download/print - Neighborhood Cats

7. Secure the rear doorAfter you’ve placed clean newspaper, food and water inside, shut the rear door andcheck that it’s securely locked by tugging up on it. Remove the dividers and cover therear of the trap with the sheet. For ventilation, leave the front and rear doors partiallyuncovered.When working with large numbers of cats, it can be helpful to proceed in anassembly-line manner. First, put newspaper on top of each trap. Then make your waydown the row of traps, doing all the front ends first. Next, prepare all the food plates andwater dishes and put one of each on top of each trap. Finally, do all the rear ends, placingfood and water in as the last step for each trap. The reason the food and water should beput in as the last step and not the first is so the cat doesn’t sit in it or knock it over whileyou’re cleaning. What if a cat does escape?If you follow the procedures outlined here, including always using two dividers anddouble-checking that the doors are locked after you close them, cats will not escape. Butif for some reason there’s a mishap and a cat does get out, the most important thing toremember is never try to grab a feral with your bare hands. The cat will be veryfrightened and will believe you’re trying to harm him. He’ll fight to break loose fromyour grip and, in a split second, can inflict an injury serious enough to send you to theemergency room for treatment. Don’t try to throw a blanket over him and grab him.That’s just as dangerous. What you will need to do is re-trap him.Anticipate the possibility of an escape, even if it’s highly unlikely, by shutting thedoor and blocking any other way out of the holding space when you first enter it.Obviously you can’t do this if your holding space is outdoors or in a large, wide openinterior like a warehouse, giving you all the more reason to be extra-careful when feedingand cleaning.If an escaped cat cannot get out of the holding space, there are a few ways to re-traphim. One is the “lure into a closed space” method described in the “Hard-to-catch cats”section of Chapter 9. Your escapee will already be in a closed space, so no need to lurehim in. The rest of the method, however, would apply. Briefly, you would eliminateplaces the cat could hide and get him to run behind a board or into a closet where a trap isset. Review the full procedure in Chapter 9.If this method doesn’t work or is impractical in the particular space, set and bait a trapor two, cover the sides of the trap with a sheet (but not the front and rear doors) and waitit out. It can take a few days before hunger drives the cat back in, though usuallyovernight will do the trick.Worst case scenario would involve asking a veterinarian or veterinary technician tocome and use a fast-acting sedative on the cat. This is possible only if the cat is holed upsomewhere where he can be easily reached and has little room to move. It should only beattempted by a veterinary professional experienced in working with ferals.108