Does Animal Care and Control of New York City take in feral cats?
A. My understanding is that AC&C does not respond anymore to requests to trap cats absent a public health emergency or other similar situation. If someone traps them, AC&C is required to go and pick them up. The feral cats that come into AC&C come primarily from private citizens or extermination companies hired by private citizens. If an ear-tipped cat ends up in a shelter, we are notified. The cats aren’t micro-chipped but AC&C gives us the general location where the cat was picked up and then we put word out to our extensive e-mail list to figure out which colony the cat belongs to. Of seventeen cases this year, half of the cats were returned to their colony; the rest were either adopted out or placed in another colony. Due to our strong network, only one of the cats was euthanized and that was due to terminal illness – we actually did locate the caretaker so at least he had a chance to say goodbye. Q. Do New York’s harsh winters take a toll on free roaming/feral cats? A. Not in our
