feral cat

I have one. Or I should say that I am feeding a feral cat who lives in my yard. Her name is Heidi. (Humor me.) Like all cats she is independent but especially so; she bolts if I come within 30 feet of her. So I was surprised when she came up on the deck allowed me to photograph her through the door:

I first saw her about six months ago. She disappeared over the summer, then with the first rains she has reappeared. As it started to cool, I put up a makeshift shelter--- a cardboard box with a garbage bag. At first she loved it; curled up in there all night long. Here I am approaching --- still a dozen yards away on the deck --- and she is bolting:

But we've had snow and nights in the high twenties (Farenheit) --- fairly brisk for Seattle --- and she seems to have another place to huddle. How good that is I have no idea of course; she doesn't leave me any clues. But my original Heidi Hut was a shabby shelter for a builder's feral cat. So I've made her another. (I went to the pet stores and while there are dog houses galore there are none small enough for a cat. I was surprised. So I went online and Googled "feral cat shelter" and found some great leads.) The best idea was to take a plastic tub (mine is from Rubbermaid), cut a cat-sized entry and line the whole thing with two inch high-density foam. Voila! A Heidi Hut. Nothing quite so evolved as the sort of thing you'd see in The Cats' House:

But I hope she likes it. I just put it out with a bowl of wet (canned, smelly) food inside it to entice her. We'll see.

Picture of the Heidi Hut soon. Suggestions appreciated.

Comments

[D. Michael Ray]

Get her fixed... contact your local feral cat group -- if you don't know who they are, then get in touch with Alley Cat Allies in San Fran or Feral Cat Coalition in San Diego-- they should be able to help. Your local group will help you trap her and get her fixed for free or very low cost, then they'll release her right back where she came from. If you make someone else do the dirty work, she won't even associate it with you, either.

Otherwise, Heidi will turn into bazillions of little heidiettes.

[Murph]

My dad (who claims to hate cats) built something similar for my parents' ever-rotating outdoor cat population. It's a cardboard box, with a cat-sized opening, lined with two-inch high-density foam (sound familiar?). It fits about three cats and, additionally, has a light bulb in it. The bulb is an old workshop light; it has a plastic cage surrounding it at a few inches radius to keep the bulb unbroken and the foam (and cats) unscorched, and has an extension cord to an outlet on the porch for those particularly cold Michigan nights.

[Gordon]

There is a product line called SmartyKat that offers convertible beds. When closed it is an open bed with short sides, open, it's a cube with front and rear entrances. I put mine on the front porch (large wrap around porch) but now it's getting cold. So I put it on a door mat under the house. Yes, my feral cat Roswell can get under the house from 2 or 3 places. She seems to prefer good old dirt but she does sleep in the bed when it suites her.

[cynthia]

Awww i myself built several "Snowybutt Huts" in Louisville, Ky for a white neighborhood cat. She used boxes etc.. but we always had the issue of more aggressive strays finding her hut and trying to claim it. Her summer hut was a tent made of a sheet with another sheet of plastic over it. I could actually climb in it with her. In winter I made something exactly like your design (a tub lined with styrofoam & towels.) Animals need a structure that is not much bigger than they are for maximum warmth. After a long summer of feeding and verbal greetings she came to trust me and lives in the best hut of all --my house. Tip: if your trying to bond with a stray, scratch a stick on the ground and get the cat to "play" sounds ridiculous but this has worked twice for me. Trust me Heidi knows you are her defender.