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Feral Freedom in Florida

October 15, 2008, 5:41PM MT

By Jennifer S Hayes

Ground-breaking new program in Jacksonville has already saved 650 lives

Ground-breaking new program in Jacksonville has already saved 650 lives

By Jennifer Hayes, Best Friends staff

Go directly to jail, do not pass go, and do not collect $200; that is what happens when you select the wrong card in Monopoly. However, it is no game when a feral cat is captured by most animal control officers. Fortunately, thanks to the new Feral Freedom program, the outdoor cats residing in Jacksonville, Florida have essentially received a “get out of jail free” card – which makes everyone winners.

What started out as discussions to microchip all the cats being sterilized at First Coast No More Homeless Pets (FCNMHP), exceeded everyone’s expectations when Ebenezer Gujjarlapudi, the Jacksonville Director of Environmental Resource Management, offered to send all feral cats to the clinic instead of the city shelter where they would face certain death.

Instead they are spayed or neutered, vaccinated, ear tipped, treated for ear mites and fleas, microchipped, and best of all, returned to where they came from, without ever having had to step a foot into the shelter.

Thanks to a six month grant funded by Best Friends Animal Society, the pilot project officially began on August 1 and has already saved approximately 650 cats.

In the past, the only option for trapped ferals was euthanasia. Now, Rick DuCharme, founder of FCNMHP states, “Every surgery we do is a cat saved; it’s a cat that is going to live, instead of one who will die in the shelter.”

Working collaboratively

The City of Jacksonville Animal Care and Control (ACC) educates the public about the new program, loaning out live traps to residents, and picking up the captured cats to be brought to a protected area outside the shelter. FCNMHP collects the cats twice daily, to be housed overnight for surgery the next day. They are then returned to where they were originally trapped the following day.

“We’ve always thought that feral cats were the biggest problem we would have to face in animal welfare in getting to a no-kill community. And it seems like this has possibly turned out to be one of the easiest solutions we have, if in fact all we have to do is fix them and put them back where they come from,” noted DuCharme. He went on to say, “It’s certainly easier than finding 12,000 dogs and cats homes every year. These cats in reality already have a home. All we’ve got to do is fix them and put them back, so they’re not causing problems with anybody.”

Program expansion

While the vast majority of cats through the program are returned to where they were caught, occasionally one is found to be unsuitable for re-release. Monroe (pictured to the right) is one example, when it was discovered that she was blind due to a viral infection. Those cats are placed with local rescue organizations to find loving, indoor homes. In fact, Monroe is currently available for adoption from Lucky Cat Adoptions and despite her disability, has proved to be a daredevil who does not require any additional medical care.

While the program was originally intended to only fix cats who had proved to be a nuisance to the point where ACC was called, they are finding more and more people with colonies in need of their service. In fact, FCNMHP Program Manager, Cameron Moore, says “It’s kind of like a cat soap opera every day.”

Just recently, a woman captured one cat to be fixed. However, when he was re-released, eight more felines were seen in her yard. Though she did not consider herself a “cat person,” she could not bear to see the neighborhood strays go hungry, so planned to utilize the program further, to prevent her nine from reproducing to become 100.

This is not an isolated incident and while a wonderful resource for the community, funding is needed to help finance the additional sterilization surgeries of those unanticipated felines.

Pioneering live-saver

Nikki Sharp, Campaigns Manager for Best Friends, is very enthusiastic about this innovative new program. “I’m hoping that people will see that this is ground-breaking, not just because feral cats are not being killed in the shelter, but because the shelter is actually one of the partners that’s doing the trapping of the feral cats.” Of course Jacksonville benefits as well, saving money that had previously been spent on euthanizing and disposing of the cats. Plus, fewer animals being brought in to the shelter reduces the likelihood of disease transmission among the adoptable residents.

“We do believe this has definitely raised the bar in terms of getting us closer to expecting homeless, stray, and feral cats to be seen more as community cats that need our protection,” commented Sharp. She hopes that once all the data collected during the six months is analyzed, it will prove to not only save the lives of those cats who went through the program, but will translate into significantly reduced euthanasia at the shelter.

For now though, every cat through Feral Freedom can truly be considered a life saved.

“Not only are we doing 3,600 cats a year, but we’re doing the most effective 3,600 cats a year because now those cats that are yowling, fighting, and spraying; they’re not doing all that any more,” summarized DuCharme. “It seems like it’s a win-win all around.”

HOW YOU CAN HELP:

1. The best way to support the Feral Freedom program is to donate. The program is costing about 50% more than anticipated, due to the additional colony cats who need their services. Any contributions will be very appreciated and will help toward their life-saving mission.

2. FCNMHP truly values their volunteers and has plenty of available opportunities to help:
• Cleaning and animal preparation assistance is needed at the clinic. No medical experience is necessary; they will be happy to train interested volunteers.
• Volunteers can ride along and assist during drop-offs.
• For those who may not want to work directly with the animals, assistance is always needed with office work and phone calls.
• Helpers are needed at events, including selling drinks at the upcoming Planet Fest concert scheduled for Saturday, November 8.

Please e-mail Debbie Fields dlfields@bellsouth.net to sign up to volunteer.

For more information:
• First Coast No More Homeless Pets
• Rick DuCharme of FCNMHP Does It All!
• Feral Freedom | Jacksonville, Florida Blog

Posted by Jennifer Hayes, Best Friends staff
Photo credit: photos courtesy First Coast No More Homeless Pets

Comments

Posted October 22, 2008, 11:21AM by shellyk

thanks Joy it was geting ugly

Posted October 16, 2008, 3:47AM by TNRdoesNotWork

Not a win-win for everyone. There are many issues to consider. More at:

http://tnrrealitycheck.com/

Posted October 16, 2008, 10:25AM by cattees

Happy National Feral Cat Day! GO TNR!!!

Posted October 23, 2008, 4:3PM by Joy

Apparently there were some members who did not understand my previous post. Their subsequent comments have been deleted and their membership privileges revoked.

Posted October 16, 2008, 12:46PM by nutmegger

YAY for the ferals! HAPPY FERAL CAT DAY!! More TNR!!

Posted October 22, 2008, 11:44AM by poppysfriend

It's always great to read stories like this. I recently heard a man at my local vet's office say he got off our animal shelter board because they supported TNR.

Posted November 20, 2008, 2:30PM by lld

I would love to see something like this for Orlando. I work in a veterinary office and would like additional information so I can bring to the doctors on staff to see about having a "low cost" clinic perhaps one or two days a month. I think it would be great in these tough economic times to offer something like this to the community who otherwise might opt not to get their animals vaccinated, etc simply because the money is tight this year.

Kudos to the City of Jacksonville for doing this! I think this is awesome!

Posted November 21, 2008, 8:25PM by nestapleton

Five or six years ago, I met a lady in Denver on Marion St. who was participating in a similar operation, trapping feral cats in an urban neighborhood, fixing them, then releasing them. When I spoke with her 4 years ago, I asked how it was going trying to capture the cats. She explained that their efforts had been such a success, there was no longer a need to capture the cats - the population had stabilized. The efforts in Florida are awesome.

Posted October 16, 2008, 10:9AM by kathy_g

Jennifer-
Excellent story!
Thank you so much for posting this-it's a wonderful program and I support it wholly.

One of the key answers to reducing the pet over population is spay/neuter, and FCNMHP is helping Jacksonville to get a grip on this by their innovative programs and community outreach.

The Feral Freedom project is the best chance these cats have of of living out their natural lives; and they can no longer contribute to the over population problem, exhibit bad behaviors(which historically reduce or disappear after s/n)and in general; it is a "win-win" for all.

When I was growing up, we lived on 10 acres and always had what is now termed as "barn cats"-sometimes as many as 30 at one time since we would try to help strays. We fed them-but they had free roam to do as they wished.
It was pretty rare for any of them to catch a bird or squirrel; but they were pretty darn good at chasing away, or even catching mice and rats-which few people want around their house or yard; so in essence, the ferals that are released, may end up serving a community purpose; and this is much better for them than automatic death just because they don't fit into the idea of a pet.

Posted November 25, 2008, 5:44PM by animaladvocate

WOW, This story has given me a shot of motivation! Thank you.
I am part of a small group called South Bay Homeless Cat Coalition, located in Northern California. We consist of the top people from our 3 local shelters and a few established cat rescue groups. We have been running TNR, (Trap-Neuter-Return), programs for many years now, and keeping records on feral cat populations. Several years ago it was estimated we have over 125,000 homeless cats in Santa Clara County. I don't have the numbers at my fingertips, but we have been able to set goals of how many cats need to be put through TNR each year for us to reverse the upward trend of the growing population. I am thrilled to report the statistics have proven TNR works, not only to reduce the growing populations of these cats, but to reduce the numbers being euthanized in our shelters.
Alas, it is a drop in the bucket. We have little funding, our volunteers burn out, and it seems we are always fighting heavy opposition. I am very concerned about the continued success of our programs.
Having said that, this story has lit a bit of a fire under me, and I doubt I am alone. I would like to seriously look into how we might be able to implement a similar Feral Freedom Program in Santa Clara County. We have plenty of dedicated volunteers, but lack leadership and focus.
We have funding sources, heck we are in Silicon Valley, but lack a recognized, creditable organization to drive and attract these donors.
We have had support of our county, giving us a minimum of $25k per year for TNR. They even named 2006 The Year of The Feral Cat.
We have some cooperation from local shelters, within the parameters of their political structure restraints.
But we seem to have hit a plateau and I am afraid our momentum is fading. I really think with the help of Best Friends and maybe Ally Cat Allies, we could get recharged, and make a difference at several levels.

Posted October 25, 2008, 1:43PM by JerseyGrrl

Great story and very encouraging to others doing TNR in their communities !

Posted October 22, 2008, 11:16AM by Joy

I have removed 20 messages that had degenerated into a lose-lose debate. Any further comments arguing or name calling will result in the user's account being blocked from the Network.

Posted April 07, 2009, 7:29PM by GeorgeBailey47

This is such a great program, one that not only offers us immediate life saving options, but one that potentially can change the whole way shelters across this nation and the world, work.

Keep the ferals out of the shelters, and there's more room for domesticated cats in shelters.

However, the big goal is to still STOP THE SHELTERS FROM KILLING TO BEGIN WITH.
We need compassionate shelter operators who work to save lives, instead of working to end them.

The myth that the shelters have "no choice but to kill" has been exposed as a transparent lie perpetrated by those who do not care to save the precious lives of cats, because they have become too relaxed in the ways of the status quo killing machine and instead of overcoming their fear of change (regardless of the fact that it would save five million precious lives every year) they instead cling to their outdated, visionless, heartless, "Kill 'em and add em' to the pile" illogic.

Shelters do NOT have to kill cats and dogs. They CHOOSE to.

They have a choice, there IS an alternative: LIFE

www.nathanwinograd.com

www.nokilladvocacycenter.org

"See yourself in others. Then whom can you hurt? What harm can you bring?"

If we demand to our local shelters, animal control officials, mayors, etc that our cities become no-kill cities, we will accomplish the No More Homeless Pets dream.

But we ALL need to do our part and see that our voices are heard.

PS I gave a donation to the Feral Freedom Project, and it feels great to be a part of the life saving work.