614 people were killed at or above the floors of impact (floors 75-85.) Three companies located at the World Trade Center lost more than 100 employees: Cantor Fitzgerald lost 658 employees, Marsh and McLennan lost 295, and the Aon Corporation lost 175. 90% of those who died had been at or above the points of impact.

~ And remember, it’s called the World Trade Center. Excluding the terrorists, people from 77 different countries died numbered around 372 identified foreign nationals representing 12% of the deaths.

~ At the Pentagon, 125 people were killed - 70 civilians and 55 military personnel. The Army lost 47 civilian employees, six civilian contractors, and 22 soldiers. The Navy lost six civilians, three civilian contractors, and 33 sailors. Seven civilian employees from the Defense Intelligence Agency and one from the Office of the Secretary of Defense, who was a contractor. Lieutenant General Timothy Maude, a Deputy Chief of Staff from the Army was the highest-ranking officer to perish.

It’s easy to just see the numbers. Each and every number represents a person’s life. Each person left behind family and friends. Each life mattered. We need to never lose sight of that fact.

And see the faces of those who survived the attacks, those who were there to rescue, those that there were there to clean up the site, and those that lived, worked, and studied there. They were all exposed to toxic material and human remains from the pile of rubble. Over 400,000 are thought to have been exposed. Immediately after they fell, 90,000 firefighters, paramedics, police officers, and others from around the country rushed to the scene.

As time passed, those hailed as heroes were forgotten and significant health problems increased months and years later. People returned to work, students to school, and people to their homes in the months following the attacks. The dust they breathed in during that time was extremely toxic. There was pulverized concrete and more than 2,500 other contaminants. There were construction materials, massive amounts of glass, asbestos, lead, mercury from fluorescent lights, toxins from the fires that burned there for three months. These exposures have led to debilitating illnesses. The city failed to provide the correct equipment and the EPA insisted the air was safe when it was not. 

New York City simply failed to prepare adequately for the protection of workers at Ground Zero. There were many, many lawsuits filed against the city of New York, the EPA, and other agencies. In 2010, Congress set up the James Zadroga 9/11 Health and Compensation Act. This fund stopped operating in 2004 (as planned) but in 2010, lawmakers started pushing to reauthorize it to provide medical care and financial aid to emergency personnel, volunteers, and survivors who inhaled the toxins at Ground Zero. It began processing claims again in 2011 and was renewed in 2015, allowing claims to be submitted until December 2020. In 2019, the funds were quickly being depleted and likely did not have enough money to pay claims.

Jon Stewart, a fierce advocate for the first responders, began a media blitz to bring attention to the issue, culminating in testifying before the Judiciary Committee’s Subcommittee of the Constitution, Civil Rights and Civil Liberties, where he urged a bill to pass a bill that would allow the fund to pay benefits for the next 70 years, called the Never Forget the Heroes Act that was passed in July of 2019. Even to this day, though, it is hard for people to get care if they live outside of New York City.

There are thousands of deaths that are casualties of September 11, 2001, that didn’t die on that day, and they continue to that day. Around 250-300 responders are dying every year. That number does not include civilians. Those who lived in Manhattan, those who returned to work and breathed the same toxic air.

Really, it shouldn’t be too hard to take care of the people who are now literally giving their lives.

Timeline for September 11, 2001:

• 7:59 am – American Airlines Flight 11 takes off from Boston’s Logan International Airport en route to Los Angeles.

• 8:14 am – United Airlines Flight 175 takes off from Boston; it is also headed to Los Angeles.

• 8:19 am – Flight attendants aboard Flight 11 alert ground personnel that the plane has been hijacked; American Airlines notifies the FBI.

• 8:20 am – American Airlines Flight 77 takes off from Dulles International Airport outside of Washington, D.C. en route to Los Angeles.

• 8:41 am – United Airlines Flight 93 takes off from Newark International Airport en route to San Francisco. 

• 8:46 am – American Airlines Flight 11 crashes into floors 93-99 of the North Tower of the World Trade Center.

• 8:50 am – White House Chief of Staff Andrew Card alerts President George W. Bush that a plane has hit the World Trade Center; the president is visiting an elementary school in Sarasota, Florida at the time.

• 9:03 am – United Airlines Flight 175 crashes into floors 75-85 of the WTC’s South Tower. 

• 9:08 am – The FAA bans all takeoffs of flights going to New York City or through the airspace around the city.

• 9:21 am – The Port Authority closes all bridges and tunnels in the New York City area.

• 9:24 am – The FAA notified NEADS of the suspected hijacking of Flight 77 after some passengers and crew aboard are able to alert family members on the ground.

• 9:31 am – Speaking from Florida, President Bush calls the events in New York City an “apparent terrorist attack on our country.”

• 9:37 am – American Airlines Flight 77 crashes into the Pentagon in Washington, D.C. 9:42 am – For the first time in history, the FAA grounds all flights over or bound for the continental United States. Over the next two-and-a-half hours, some 3,300 commercial flights and 1,200 private planes are guided to land at airports in Canada and the United States.

• 9:45 am – Amid escalating rumors of other attacks, the White House and U.S. Capitol building are evacuated (along with numerous other high-profile buildings, landmarks, and public spaces).

• 9:59 am – The South Tower of the World Trade Center collapses.

• 10:07 am – After passengers and crew members aboard the hijacked Flight 93 contact friends and family and learn about the attacks in New York and Washington, they mount an attempt to retake the plane.

• 10:28 am – The World Trade Center’s North Tower collapses. 

• 1:00 pm – At Barksdale Air Force Base in Louisiana, President Bush announces that U.S. military forces are on high alert worldwide.

• 5:20 pm – The 47-story Seven World Trade Center collapses after burning for hours.

• 6:58 pm – President Bush returns to the White House after stops at military bases in Louisiana and Nebraska.

• 8:30 pm – President Bush addresses the nation, calling the attacks “evil, despicable acts of terror” and declaring that America, its friends, and allies would “stand together to win the war against terrorism.”

• October 8, 2001: President George W. Bush announces the creation of The Office of Homeland Security. 

A Cat-egorically Dangerous Problem - For Everyone.

If I heard it once, I've heard it a thousand times. Mom said that from the day I learned to walk, I learned to chase animals. Much to my Mom's consternation, I walked up to strange dogs - one time freaking out a babysitter when I encountered a large white dog and then rubbed my eyes. They puffed up. We were in New Jersey visiting friends and my Mom and my friend's mother went to Washington D.C. with my sister. As far as I'm concerned, even though I was the one who suffered, and the babysitter I guess, that's what Mom gets for leaving me behind. If I could go to the Liberty Bell and run up the Philadelphia Metropolitan Museum of Art steps so I could wave my arms around like a pint-sized Rocky, I could go to D.C.

I once watched a nature program where a mother lioness left the weakest cub behind to die. I didn't understand why he had to die. Some kids can't watch scary movies. My Mom wouldn't let me watch nature programs after that. I rescued baby birds, took a litter of baby bunnies from their den in the schoolyard, where a bunch of boys was killing them, saved ducklings, I even caught a toad once that was very slowly hopping by me as I tied my shoes. I wanted to

keep him, but he did a Houdini. And then there was Shadow. A gray and white cat me and my friend fed (both of our mothers were not thrilled with it either). He ended up being adopted by neighbors, who lived a pampered life. As in, he needed Jenny Craig, WeightWatchers, and a few gym memberships. Any loving ducky couple was named Harry and Gertrude. I don't remember why, but that's what I called them. In other words, I have a Mom who spent her time pounding her head against a wall, yelling. "DON'T GO UP TO WILD ANIMALS OR THOSE THAT YOU DON'T KNOW!" I don't think she's ever stopped - because I haven't stopped yet. My love for animals is a huge part of who I am.

My Step-Grandmother Tommie taught me even more about kindness and compassion for animals. As a young girl, I watched her and my Grandpa scrape paint as they got their swimming pool ready. She patiently carried every spider and insect up out of the pool and outside. She wouldn't allow my Grandpa to put ant traps outside because of that is where they belonged. Only indoors could he place down traps. She patiently stood by when a female raccoon moved in her chimney, feeding the proud momma who was thin from nursing, and when they moved out, Tommie stopped traffic to allow them to cross the street safely. Only then did she block the chimney. Pooky, their dog, wore diapers towards the end of her life. She wasn't in pain, and incontinence was not an excuse to euthanize for Tommie.

I've had hamsters, hermit crabs, fish, have and have had lizards and snakes (and still do). And of course cats from the age of three. I have not lived without a cat for as long as I can remember. I have four right now. Teige and Olivia, who are brother and sister, Simon, and Reggie, our baby fuzzball rocketcat that we trapped after we found out that there were kittens living under our house. (After we trapped him, Mom returned the trap post haste.) I have loved and been honored to have been loved by eleven others. I miss them deeply and they still can bring tears to my eyes. I know that I will see Clover, Max, Tabitha, Kasey, PJ, Reilly, Quincy, Timmy, Seamus, Nigel, and Phineas (Phinney - Simon's brother). I held all but two, as they took their last breath.

To say that I love animals would be an understatement. I'm interested in their abilities, beauty, and what they can do. They are a never-ending fascination for me. There are always interesting things to learn about each and every animal out there. Even mundane things like why cats have claws or why a dog behaves the way it does. Or how a snake can swallow prey so much larger than them.

So why the long animal resume? I am really bothered by the circumstances under which we got Reggie. We are truly blessed to have him - we probably saved his life. A couple of days before we caught him, I heard a loud meowing outside. I went to check and saw a young grey kitten scurrying under our house. The park manager had a humane trap that we borrowed (it was at another woman's house). When Mom picked up the trap, the woman was talking about the neighbors next door who fed outdoor cats, and how if there was a female that is pregnant, they brought her in and kicked her back out when the kittens could walk on their own. This woman had tried giving low-cost neuter and spay certificates that they just ignored. When I heard of this, I was angry but not more than I usually would be.

In the meantime, I was intent on setting up the trap. I caught an animal on that first morning. A very irate raccoon who not only ate the tuna but the paper plate it was on. I would have to say he got more upset as I took pictures and videos. Mom came out to help keep him distracted while I sprung him loose. The next morning, someone had cleaned out the can of tuna without tripping the trap. The next morning, only half the can was gone and I decided to move it. A few hours later we heard it spring. 

We found a small kitten who was thin and had a large cut on his upper lip. It was too cold to leave him there on the porch and we couldn't bring him in. We took him to an Urgent Care Vet for a FeLV/FIV test (he was negative), weighed 1.6 pounds and had fleas. A couple of days later, he had a fecal test done and was treated for coccidia. Both vets agreed on six-weeks-old. When he ate, he gulped it down as fast as he could - with an equal amount of air. For at least a half hour, he would burp afterward. Thankfully that lasted only a couple of months. There was just one thing wrong...he was an orange tabby, not gray.

Reggie was very socialized, and I think that he

Reggie - right after we found him.

was one of the kittens born in that person's house. He had to be one of the kittens born indoors and booted out when he was old enough at that house. Kittens aren't normally socialized unless they are exposed to people at a young age. The thought that they turned this little kitten out made me sick and angry. How many cats have died? How many kittens used to indoor living were unceremoniously kicked out into a harsh environment? How many survived? We're in rural Florida. There are great-horned owls, coyotes, raccoons, venomous snakes and alligators (we're two blocks from a lake).

After researching local ordinances, I discovered two laws that they were breaking - feeding stray cats and having cats over four months old unsterilized. I reported them to Animal Services where their policy is to sterilize and vaccinate and tip their left ear to let other rescuers know the cat is a feral/stray that has been sterilized. Within a few hours, they are released to one of two organizations here and released into the wild (where there is no surgical follow-up). Kittens are adopted (or fostered) if they were able to be tamed. This is known as trap-neuter-release (TNR).

I don't support TNR because I recognize the danger the cats are still in and the danger and damage that cats can cause. I was curious to learn more about TNR and realized it was worse than what I thought. Especially when the two sides working to protect wildlife and ecologies and working to protect cats refuse to work together. Somehow the two sides..the "bird people" (want to protect wildlife) and the "cat people" (care more about the cats than local wildlife) are more interested in throwing insults and names, claiming the other side is wrong and they are right. Logic dictates that working together will help both sides. Until these groups learn to act mature and in ways beneficial to both sides and all animals, cats will continue to kill and be killed - suffer needlessly.

Conservationists produce sound scientific studies that prove the statistics with peer-reviewed research with multiple datasets. They are also looked at scientifically and who study both sides of the situation. Unfortunately, scientific reports can be hard to read. So even though there are studies out there that support the Conservationists, it doesn't matter. They have to be easier to read and be able to produce strong feelings. Two things "Catists" are really good at exploiting. They use Ad Hominem attacks, outright lies, strawmen arguments, and diversionary tactics to twist the words of the Conversationists while holding feral cats up as a symbolic object in order to further an agenda based on fabrications. The focus is on the county or state euthanizing feral cats instead of the sheer hell that these cats go through on a daily basis. (I am referring to cat advocacy groups, not the people at the bottom who are trying to do what they think is best.)

Even though I am against TNR, I do understand the want and need to try and help an animal that for all intents and purposes reminds people of the pets they love. Cats are and were pets to me too. I just don't believe their place is in the wild, even if they were born there. They are domesticated. We need to do right by them, and by the animals that are killed by them. While I cringe at the thought of a cat killing an animal, in all honesty, I just want the cats to live where they belong - as an indoor cat with someone to love. Totally unrealistic I know. We won't ever find the loving homes needed for all the feral cats out there. That's just a pipe dream. But there must be something that can be done for them. Until then, there are unfortunately only three decisions: do nothing, TNR, or TE (trap and euthanize). None of them are good.

TNR
In all fairness, this is something when nothing else is being done. Cats are healthier simply by being neutered or spayed. Male cats are no longer fighting and caterwauling over mating. And the bites and scratches they received during fights won't become infected. Unspayed female cats are basically in heat all the time, except when they are pregnant, having up to three litters a year. They can go into heat soon after giving birth. Like other female animals, they can lose vitamins or nutrients like calcium and iron when they're nursing. Having to take care of their little family means they can't eat as often as they want and can be extremely emaciated. In both cases, it shortens their lives. Cats that have been sterilized fight less and aren't caring for babies. Their life expectancy goes up but not as much as indoor cats enjoy.

And before I get into everything, I need to explain the difference between no-kill shelters and the shelters that euthanize animals. A no-kill shelter is exactly what it is. Therefore, they tend to only take in animals that are very healthy and adoptable. Traditional shelters take in every pet animal brought in, regardless of age, health, injuries of the animals. Traditional shelters take in the pets that no-kill shelters rejected. It would be a great idea if the no-kill shelters took in all animals and worked with them. Another factor with no-kill shelters is that an animal may never get adopted. Lacy was a black dog brought into a no-kill shelter as a puppy. Five years later, and she is still at the shelter. How would she take to being adopted after five years in a kennel?

Trap-Neuter-Release is basically what it is. Humane traps are put out with a can of tuna for bait. When they are trapped, the cat is taken to the veterinarian (usually still in the trap), sterilized and released. Some programs include vaccinations

and some include FIV/FeLeuk tests. If kittens can be tamed, they are put up for adoption and hopefully go to foster homes to find out how to live with humans. And usually, any sick cats that come in are euthanized. The shelters and organizations who work with TNR programs are usually full of not only feral cats, but tame cats and kittens up for adoption. A virus that spreads rapidly becomes impossible to control and the only thing to be done is euthanasia. I called a low-cost vet clinic to see what the deal was with kittens caught. They said to test for FeLV and FIV, and if they come back positive, the best thing to do is euthanize them. Depending on the facilities, cats are sterilized in huge rooms with multiple cats sterilized at once (though I'm sure the doctors know better, I question the sterility of the room in which they are operating), in TNR centers or at a volunteer veterinary clinic. As soon as they come to, they either go home with a caretaker for the night to be released the next day or are released the same day. The colonies they are released into (usually the ones they were trapped in) will then have a dedicated caretaker or two to put out fresh water and food. They also keep track of the cats, taking in any new cats to be neutered and trap kittens. At least that's how it's supposed to work.

Sterilization is an important component for all cats. However, when my cats were neutered, the procedure was done in a surgery suite using sedation and anesthesia with both the vet and a trained vet tech monitoring vital signs. Toward the end of the day, the doctor brought in my cat and goes through everything, and answers any questions I have. I get called the next day, and a few days later to check up on his progress. For TNR, the non-profits either have a vet at no cost, discounted price or the shelters working in conjunction with the organizations have a vet on staff. All cats trapped are sterilized in a factory-like style. They line them up, the procedure is done, and when they wake up in a couple hours they are re-released with no follow-up care. Chance of infection is greater, obviously. For male cats, there are two small incisions that are not stitched - too small for a stitch. So they are released with two open slits on their scrotum where their testicles were removed. Females have a two to three-inch incision where their ovaries, fallopian tubes, and the uterus are removed, requiring stitches. They are most likely absorbable stitches because otherwise, they would need to be removed. This is much more invasive and contamination could've occurred during surgery. Either way, if an infection set in, it's probably a painful end. Cats are very intelligent animals, and there is no can of tuna big enough to tempt a sterilized feral cat into going into another trap afterward the procedure for progress checks or infections.

Opponents of TNR claim (with a lot of truth) that the only thing that is done for cats is to have them sterilized. That action is still preventing more cats from coming into this world, but it doesn't bring down the numbers and it doesn't save wildlife and ecosystems from being decimated. 

Proponents claim that the TNR community are dishonest about many things. For example, their feeding stations are kept clean. However, and raccoons, skunks, opossums, and rodents all eat side by side with the cats. And the insects. Don't forget them. They are probably some of the most

This is exactly what shouldn't happen - six really
fat raccoons and nine cats, mostly kittens.

disease-infested areas with all the other animals that come to eat, food left out, internal and external parasites that come to eat, food left out, internal and external parasites, diseases, and injuries and feces and urination. And no matter how much a caretaker tries to stay on top of things, it doesn't stop colony cats from roaming around where they can get themselves in trouble (this also goes for owned cats allowed outside as well.) They aren't safe. There's the obvious: cars, climbing into engines, injured by animals - but there's more too. Bite injuries have a huge bacteria load. If the wound abscesses and doesn't get treated, the cat can die from sepsis. They can get into fights with other cats, dogs, and raccoons for example. Coyotes, wolves, other wildcats like bobcats, lynxes, cougars and even raptors (eagles, owls, hawks, osprey) can kill cats for food. They can be bitten by a venomous snake (that they most likely are trying to kill), fall into holes, walk on broken glass, sharp objects or surfaces too hot or too cold. These can be unintentional poisoning (licking antifreeze or oil when they clean themselves after walking in it and walking through pesticides and insecticides, catching and eating an animal poisoned with a rodenticide, caught in a glue trap) and weather exposure. If we can't stand it, they can't either. They can also get sunburned and suffer from heat exposure, exhaustion, dehydration, and starvation. The pads of their paws can be burned or frostbit while walking, and even worse, need an amputation.

And the worse thing I can think of: torture. There are a lot of people who hate cats and get pleasure out of seeing them suffer. It's despicable. There's a case in Texas where a veterinarian killed her neighbor's cat with an arrow through the head. In the UK, there was thought to be a serial cat killer that killed over 400 cats. They later came out and said that the cats were being hit by cars and scavenged by foxes, making the cats appear mutilated. A serial cat killer at the end of August 2018 killed 13 cats and tortured them by removing their spine. In Provo, UT, at least six cats were killed. They were found burned, with their paws taped, ropes still around their neck or finding them on a private railroad track where the train caused decapitation. Last year in Colorado, cats and kittens were found in a dumpster behind a pet store, some with their heads and paws wrapped in duct tape. The vet said that they died by blunt force trauma to the head. The killer said he had used a hammer. The last one was jailed for killing 19 kittens/cats that he obtained from Craigslist and other social media. He would stomp on them, breaking bones and then leave them to suffer awhile before killing. He drowned the kittens in the toilet and the adults in the bathtub.

I'm not sharing these disgusting stories (or these photos) for the hell of it. These cats were often indoor/outdoor cats lured to the killer (they're not as afraid of humans) or they were adopted from ads. The torturer isn't going to find a feral cat who wouldn't scratch their eyes out. They're going to try and find the easiest target. I write this in the hopes that maybe people will think that each time they let their cats outside, this could happen to them. Why risk their lives and perpetuate their suffering?

I know I will upset people by saying this, but it's what I think. What is the point of letting them outside? When they joined a family, that cat's health and well-being became a responsibility. Part of that responsibility is protecting them from harm. Something that can't be achieved if they are allowed to roam. And one day, their cat won't return home and the owners will never why. They might have suffered for hours after being attacked

by a raccoon, died on a lonely highway after being hit, or may have been taken by somebody who tortures them before decapitating them alive. It's inexcusable to allow this to happen unless the cat is contained in a "catio" or walked on a leash. Most places do have leash laws for cats if the cat goes off the owner's property for their own protection. Allowing cats to run around the neighborhood is just asking for trouble and it should be a misdemeanor offense if an owner is caught letting them out. Something that will be discovered for every background check they have to go through.

Cats need to be treated like dogs. Imagine the problems - and that's putting it mildly - that would be caused if we allowed our dogs out like our cats. If dogs meet their buddies and start wandering around neighborhoods, they would be emboldened to corner a person and attack. That's typical behavior with packs. Or one dog, even. Especially with cats. When I first moved here, we were driving home and I came within inches of hitting a white animal. It was a Shih Tzu. I called the number on her tag and she lived literally lived across from where I was parked. The owner just let her out in the front yard and went back into the house. The dog just walked out into a street that had very few streetlights. How incredibly stupid. I have a friend who was walking her well-trained chihuahuas when a large breed mix got out of her yard and attacked one of my friend's dogs. Thankfully, the dog made a full recovery and though the police were called, nothing was done. My friend had to move out because the owner of the dog was not doing what the police told her to do, and when my friend tried to document it, they just made sure everything was closed up tight.

Imagine having to move because of the fear caused by the next door neighbors' dog. That one animal could get loose again. Attack the dogs again. Or attack her. To such a degree that it was necessary to move as soon as humanly possible. Now imagine if that were legal. Such situations should be considered before allowing a cat out. They are considered a pest by many - even cats owners. I have lots of stories about stray cats, but I won't bore any more than possible. 

I live in a mobile home and I need to know where my cats are at all times. And while I admit that

three of the cats I have are just a little more rotund than they should be, they are otherwise healthy, well-adjusted cats. I would rather face the diseases caused by being overweight than the injuries, infections, cruelty, and not knowing what happens with cats let outdoors. They have also lived to be 12 (two of them - brother and sister) and one is 11. They are much older than most feral and outdoor cats get.

What Cats Do

Ecosystems are a delicate cycle. Everything in is in balance. To explain it loosely, there aren't too many predators that cause the extinction of their prey - it is counterproductive to their survival.  Instead, they kill off the old, weak, diseased, and the young. That leaves the strongest animals to survive and breed without wasting resources that are needed for those who aren't likely to survive. The predators are allowing their prey to become stronger genetically by eating them to control their populations and take the weak genes out.

Enter feral cats. They are in colonies, loosely based matrilineally a group of related females that work together to care for the kittens. Males may stay in one colony or wander between colonies. They are less loyal. Most of the colonies have never rested eyes on a human or show up for food after the caregivers leave. The number of cats in TNR colonies and not reproducing is just the very tip of the iceberg that represent feral cats. They are non-native and considered invasive. As prolific breeders, they are quick to negatively affect that delicate balance. Cats are known as "surplus predators." That means they kill more than what they need to survive (only eating about 1/3 of what they kill.) With the cat's superior (and admirable) hunting skills and tremendous numbers, soon not even cats can sustain themselves and many starve to death.

The average lifespan of a feral cat without assistance is 2-5 years old - that is, if they survive kittenhood. Kittens have a high mortality rate of 50% - 75%. Their life is hard. They are injured from fighting, the females are constantly in heat and are severely malnourished from having and raising three litters a year. And that is just the basics. It doesn't include everything else that they go through. They are suffering. Proponents of TNR would say that starvation sets in because there is no food (the cats killed them off) is the "natural order of things". It's not "natural" when the animal is not native and invasive. They should not be there in the first place and those that die horribly deserved better. And if cats are a part of the natural habitat, then why are they compelled to sterilize and feed?

This is not how a healthy species is supposed to survive in their environment. Healthy species thrive.

Karma was hit by a car and can't use his back legs. He
remains a feral, still.

They don't kill animals to the point of starvation, reproduce so much the females are dying from malnourishment and exhaustion, and males die from sepsis caused by bite wounds during territorial fights. They also cannot fit into any ecosystem without becoming a destructive force. 

[SCIENCE WARNING] It is estimated that two billion birds are killed a year, and 12 billion animals (mammals, fish, reptiles, amphibians). They have caused the extinction of 63 animals: 40 birds, 21 mammals, and two reptiles, worldwide. In the United States, it is estimated that 86 million cats are kept as pets. Cats allowed to roam freely will kill an average of two animals a week for a total of 104 animals for each pet cat allowed outside. Feral/stray* cats are believed to be 30-100 million in population. It is hard to get a fix on numbers though. They kill up to six animals a week (a grand total of 312 for each feral/stray out there.) *Feral cats usually have no contact with people and act as any wild animal would, though they are still domestic house cats. Stray cats were owned at one time and either was dumped or ran away.

Ridiculous Claims from the TNR People


There it is. The people who think TNR works, the people who don't think it works, and the facts on what cats do in the wild, whether in an assisted colony or not. But it seems that instead of trying to

figure out what else can be done beyond TNR, they are defending themselves against conservationists by using misinformation and full out lies. Full out lies that people who actually care, believe and are bamboozled into thinking that they're helping homeless cats when in fact, they are perpetuating the problems. It villainizes people who love cats and are concerned about what happens to feral cats and the environments they live in. There is no middle road for proponents. They fail to understand that there was no declaration of war on cats. It's correcting the mistakes we've made to this planet and changing it back. Taking cats out of the wild protects not only the animals they kill but the cats themselves (and yes, euthanasia is a form of protecting cats.) A lot of people who support these changes, including euthanasia, also own cats themselves.

Supporters claim TNR "maximizes their quality of life" and the colonies have no risk for disease. They may increase their quality of life, I will give them that. Not a lot, but some. To really "maximize" their quality of life, get them indoors. There are TNR cat colonies that have had success in reducing populations. But the colonies have to maintain at least a 75% sterilization rate, and that is hard to do. Unsterilized cats are always joining because getting food is a lot easier. There are no studies that have been done to prove that cats in colonies have no risk for disease and aren't a danger to wildlife because they are fed by humans. By all logic, free-roaming felines are indeed able to get sick from transmitted diseases. 

There isn't a living being - not even plants - that don't become diseased and predatory behavior in cats, indoors, outdoors, or well-fed is well documented by owners and scientific studies. They kill exponentially. It's not their fault, they're cats. Which is why some kind of action needs to take place. 

If you go to the Alley Cat Allies page, they do have a page with a list of scientific studies, however, they are largely studies done without using enough datasets or control groups. Studies that might carry weight would be comparisons with feral cats that have not had the TNR experience and those 

Scared, emaciated and pregnant.
Even her tail is too thin.

who have. How is their weight gain, parasites, diseases, injuries, behavioral differences, etc? Tangibles that can show how much quality of life improves. (ACA Studies). And more importantly, how TNR affects wildlife populations. They have no studies that categorically prove that cats don't kill billions of animals a year, or whether wildlife's safety is assured in a TNR colony. Nothing about diseases and injuries either. Volunteers most likely don't have the ability to pay for veterinary care beyond sterilizing, which is usually paid for by a TNR advocacy group. To prove that TNR works, there needs to be more data sets. But for good data sets, there have to be more colonies that participate, where the cats can be caught and fitted with GPS. There has to be the study group - TNR colony cats - and those that join the group during the period being studied, and two control groups: pets that are allowed outdoors to roam and feral cats that have not been TNRed. Examinations and bloodwork need to be done at the beginning and the end of the study period to see if there are any injuries or diseases. Instead of doing proper scientific studies like that, advocacy groups do a study at one large shelter and calculate how many cats were sterilized, vaccinated, or how many come in with a disease. The TNR program the shelter has doesn't mean anything in relation to these numbers. They can say that fewer cats are coming in, but not why there are fewer cats. It could be an increase in predator populations like coyotes, more cats dying out in the wild, etc. The study from the Albuquerque shelter looks good until you delve a little deeper to find that there have been at least two lawsuits over their policy.
Sued December 2018,
Sued December 2013 

Instead, they are coming up with alternative arguments and responses to how cats are detrimental to animals and ecology. They even go so far as to say that cats can balance ecosystems or that you are more likely to get a disease from standing in line in a grocery store. Maybe, but they also admitted that cats can transmit diseases. To the one person who dies or miscarries from the transmission of a disease from a cat, that grocery store "statistic" doesn't matter. 

Proponents to TNR also claim that "more" birds are killed by windows and windmills and imply that any birds killed by cats shouldn't count. Yes, there are bird fatalities from windows and windmills, but it doesn't take away the fact that cats are the #1 cause of death for birds. Suggestions that the whole ecology is screwed up and we really should concentrate on that instead of blaming cats is preposterous. We have screwed up the environment monumentally. And we do need to focus on that. That doesn't mean that we shouldn't try and fix damage to the environment by other means, such as removing an animal that we domesticated and then let loose to live as a non-native, invasive species in every continent except Antartica. If we need to own up to air quality, carbon emissions, and climate change, we need to own up to the fact that we let an extremely competent predator loose and it causes a great amount of damage. They say it's been proven that if cats are taken out of their environment, only more cats will take their place. I would expect that to happen. The cats that are in a colony are just the smidge on the iceberg that makes up feral cat populations. I would assume that there is a multiple-layer social structure and if one layer is removed, the next one emerges. Removing cats from the wild doesn't mean that there are more cats showing up. It's just a shifting of their social structure, showing that there are more cats that we had no idea about. Those cats have always been there. And unless the caregivers stay to watch the cats eat and remove the food away after a certain amount of time, they are not seeing all the cats that come in to eat. It is also common for cats from other areas to join when they discover a steady free meal.

Unless that 75% sterilization is kept, the population of cats increases and unsterilized cats there for food will find each other and reproduce. There's actually been a study done on the misinformation that comes from advocacy groups. (Pssst - there are a lot of things you can apply this with.) Here's the link: Responding to misinformation and criticisms regarding United States cat predation estimates  

Beyond the Ridiculous

I'm sorry, what I'm writing about is very serious. But I've actually read this defense from numerous people trying to defend feral cats. I suppose it's their way of suggesting what would happen if

cats were eliminated, but it fails most egregiously and did nothing but cause me to laugh. Back in Medieval times, it was popular to blame cats as being a companion to witches, who served Satan. Since society treated the "witches" so well, they extended that courtesy and killed cats in the same hideous ways. The proponents' story is that so many cats were killed that when the Black Plague came along, there weren't enough to kill the evil rats that carried the hideous fleas. I don't know how this can be presented seriously to justify ferals. Cats eat birds, mice, voles, moles and other small animals. But they aren't fond of rats. (Cats Hate Rats) When there are cats around, rats tend to take cover and not to cross paths. Cats don't want to deal with a large rodent that fights back. So if people believe that there were no cats to kill plague-infested rats, they were there. And if any evil cackling was heard when rats skittered into homes, it was the cats enjoying their sweet revenge, before they shapeshifted into old women with pointy hats and flew off on their brooms.

Cats also had another excuse - they were also victims of the plague. As for the feline purge, people would only kill the cats that lived near them. This wouldn't affect the cats that didn't have anything to do with humans. In other words, there were plenty of cats. And finally, in 2018, a paper came out that they finally figured out how the plague spread so quickly - human lice and human fleas. There was always a question to how it spread so quickly. They didn't think it was from rat fleas. The plague was very contagious too. If a town was under siege, the other side would catapult corpses of plague victims into the town until it spread and killed everyone. One of the earliest forms of germ warfare (thank the Mongols and Ghengis Khan for that). When a person found out he or she had lice, they couldn't go to Walgreens and get medication. I doubt they considered it a big deal and may have named them.

The Dark Ages was probably dark because there was a lot of bad smells. There was no hygiene. Bathing maybe twice a year, and families all used the same bath water oldest to youngest. Having only a fire pit in their huts that they had to struggle to keep lit to keep them warm, bathing was frowned on in the winter. Who wants to take a bath with hardly any heat? They did try to keep certain body parts washed. The hair was one of those parts by putting some kind of liquid or cream. But it still isn't washed often. They owned maybe two sets of clothes, and some of them were regularly washed, but the wool was brushed clean. The clothes were washed in the river - full of excrement, and again, unlikely to be done in the winter. Attempts at brushing teeth were done using wool cloth and hazel twigs. Their toilets were community cesspools with outhouses over them. Medieval toilet paper were reusable rags, old corncobs, or fingers. Urine was used for tanning leather and fulling wool. It's been said that the reason why weddings were in the Spring and Summer was that they could wash before the ceremony. I don't know how true that is, though. If they needed to see the "doctor", the taste of his patient's urine helped in a "diagnosis". Did I mention no running water and no hand washing? And on top of all this, their livestock lived in their huts to stay warm in the winter. Those lice lived good lives. And finally, the Black Death also hit countries and continents that actually loved their kitties. Nothing to do with cats whatsoever. Killing cats would not cause a pandemic of plague that killed around 150 million people.

Do TNR colonies work?

As I said, there have been a few TNR colonies that have succeeded, so to say that it doesn't eliminate cats in the wild cats in the wild. With well-maintained colonies, populations can decrease quickly. Normally, it takes years, even

decades, for the colonies to close down. If homes aren't found for these cats, the colonies exist for as long as the cats live. The places where they have been successful are supported financially and the cats observed closely. However, most TNR colony caretakers have jobs, families, or may have more than one colony they take care of. Since a lot of colonies are taken care of by volunteers, there are a lot of things that might be overlooked. Not only are there cats that can carry diseases, or disease infested parasites, like a Lyme disease-carrying tick or cat scratch fever. Cats that show up in colonies that aren't neutered are probably not vaccinated either. There isn't a sign over cat colony feeding stations that say "Cats Only" (and raccoons wouldn't care if there was) so other animals show up to eat alongside the cats. Two of them, raccoons and skunks are high vectors for rabies (disconcerting if the cats aren't vaccinated for it) and other diseases. Other animals would be rats, foxes (also a high vector for rabies), coyotes, loose dogs, and a plague of bugs. Any animal that is an omnivore/carnivore in need of an easy meal will show up. Since most colonies are volunteer-driven, they might not know that they themselves need to have a rabies vaccination, go to the doctor if they are bitten or scratched while tending the colony, or to recognize the signs of rabies. This makes colonies a public health threat. 

In New Hampshire, the bite of one rabid kitten led to the treatment of 665 people and spent 1.5 million dollars in the investigation, laboratory tests, rabies, immunoglobulin, and vaccines. There are more cats found to have rabies and has surpassed rabies in dogs. The position of the Florida Rabies Advisory is "the concept of managing free-roaming/feral cats is not tenable on public health grounds because of the persistent threat posed to communities from injury and disease."

Toxoplasmosis

Probably, Toxoplasma gondii is one of the most underestimated public threats that come from cats. Toxoplasma is a parasite that only reproduces in cats...meaning that they are the definitive host. They have both sexual and asexual toxoplasma. When the eggs (called oocysts) are ingested by cats, they wander over to the intestines to reproduce. For two weeks after that, cats shed

millions and millions of oocysts through their feces. One to five days later, the oocysts become infectious and can easily live more than a year in soil or water. After two weeks, the cat's immune system shuts it down and gives the cat immunity. The cysts that are in the cat's intestines are released to other forms in the cat, however. The first is called a tachyzoite. They are released and spread throughout the body until the immune system forces it to be dormant. So they form cysts in the muscles and brain. And finally, there are bradyzoites, which are slow multiplying toxoplasma. Now, cats are the hosts, but can they themselves become infected? Yes, they can. In young kittens and immunosuppressed cats, especially those that have feline leukemia (FeLV) or feline immunodeficiency virus (FIV), which is the feline version of HIV, it can become deadly.

When they become sick, it becomes toxoplasmosis and will cause lethargy, appetite loss, and fever. Because the immune system isn't working properly, the body is shedding tachyzoites and the immune system can't handle it. If it's a female cat that becomes infected while pregnant, she will usually either miscarry, or the litter will be stillborn. If they are born alive, they most likely will be too weak to survive. 

There are three modes of transmission:

1. Directly. It's rare that an indoor cat will have it, but with millions and millions of cats living outside, there is a chance. Cats like to defecate in loose soil or sand. Gardens have loose soil and sand is found on beaches, sandboxes, and in playgrounds. All it would take is just the tiniest amount to ingest. (Which is the reason why neighbors don't like cats in their yards.)

2. Through food and water. If meat from an infected animal isn't cooked all the way or the water has oocysts, you can become infected. Vegetables can come into contact with feces. Also, feeding animals raw foods can cause infection as well.

3. In utero between the mother and the baby.

Most infected people won't get sick, maybe a day or two of not feeling well. Something "flu-like."
Like cats, we get immunity from it and we can pass the antibodies from mother to child. If there is a concern about having toxoplasmosis, there are drugs to treat it. It requires a blood test to check for antibodies. This could take a month, however. Even if a person is infected, as long as there are no symptoms, that person is really not that affected. They can't spread it unless the infected person becomes the victim of cannibals who prefer medium to medium-rare.

However, there are segments of the population that needs to take extra care.

A pregnant woman who gets infected early in the pregnancy has higher chances that the child will be stillborn or miscarry. If the baby is born, there is a higher chance that they can suffer from developmental disorders, intellectual disorders or eye disease (with lesions), and they probably will have congenital toxoplasmosis where the head is abnormally large. 

Toxoplasmosis is also considered an opportunistic infection with people with AIDS. It is recommended to keep up with drug cocktails in order to avoid it and to keep the T4 cells high enough to prevent another infection. 

There are some studies that suggest toxoplasmosis also causes schizophrenia and other mental disorders. However, there have not been enough studies to prove this. Largely, these studies only included mentally ill people with no control group of people who didn't have a mental condition.

Toxoplasmosis needs to be paid more attention too. It can adversely affect certain groups of people and change their lives, or experience a loss of life. It is also a threat to other animals that we depend on for food and clean drinking water. 

More sources on toxoplasma/toxoplasmosis:
The Myth of Toxoplasmosis
Is Toxoplasmosis Responsible for Mental Impairment in Humans
Toxoplasmosis and Mental Illnesses
Mayo Clinic
Toxoplasmosis in Cats (Cornell Veterinary) 

The happiest cats on earth...

I had this all typed out. And was even proofread from my long-suffering mother - who gets to do it again.

I came across probably the best article I've read on the situation. It's long but WELL WORTH THE READ (The Happiest Cats on Earth). I have just two things I want to talk about. 

One is a woman named Carole Miller. She was on staff at Stanford University in the 1980s when the University was figuring out how to eradicate the over thousand cats that lived on campus. Mostly, these cats were owned by students who graduated. Ms. Miller and some of her friends organized a TNR program (that continues to this day), that was well-funded and the cats were supervised. According to what I read, by 1992 there were no

kittens born on campus. In 2013, Miller was giving a tour to a bunch of reporters, showing neat structures for feeding, water, and shelter. Later that year, she had a fire. It was discovered that she had around 100 cats in her house, many died in the fire. Investigators interviewed veterinarians who said she would bring in cats, half dead with serious and sometimes fatal illnesses, with matted fur and infested with internal and external parasites. Naturally, some didn't survive. There were 21 cats found in the freeze who had died prior to the fire. She no longer works with the TNR colony at Stanford and has been ordered to stay away from animals - especially cats. This is the worst of TNR. I'm not saying it causes animal hoarding so much as it attracts animal hoarders where being caretakers isn't enough, and they have to have more. This crosses the line. It's just too bad that this was discovered after a fire that killed many cats.

Inspired by Stanford, the city of San Francisco began their own TNR program in 2000. After moving to San Francisco, JR Yeager was enthusiastic to volunteer for the program, after he had volunteered at a traditional shelter that euthanized animals. He was assigned to a colony that had 100s of cats, many injured or sick, almost all were struggling to survive. There were even cats (plural) who had no control of their hind legs and walked dragging their hindquarters (tail injuries can cause paralysis too) behind them to eat. The caretakers weren't sustaining the colony and allowed those who were obviously suffering to go without medical attention. Mr. Yeager became disillusioned and stopped believing in TNR as effective. He now thinks it's absolutely insane to sterilize and then rerelease cats back outdoors where they are forced to fend for themselves. In his opinion, it is a cruel practice and it is far more humane to euthanize them. Which he started to do, trapping sick, and injured cats to euthanize. He has virtually eliminated populations from Laney College, Oakland Museum of California, the county courthouse, Peralta Park, and La Escluelita Elementary School. He has estimated that by 2014, he euthanized more than 300 street cats. There are a few that he found homes for, and he has a rescued street cat named Penny, who is a beautiful white cat. But mostly, they were euthanized, and from the descriptions, were better off for it.

So what do I think?
Ideally, I think that the conservationists and the cat

people should stop acting like children and calling people names back and forth and get together to do what's best for our ecology. They don't need to agree with euthanasia. Wildlife biologists want them out of the wild. They don't want them fed outside and consider it an ecological disaster. They want them contained. How about outdoor pens? Or maybe cat advocacy could use some of the millions they receive and buy abandoned warehouses to turn into TNR shelters? They are out of danger and they can be monitored for health problems. Vets can come out and administer vaccinations and flea treatments. I'm not thinking of huge rooms full of 100s of cats, I'm thinking small colonies in a small room size enclosure that has three to five cats that has climbing apparatus, interactive toys, and caregivers can come in not only to feed, water, and clean the litter, but to spend time with the cats with the hope of taming them in order to place them in homes that will keep them indoors. In the meantime, wildlife biologists outside, particularly colonies that are more remote and have not experienced humans. Kittens and friendly adults could be sent to the TNR people running the catteries to place in homes. And of course, advocacy groups could continue to trap, neuter, and contain. I mean, this just came off the top of my head. I'm sure there are logistical nightmares that means it can never happen, but it's an idea that could be worked on by both sides without the bickering. Not every cat can be saved.

Realistically though, they really need to come together to make a compromise that will help both wildlife rebound while decreasing the numbers of cats in the wild. Conservationists that will help both wildlife rebound while decreasing the numbers of cats in the wild. Conservationists have a hard time because they are coming at people with facts and they don't understand why people aren't listening. And I understand that. I like seeing facts and reading studies. Unfortunately, they've run into a society that isn't going to accept killing cats and their reasons are emotional. They need to bridge the gap with the cat people and learn how to work together and reach people who care about cats.

And I suppose now, I have to say how I feel. I come down on the side of cats AND wildlife and ecology. But unfortunately, that isn't a good thing for cats, depending on how people think. I have tears in my eyes as I type this because I truly believe that the feral cats are suffering out there. I know that they die in horrible ways and lead incredibly hard lives because of our stupidity. They suffer in ways that they shouldn't have to go through if we had done right by them. My cats were all from shelters or chose us to live with. I look at Reggie and think of what he looked like in November. He was cold and scared, and he had a cut on his upper lip that has scarred. The first two or three weeks he ate so fast that he burped at the very least 10 times for a half an hour after.

This winter on the news, they were talking about historic low temperatures and to make sure dogs had booties. There are feral cats freezing to death. Even those in TNR colonies. If they survive the cold, they face frostbite, starvation, and dehydration. Or they climb into engines for the warmth. Banging on the hood won't cause them to leave. They will freeze and not twitch a muscle, a typical defensive reaction. This is what cats face every day of the week if they are feral or stray. It is a mercy to put them down.

It's not the cat's fault. It's never been their fault. But we have to do something and they shouldn't be allowed to suffer. If they can't be found homes or contained, then the best thing we can do is send

them off to a better place where they have people who love them and homes to curl up in. Corny, I know but that is honestly what I believe. There is a pit in my stomach whenever I think of the suffering and what needs to be done. I feel it's a betrayal to the animals who have comforted me my whole life if I don't support the way that benefits feral cats the most. I can only hope that God can forgive me for thinking that there's more mercy in taking their lives instead of preserving them.


Dedicated to: Clover, Max, Tabitha, Kasey, PJ, Reilly, Quincy, Timmy, Seamus, Nigel, Teige, Oliva, Simon, Phinney, and Reggie. Every single one of you has made my life better.