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Having multiple cats is always a risk. Sometimes they get on well for years but then one of them gets bullied and excluded. I've seen it happening in two households. In one case a young cat grew and started challenging the ageing one. In the other case a cat was away for a few weeks recovering from injury and the others wouldn't let it reintegrate. The owners don't concede that they've created the situation until well after everything's gone wrong.
How about posting vids and clips on the whatsapp every time this cat is in your garden, while repeating the message over and over again that she's your neighbour's cat and therefore you and your kids would never feed her? You don't want to make him feel that you are stealing her. So your kids should use the cat's original name. Don't feed her, not even once. That really would be tantamount to theft. (There was a court case....the feeder was ordered to stop.) You don't have grounds to intervene on welfare grounds because she isn't starving and looks well cared for. If she felt compelled to ask your family for help she'd be very demonstrative. There'd be insistent, desperate pleas.
Eventually your whatsapping will prove that the cat has a new life with your family. Maybe the owner will feel obliged to do something in the cat's best interests...maybe give her to you, or give you permission to feed her, or get rid of the cat which is bullying her, or resolve some territorial tensions. Sometimes it's enough to feed rival cats in separate areas or give them separate catflaps or additional litter trays.
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nick_h.
Interested to hear cat owners opinions...
There is a cat/big kitten that spends an incredible amount of time in our garden. Pretty much most of the day, every day (she's in the garden now in the drizzle). She drinks from our bird bath and it pretty much here when I get up with the kids and when we go to bed. The kids love playing with her and have named her.
When she first rocked up she didn't have a collar, so I posted on our st. whatsapp. A neighbour said she was his and not to feed her. But now she's bigger, she seems quite thin. From sleuthing the chat thread, I can see he's got at least 3 cats (probably 4, maybe more). I can only assume that she doesn't like the other cats and maybe they eat her food.
Any suggestions or ideas?
I don't want to feed her, but the rest of the family do. I know you never really own a cat, just look after it, but I can't help but feel that if they don't want to go home the owner isn't doing a great job. Equally it's hard not to judge someone with more than 2 cats, so I might just be being unfair.