HELP! Cat problem!!

My best friend is having a problem. I told her I would ask the smart cat people on DU for help!

She just bought a house a few months ago. This house is in an older well established neighborhood. The previous owner of the house was an older woman that died and her children sold the house.

Here's the problem. The older woman used to feed all of the neighborhood cats. When she died the cats went away, now that the house is occupied the cats are back. So, my friend has been feeding them as well. Anyway.....

She rescued a puppy from PAWS of Austin. The doggie is still a puppy. She gets along pretty well with the cats but is constantly eating their excrement ( which is EVERYWHERE, BTW. ) in the backyard. She has tried cleaning the affected areas as well as putting cayenne pepper down, to no avail.... the puppy ROLLS in it and eats it. The other problem is that one of the cats ( she is not sure which one ) kills and mangles squirrels in the back yard. It has gotten REALLY bad, sometimes two or three a day... leaves the heads and feet and eats the innards.

Here's where it gets bad.... the new puppy will run out to the yard and grab the head or feet or what have you and start munching. My buddy has had to clean the backyard with a shovel to rid the backyard of squirrels guts before letting her puppy out for bathroom breaks. The puppy is only 12 weeks old and my friend is worried that she is going to get sick with all of this squirrel and cat shit digestion.

Here's where I need help. What should she do with the cats? None of them have tags and they all look like they are in good shape. They appear to have been someones animals before, or at least the two females that I have been in contact with. Should she call animal control? Post signs in the neighborhood? Find a rescue? She would hate to haul off someones cat....

And just and FYI... she cannot have the cats indoors due to a severe allergy to cats dander.

Any idea's DU?

yeesh

Ever see a cat eat a pile of shit? Didn't think so

PIG!!!! :P :P

Nice knockers


:hide:

Kinky Friedman's place. http://www.utopiarescue.com/

if it's an older, established neighborhood, the neighbors probably know whose cats are whose, so she should ask around. "Hey do you know if that black and white cat belongs to somebody?" etc etc.

Also, if she finds out that they belong to somebody, she should (obviously) stop feeding them so they won't come around anymore. :) If she finds out that they don't belong to somebody, then I'd look into finding them a spot at a no-kill shelter. If she takes them to the city or calls animal control, they'll almost certainly wind up dead. Finding them a spot at a no-kill shelter will take some time but if they are nice, friendly, socialized critters, it's worth the extra effort, IMO. :) Not to say that ferals aren't worth the extra effort too, but they are a lot harder to find new homes for.

If I did have an inside/outside cat it would have a collar of some form on it. Without a collar then these cats need to go to a no-kill shelter. I'm sure the shelter will have the scanner needed to check for microchips and any microchipped cats would be returned to their owners, but my guess is those cats are ferral.

let their indoor / outdoor cat run around without a collar -- because "everyone in the neighborhood knows who that cat belongs to." :shrug: I can think of at least three people who do that.

and have the cats removed. She got her puppy from PAWS, I think they have a no-kill cat rescue group or can point her in the right direction.

Thank you lynneSin! I'll have her call PAWS.

That would be my first concern. Is the dog deficient in something? :shrug:


As far as the cats go.. she needs to quit feeding them. They'll go back to wherever they were before. Or catch them and get them to a safe shelter.

eaten cat poop...as a matter of fact my female Boston used to get the cat crap out of the litter box all of the time and munch down... just one of those things.

The squirrel gut is another matter... I think the puppy is a mix of blue heeler and some sort of hunting dog as well... so that makes sense that she would eat the squirrel guts.

I don't think deficiency has anything to do with it.

mmmmm.....

I don't think a dog gives a fuck what it eats so long as it smells remotely like food--which is why it's so easy to kill one with poisoned food.

Look what cats eat--fish, meat, liver...dogs love all those foods, and I am guessing that the flavor of those foods is still in the cat shit. (Not being a huge believer in cophrophagy, I'll pass on dedicated research to prove/disprove this theory. But I believe it to be sound.)

One of my wife's friends has indoor cats and an outdoor boxer. The boxer is an outdoor pet because every time she lets it in, the first thing it does is run to the litter pan and eat all the cat shit in it.

have your friend mush up canned green-beans (run them through food processor) - mix some of it up in the cat food. just a tablespoon per cat

makes the cat-poop taste really bad

my parents went through this with their dog - would eat cat poop and her own poop until the vet told them to mix canned greenbeans in with the food

I'll have to pass that along! Thanks!

The cats love the taste, it is addicting to them too, but it is not digestible. This is why dogs have a fondness for cat poo I believe. (Sweet little nuggets to them.) My suggestion: stop feeding the kittys. This will not solve the squirrel problem but at least those squirrels will be able to wonder through the yard on their own steam. There was an earlier suggestion about making kitty poo taste bad which sounds like a winner, personally I would try that first but make certain that you are not poisoning anyone's pet first. There are plenty of pet links online, try asking there too.
chknltl

There was an article in the news about that recently - apparently just discovered.

Cat food is higher in protein because cats are true carnivores - that's why dogs like cat food better than their own, and probably why they like the poop so much ,but as far as the poop goes, lots of dogs will eat poop from horses, cows, rabbits, other dogs and ,of course, human poop. I've read somewhere that that was one of the jobs of dogs in primative times - to clean up poop from children running around in the village.

taste bud that is.... I didn't know this.... I have been spreading that sweet poo story for years too.
That'll stop here and now. Thanks CAcyclist

Sorry I don't have the link. I'll have to remember to save it next time I come across it.

Obligate carnivores pass a lot of protein through their poop.
That's what makes it so appealing to the dog, however, that
high protein will hurt the dog's kidneys.

because cat food is higher in both protein and fat than dog food. Dogs like the taste of both protein and fat, but don't need as much as cats. So, cat poop smells and tastes good to dogs. But it still contains e-coli and other nastiness.

I think calling the shelter for advice seems the solution here.

First off, the dog is probably eating the poop because the yard is his terroritory. Dogs eat poop because of territorial issues, not because it's a "tasty little nugget." Here's a good article about all the reasons dogs eat poop.
http://www.thepetprofessor.com/articles/article.aspx?id=105

As far as your friends cats, what is established is a cat colony. If the cats are feral or "companion" animals, they will still form a colony. She needs to stop feeding the cats if she doesn't want to take the responsibility of caring for them. If these are cats that have homes, then there is no reason to feed or care for them. If they are feral, then a rescue group needs to be called to trap and take care of moving the colony to a better area. Since it's a well established neighborhood, then putting up signs isn't a bad idea at all. Let people know her intentions as far as having the animals removed. If these are feral cats, they need to be trapped and spayed/neutered so the colony doesn't grow.

It's your friends preference as far as what type of shelter to contact but I, personally, am against no-kill shelters. The animals are often times confined for long periods of time, increasing their anti-social behaviour and making them even more unadoptable. If you've ever seen footage from no-kill shelters, often times animals end up going "kennel crazy." It isn't always the best thing for the animal. How would you like to spend the rest of your life in a prison?