In many cultures, but it seems to be particularly popular in Britain and the US (if you watched The Simpsons, you will know what I am talking about), there is a thing called "old cat lady". I am not a 100% in agreement with the term, but it weirdly describes our problem at this time.
What is the problem?
The problem is, that not long ago, we had a man living in one of the local apartment blocks. I suppose in the UK, it would fall under "affordable housing". He was (or probably still "is") an elderly man, absolutely fulfilling all stereotypes of an old cat "lady". He doesn't talk to anyone (though I heard him talk once, he really sounded like The Simpsons cat lady, funny enough!) and whenever I saw him, he looked rather grumpy. And this old man started feeding a few stray cats.
So what, nothing wrong with that...
...you would think. Now, if you have ever been to some of Greeks beautiful islands, you will quickly notice that there are a lot of cats around. And if you have been anything like me (after all, I do love cats!), you'd be amazed and yet surprised how this could have become such a big problem.
Wind forward and we're in Sainte-Blaizine. A tiny hamlet somewhere in the French jura mountains, with an old guy that decided to feed a few stray cats. Which in return then multiplied. I don't know how many years this guy lived here, but even about 3+ years ago, when we came here for holidays, there were dozens of cats roaming around in the street.
Back then we found it bizarre but funny, didn't think much of it. But now the big problem comes to light: this cat "mister" moved out and left around 20 cats fighting for themselves, many of them becoming more and more desperate (and bolder) as winter approaches and they have no food. But food is not the only problem.
Health
Because, believing neighbours with cats (and similar cat problems) of their own, this guy never had never anyone looking at the cats, they had no check-ups, they presumebly carry diseases and of course make other cats sick as well. As it already happened to our neighbours' cat.(s). So obviously I am a bit concerned about our cat, but at the moment I can say that she has been completely vaccinated from the start, so hopefully she won't have any problems.
However, this does come with another issue: as none of the cats have been looked at (or after, to be precise) they have also obviously not been sterelised and to no surprise at all, we had a very aggressive cat not far from our compost pile, that later reveiled she had a little kitten. Unfortunately, despite our efforts to help the little one (I'd say about 3 weeks old), it started to get cold and wet outside and the little kitten was clearly malnourished and the cat was in no way capable of taking care of the kitten. To our dismay it died the evening of our daughter's birthday (luckily she was in bed already).
So so many...
As a consequence, we now have so many cats and from one day to another, you think you counted them all, you find another one that you haven't seen before. So far I counted
- 4 grey tiger cats behind our compost camping out under the woods, where we can't reach
- 1 brown tiger cat, very timid but aggressive with the other cats
- 2 black ones - originally we thought it's just one
- 1 completely grey one
- 3 tortoise shell, white belly, brown head and grey tiger back, absolutely gorgeous cats
That is 11 now, and I know there are more but I cannot remember anymore. I need to go through my photos. But these are 11 cats that currently live on our property and we have no way of getting rid of them.
Then you need to add the other cats and kittens. We have two neighbours, each of them with a barn where they discovered kittens. If I remember correclty one had six or seven kittens, the other one three. To that you need to add the cats that have moved further up or down in the village finding new territories, where they can find food away from the others.
Trying to help, not a good idea
So, as I mentioned before, we tried to help the little kitten that unfortunately died. Somehow those cats figured that out and started appearing in front of our house door. Not having thought anything of it - and it also still being very warm - we left the doors open. Well one of the cats got in and found our cat's feeding station. Now the devil is out of the bag. Whenever we now open the door, we have about three cats trying to force themselves in, head first.
I have now started feeding the cats every few days away from the house. But with very little success. We started splashing them with water and like our cat I started growling at them. Better success, but not much. Out of the 12 cats, we now have around 3-5 that keep living at our window.
One of them, we decided to adopt and take inside during the night. Also the littlest one. That again pissed off the other cats as they now obviously can see their friend/sibling/child being fed and kept in the warm. At one point, the cats jumped up the wood framed windows and clawed themselves into the frame to look inside. First we thought they really missed their sibling, but we noticed that a couple of the cats came in, they literally just went straight for the food, to the point where they started biting and clawing each other (they basically drill their nails into the other cats paws, no matter how much they scream, and leave the claw in until they finished eating, it's dreadful).
So I thought we'll feed them, they get friendly, then we can pick them up and have them sorted out, health check, sterilised and maybe put into shelter. But unfortunately only more bad surprises and news were blown our way...
We're basically on our own
My first task was to get in touch with a vet. We found a lovely vet for our elderly cat Luna and thought we'd ask them how much they charge for the whole process and if they then can sort them out and pass them on to a shelter. First surprise was - for the unknowing like us - is that female cats sterilisation costs twice as much. So let's assume we have 12 female cats in the garden, that's quite a steep bill to pay. As much as the vet was willing to help, but even they were surprised how many cats we have around.
I contacted the mairie but was already told by neighbours they won't be helping. In the end, I sent an email anyway, pointing out that the person was living in a social housing apartment that was provided by the local council and that they should sort it out. To no surprise, they did not answer.
Some people suggested pet charities that take care of stray animals. But even Abdullah online only found a couple of charities which were each quite some distance (we're talking hours). But some people suggested that it would be easier on social media and all these local group apps. But then again, we don't know that many people locally, so that would be of no help.
So on this front no good news. But it noticed over the past few days since I started writing this article, that there are less cats coming to our door. I am not sure whether that is because it's cold and they may have not survived or starved, or whether someone else in the village has decided to help them so they moved on.
Where to go from here?
I actually have no clue. There are so many things that need sorting out and the cats are not top of my list.
However, talking to a vet, I heard someone else in the village has adopted a cat (some good news), and Abdullah seems to have taken quite a liking to another cat, or should I rather say kitten. It was very tiny and needed help. It looks like it has a sibling that was much bigger. So we started helping the kitten, let it rest inside and give it food away from the others. It has now caught up with the sibling's size and interestingly it started playing a lot and is much more active than before. Randomly starts playing and also now shouting at us. My husband named her Lucky. So I have decided (as it was back when I got my cat): who names her, owns her. 😉
Today I also noticed after dropping some food into the chicken cage, that some cats were so desperate, they tried to bite through the iron chicken fencing. That's despite the fact that I gave them two tins of cat food for the lot today. Particularly one was eager to bite itself through and it had quite a gash missing from what I would consider "shoulder". So clearly had a fight with another cat or something else.
We will see what time brings, but at the moment I feel like the cats won't be around for too long. The temperature is dropping substantually and despite the fact that I provided them with some hard wood shelter, they don't seem to be able to find a safe spot for them. When the snow (and subsequently rain storm) started, they clearly were hiding under our wooden terrace but even there they were not safe from the storm that followed and they hid behind our bins. Everytime I went out they ran for their lives.
Well... let's wait and see...