Safety of cats in Pahoa?

[MichaelH]

This is all great advise. Thank you all. Our cat, "Bully", is very wary of cars and would not leave the site of his home. He only eats inside, and comes in every night to sleep, so other than the stray cats causing trouble and the centipede danger, he should be fine. We have raccoons where we live now and he leaves them alone, so hopefully he will do the same with the mongoose. He is mico-chipped as well as registered with "Homeagain". KathyH, your advise about keeping him in for a while so he does not go looking for his old home is great and I would not have done that.

[missydog1]

MichaelH, I got the advice on keeping cat in from a great web page (years ago) advising on moving cats, after I lost a kitten that I only kept in for two days and didnÔt "have the heart" to confine further. Cats have a very strong bond with the place they live, and will go looking for it until they have bonded with the new home.

When I was a kid, my parents gave one of our adopted stray cats away, and it returned on foot having made its way across the San Fernando Valley, miles and miles of urban traffic to get back, would not have believed it had I not seen it. If home is across the ocean, the concern is kitty will roam and get confused because not firm yet on the location of the new place. You want the cat fully centered on its new spot before you trust him to stay put on his own.

There was a poster here last year whose two cats (who were being held in the house) managed to escape through a window shortly after arrival, and they were missing for a long time. I remember one was found but was in too poor a condition from its time in the wild and had to be put down. Very sad.

[missydog1]

Aloha Steven,
Such important advice to avoid the potential blinding by LFA. I am so glad not to have fire ants any more (Amdro got rid of what I had). I stopped bringing in plants and never got them again. I really think that transporting plants does a lot to spread these pests. The Ant lady (the one who knows all about LFA) says that the free green mulch spreads them.

So true about outside feeding bowls. I tried feeding the feral cats, outside of course, but the mongoose and rats raided the bowls and multiple cats fought over which got the food, so I gave it up.

Delta, your story of the PepeÔekeo storekeeper made me smile. []

MichaelH, I would not be concerned about the centipedes. Cats are smarter than dogs when it comes to learning about toads, for example. You know about the poisonous bufo toads, right? Cats try to catch and play with centipedes same as lizards, but they learn it is no fun. Centipedes arenÔt aggressive, so once the cat gets stung it will be fine. The venom is not lethal. It just hurts like hell. My place has plenty of centipedes and hundreds of toads, and the cats are fine.

If you get your cat a collar with a bell, it will help save the birds. Seems not to interfere with catÔs rodent hunting chops, just the bird predation.