My welcome to Ireland and its cats....

Well over a decade ago when I first came to Ireland I was in a rented house out in the Mayo countryside,. I had one of my cats with me ( how I got her through customs is another story!), the other two to follow with my car.... So there I was in a strange house in a strange land, great welcome given, and as I was dropping off to sleep there came an unearthly wailing.. Cat and I froze and cuddled close... over and over again it came in the dark Irish night.... second night the same.. my neighbour knew but would not tell me.. That day, I put some stale scones out on the bird table and there was a starving cat wolfing them as if it had never eaten before. My dinner was to be a pan of rather fine chicken stew, and yes... there I was at the door,calling this ravenous cat to eat... and another cat .... and yet another cat came. A hungry threesome who cleared the pan and sighed with relief.My neighbour then admitted that an old man up the lane had gone into hospital and his three cats were just left and yes, the howling in the night was sheer terrible hunger....there was no howling that night.. the following morning when appeared there was literally a cat behind every bush. Eyes and faces everywhere and I made sure my neighbour started feeding some at her house.... my three were stayers which made 6 when my other two arrived.. One was a stunted wee girl who had two terribly inbred kittens that died... I did not know the picture then. They do not neuter and they just leave cats behind or let them breed and the kittens scatter. Everywhere i have lived it has been the same. My feral's predecessor here was a nasty runty aggressive creature, which is why I have not neutered mine. I fed the three cats in Mayo the entire 6 months I was there and wanted to bring one away with me but he vanished that day.. odd is it not! Some groups are making headway with TNR but the locals do not see the point. So many get killed on the roads they say. So all I can do is what I can do.. my two were of a litter of three from a filthy cat rescue place. I got them through feline enteritis they came infected with but then one died of a heart defect. ....

Friend of mine spent a holiday in Ireland. With the cottage came a mangy manky old cat she fed him over her time there treated his sore eyes and passengers and discovered who he belonged to.

When she left Ireland he came over shortly after

Sadly he didn't get on with her two cats so he went to CPL along with a generous donation. He was adopted by some people who wanted a stable cat and decided to pick the least likely to be adopted

Sadly its not just Ireland its a larger problem and peoples attitude to cats ..

I have been accused of being a cat hater because Ive said there need to be more controls on cats.
Im not Im actually a cat lover and I find it so distressing that cats are bred and given away via freebie ads all the time. Our local rescue is bursting at the seems and still they come..

People cant see the point in vaccinating or de-sexing cats, they say it normal to let them roam but then cry and wail when the cat gets hit by a car or drinks antifreeze or catches FIV, FLV or FIP, not to mention fleas, ticks and worms.

I hate seeing the obviously sick cats and the ones lurking in the bushes wailing when people go past hoping for a meal or place to curl up and sleep.
I hate my neighbours who sit inside their centrally heated house while their cat sat outside in a foot of snow looking like a small frozen blob of fur. When challenged they said 'he prefers to be outside' yeah thats why every time I open my garage door he tried to get inside for a warm..

Honestly I love cats its the (majority of) owners I cant abide.

Please God this has not happened to my wee girl.. ouch.. feel sick

Mine have always had access to the outside; we are very far from any roads etc and this is the first time any problem. I dont vaccinate , on the advice of the vet and always ticks but they are easy enough to deal with. In all my years this is a first. And always access to the house and for the feral, a warm bed in the utility. always neutered apart from the feral who I need to be all male to deter the others. I once managed to scrounge round for six free neutering vouchers. A lady was feeding around 14 cats in her back garden. Grudged the money to neuter as " they just get killed on the road, " And then she just could not be bothered taking them in when it was free.

When I lived on the island I was still breeding Siamese. SAme scene and one UK lady had a vet there on holiday and they rounded up as many cats as they could catch and operated in her shed... I let it be known I had sold a Siamese baby for a good sum and the outcry was , "EEEEYTY POON FOR A KITTEN!!!"