Putting Kitties to Work

[3113]

But do they get health insurance?

They are the homeless of the domestic animal world -- colonies of feral cats that roam residential neighborhoods and lurk around office buildings and commercial garages, scavenging for food. Unlike other strays that might rub up against a leg hoping for a crumb or a head rub, these felines are so unaccustomed to human contact that they dart away when people approach. Feral cats cannot be turned into house pets. When they end up in municipal shelters, they have little hope of coming out alive.

But one animal welfare group has figured out a way to save their lives and put them to work in Los Angeles. The Working Cats program of Voice for the Animals, a Los Angeles-based animal advocacy and rescue group, has placed feral cats in a handful of police stations with rodent problems, just as the group placed cats in the rat-plagued downtown flower district several years ago -- to great effect.

Six feral cats were recently installed as ratters in the parking lot of the Los Angeles Police Department's Southeast Division, and another group will be housed at the Central Division early in the new year.

Their reputation as furtive and successful exterminators grew after feral cats were introduced to the parking lot of the Wilshire Division nearly six years ago. Rats had been burrowing into the equipment bags that bicycle officers stored in outside cages; inside the facility, mice were sometimes scurrying across people's desks. "Once we got the cats, problem solved," said Cmdr. Kirk Albanese, a captain at the Wilshire station at the time. "I was almost an immediate believer."

After Albanese moved to the Foothill Division in the northern San Fernando Valley, he introduced feral cats to the building's mice-infested basement in 2004. "I think it's a very humane way to deal with a very stubborn problem," said Albanese, now assistant to the director in the office of operations at Parker Center, which has its own rat problem.

The cats don't generally solve the rodent problem by killing rats and mice -- although the cats are game for doing so if they catch them. Rather, the cats simply leave their scent. Once rodents get a whiff of feline presence, like gangsters under a gang injunction, they move on. "It's the smell of the cat and the cat urine," said animal rescuer Jane Garrison, a member of Voice for the Animals' board, who selected the half dozen feral cats for the Southeast station.

Less grisly than glue traps -- and usually more effective -- the cats go about their "work" naturally: "They prowl, they eat, they sit in the sun," said Melya Kaplan, founder and director of Voice for the Animals, who was responsible for putting cats in the flower markets. Sometimes they rest under police cars or on top of the warm car hoods. When the cats are new to an area -- as they are at Southeast -- they spend much of their time hiding from view.

"They've got to play it safe and see if they're OK," said Southeast Officer Sandra Magdaleno, who feeds and cares for the cats. Magdaleno, who has been rescuing animals for 25 years, can describe each of her elusive crew: two black cats, two gray and whites, a tabby and a huge gray bruiser who hissed at everyone during his days in the holding cages that the cats are confined to while they acclimate. When his cage was opened, the big bad boy timidly looked out. "He jumped out of the cage and looked around, then he heard a car and jumped back in," said Magdaleno.

"You're like the cat whisperer," Officer Mark Miraglia deadpanned.

Garrison worked with two shelters to select the most feral cats possible. (If a cat suddenly gets friendly, the animal is pulled from the pool and, with any luck, is adopted.) The cats were then spayed or neutered, vaccinated, micro-chipped and ear-tipped (under anesthesia while the cats are being altered, vets notch an ear tip, the widely recognized sign that a cat is altered).

Then the cats were moved to the Southeast Division, put in large wire holding cages and housed in a shed for a month for the process of re-colonizing. "You can't just take feral cats and put them in one location and expect them to stay," Kaplan said. "A feral cat will kill himself trying to get back to his old location."

According to Garrison, it takes about 30 days for a feral cat to be comfortable enough to consider a new location home turf. Garrison said the Working Cats program can be used anywhere. "We are willing to put cats in any safe area -- businesses, hotels, industrial parks, even residences -- and we will do that for free."

Soon the ferals may get a chance to work their magic on the legions of rats that make their home behind Parker Center. "They're coming out of everywhere," said Officer April Harding, who works in media relations. "One time I stood in the parking lot and just watched in horror, like it was a movie."

Thom Brennan, commanding officer of facilities management for the LAPD, said he was still figuring out the logistics of placing cats at Parker Center. "Nobody was more skeptical about it than I was," he said. "It sounds like too easy a fix. But everywhere it's been done, it's worked. . . . I think I'm convinced it's a viable program that will help us." At Southeast, the cats were released from their cages in late November. They hide themselves in the station's expansive parking lot, which is dotted with storage sheds, trees and bushes, not to mention dozens of cars under which to slink.

Magdaleno has a knack for spotting the felines. On a recent crisp afternoon, she spied one sunning itself against a wall behind a police cruiser. But like a celebrity in a reclusive mood, the feline dashed away as soon as a photographer trained a long lens on it. The officer pointed toward another row of cars; within minutes, a sleek black cat with yellow eyes trotted across the parking lot glancing in the direction of its watchers without breaking stride.

Magdaleno keeps the feeding station well-stocked with wet and dry food. Initially the cat installers brought provisions. Now it falls to the officer to buy food, which costs her more than $100 a month. "That is a glitch right now," Kaplan said. "I'm working with the LAPD to put that in their budget."

But Magdaleno is so devoted to the cats that during a recent vacation, she drove back to the station from her home in Temecula -- where she lives with three dogs, two cats, three cockatiels and one husband -- to check on the ferals. She gets some teasing from colleagues, who, nonetheless, have a penchant for rescuing animals in the area. "I'm more of a dog guy," said Miraglia, "but I try not to hit the cats when I drive out. Does that count?"

Albanese said there has never been a shortage of people willing to care for the cats at any station where he has worked. "If I were a wild cat, that would be a great job," he said. "Your meals are there, your housing is there, you're at a police station so you're safe."

 

[Guest]

That's excellent.

Good news for feral cats.

 

[Stella_Omega]

My cats would all fail the feral test, none of them are that untameable!

But the other evening, the three-legged young tom, Trike, was asleep in my lap. In seconds he was off my lap-- I heard a squeak-- and he was out the door with a mouse in his mouth. faster than a speeding bullet, gimp though he is.

 

[Guest]

Oh, I hate it when kitties find a mouse!

A couple of them are gathered around - something - and you just know something's up.

If I don't take the mouse away they'll eat it. Ugh. Chomp chomp chomp.

I've tossed away half-eaten mice quite often.

 

[starrkers]

I woke up to feathers all over my floor this morning.

My best mouser is the Burmese princess, and she spent her entire life in a cage before I got her.

 

[Stella_Omega]

Oh, I hate it when kitties find a mouse!

A couple of them are gathered around - something - and you just know something's up.

If I don't take the mouse away they'll eat it. Ugh. Chomp chomp chomp.

I've tossed away half-eaten mice quite often.

Why shouldn't they eat it? loads of vitamins and roughage!

 

[Guest]

Why shouldn't they eat it? loads of vitamins and roughage!

I hate them fighting over it, of course.

And they can get tapeworm if the mice have fleas.

But the worst thing - the very worst thing - is finding a mouse bitten in half lying by the fridge first thing in the morning.

Jonesey cat starts at the nose and eats in big loud bites, chomp, chomp, chomp. Sometimes he doesn't finish them. All that's left is a tail and the back legs.

Ugh.

 

[starrkers]

He sounds like Randall - he likes the crunchy bit best too.

 

[Boxlicker101]

Maybe somebody just read Dick Whittington.

 

[glynndah]

We attended a small dinner party at my mother-in-law's over the weekend. Between courses we were treated to an unexpected floor show. One of her cats very proudly carried in a mouse and dropped it in the middle of the dining room floor. The mouse rolled onto its back, shook its head and ran under the liquor cabinet. One mop handle, two shoes, three very interested house cats and numerous tries at removing the critter later... We think it may be under the refrigerator -- or perhaps the beagle ate it.

 

[SlickTony]

That sounds like an excellent program. We have organizations where I live that trap, fix and release feral cats, but I don't think anybody has thought to employ them.

A feral cat can be tamed if it is caught and acclimated at six months or less. Of course it helps if the cat is disposed to be friendly in the first place. In the spring of last year--the year that's going to be the year before last in another day--a big raggedy gray cat with ears that had been so chewed up she looked almost like a Fold came around with two pretty kittens whom she encouraged to hang out with Sylvester, a shaggy Tuxedo cat who used to belong to a neighbor who moved off without him, and who now hangs out with us. We tried to get him to move in, but he wouldn't.

One of the kittens was a solid blue color, as if he were a Russian Blue or a Chartreux (he's not. Both his parents are just big raggedy gray cats). The other, a girl, was a similar shade of gray but spotty-stripey. The boy became friendly and was soon dashing across the cul-de-sac to be with us whenever we came home from anywhere. His sister never did become friendly, although she was willing to eat the food we left out for both of them. We began to refer to the solid blue male kitten as Il Grigio. The sister we called Violeta.

My husband, who for years had been adamant that we should never have more than two cats at a time, began saying that Il Grigio was too cute to be left outside. Next we were popping him into a pet taxi and taking him to the vet to be examined, given shots etc. He was fairly hysterical during the ride to the vet--he'd never, ever been confined in anything before--but while we were in the examining room waiting for the vet and the vet techs to arrive, he settled down and started to purr. Now, I know that cats don't always purr because they're happy. They can do it if they're stressed, in pain, or even dying--it's something they can do to make themselves feel better, like meditation or something.

But somehow, Il Grigio went all Stockholm on us--we brought him back to the house and he never looked back. He shows little interest in going out, although he does like to sit in a window and sniff the air. He still remembers Violeta and if he sees her he chirps and trills at her--I think he'd like it if we ever got her to come in. But we probably won't. We have never been able to lay a finger on her. She'll get within two feet of you, but if you so much as twitch she's off and running. You come out to feed her and Sylvester, and she's there going Squeak! Give me something to eat. Squeak squeak! Now go away so I can eat it!

Earlier this year she got pregnant, as we always knew she would, and gave birth to two kittens in the corner formed by the knee-wall and the house, in the shade of a myrtle tree. We were a little surprised, because she never at any point looked pregnant. Just a little thick around the middle. She is a very small cat. She's half the size of her brother. The day after that she moved them. Later on she brought them into our yard, and I have a few pictures of her nursing one of them in the grass next to my son's car. But then the kids next door handled the kittens and she whisked them away and I never saw them again. I probably won't see her next litter, either.

 

[oggbashan]

My father used to be responsible for a Navy Victualling Yard.

They had a troupe of feral cats. The cats were recorded on the staff lists and "paid" in cat food. Any veterinary bills were paid by official funds but catching the cat to take it to the vet was "interesting". One of the works staff had a greater affinity for cats than most. He would put on protective clothing, including heavy leather gloves, before attempting a cat capture. If he couldn't catch the cat it was probably fit enough not to need professional attention.

The Victualling Yard was rat and mouse-free except for occasional deceased offerings to prove that the cats were earning their professional status.

The feral cats had been recorded on the staff lists since Nelson's time. It was possible to work out the maternal descent - but NOT the paternal!

Og

 

[SlickTony]

The feral cats had been recorded on the staff lists since Nelson's time.

There's something to be said about a country that respects tradition. Nobody's going to suddenly decide that the cats have to go on the say-so of some cost/benefit analyst.