2 Attachment(s)
Unintentional outside freeloader
About a month ago on one of my walks with Ram I saw this goofball sitting in a tree. On the following day when we went out the cat was still in the tree and it snowing quite a bit. I went back out around 9:30 pm and he was still in the same spot and the snow was still falling on him. I left him a can of food in case he was hungry. When I came home from work the next day he was still in the tree and he hadn't touched the food and the snow on the branch wasn't disturbed.
I put Ram in the house after our walk and I went back to the tree to have a chat with the cat to see if he was injured or sick. He wasn't very high in the tree so I climbed up to where I could touch him and with a few head scratches he was my best friend. He followed me down to where I could grab him when I was on the ground and the poor guy was shivering.
I let him warm up in my basement so that my two cats wouldn't be jerks. He was wearing a collar and a flea collars but no tags and he's not chipped when I had him scanned at my vet's office. The vet tech's advice was to let the cat go in my backyard and he would most likely go home but I left the carrier outside with the door open.
When I got up in the morning he was sleeping in the carrier and he was still there after work. I tried to winterize the carrier with a blanket around the outside and then the garbage bag and there are two sherpa fleece cat blankets inside, raised off the concrete and the front is blocked by the wind as much as possible without blocking the entry.
I've put up signs to see if anybody knows him or if he has a home but I haven't had any replies. He's super friendly, and starved for affection. He keeps trying to get in when Ram goes out for a pee so I don't think that he wants to be an outdoor cat and he hasn't been neutered. Two people on my street have said that he's been a regular in the hood for a longtime.
I would like to end his residency in my yard and to stop feeding him because my cats like to go out on warmer days. I thought about taking him to a shelter but if he does have a home somebody might get pissed off and you never know how crazy people can be these days.
He appears to be in good health and weight but because I've been providing food and shelter I feel a sense of responsibility for him that may not even be warranted.
What would you do?