cat safety – Pain In The Bud

This Is What Happens When People Demonize Cats

Cats were poisoned, shot with a handgun and killed with blow darts in separate incidents this week.

It’s been a while since we touched on the topic of thinly-veiled cat hatred masquerading as academic rigor in studies blaming cats for killing improbable numbers of birds and small mammals in countries like the US, UK, Australia and New Zealand.

Unfortunately those “studies,” which have little relationship with reality, have serious consequences. In places like New Zealand, it’s the widespread government-sanctioned slaughter of felines and the rise of vigilantism by creepy people who clearly enjoy killing cats.

Now that sort of thing is happening with greater frequency in the US.

In Brooklyn someone poisoned a group of at least seven community cats. A man who cares for the colony of strays found the felines dead under his deck, where they usually sleep. The cats were all bleeding from nose and mouth, and authorities believe someone put rat poison in their food.

Lab tests and necropsy results are pending. St. Vincent Feline Rescue and state Sen. Steve Chan, a former police officer, are offering a $2,500 reward for information leading to the identification and arrest of the person or people responsible. Cats from two other nearby colonies have gone missing and authorities believe they may have met the same fate.

The deaths have taken a toll on Albert Vincent Berto, a Brooklyn man who has been caring for and feeding the strays for years.

“ It gave me purpose. It gave me something to get up in the morning for,” he told The Gothamist. “ I’m just bewildered. I’m just, I feel lost. I’m so lost right now.”

Two cats eating on the ground, one white with brown patches and one grey and white. — Credit: Pexels

Meanwhile a man in West Palm Beach, Fl., has been shooting cats.

A local rescue managed to get footage of the man during his latest attack. The video shows the man riding up to the exterior of a closed flea market at night and taking shots at cats with a hand gun.

A cat named Zoe survived a gunshot wound, but the bullet shattered a front leg, which had to be amputated.

Staff at a local rescue stressed that the flea market shooting isn’t the first of its kind. They believe the same person may be responsible for shooting other cats in the West Palm Beach area.

“This is not an isolated incident from what we know,” Gabby Gluck of Furry Friends told WPBF, a local ABC affiliate. “This is just the incident that we have footage of.”

Furry Friends has announced a $5,000 reward for anyone who can help police identify the man in the video footage. The Palm Beach County Sheriff’s Office is handling the investigation.

Those weren’t the only similar incidents this week. In Tennessee, three people were arrested after killing several cats and severely injuring a kitten with blow darts. In Hawaii, two men face murder and assault charges after allegedly attacking a man and his sister, who were feeding stray cats in Maui. Alfred Kailihiwa, 71, who was well known as a caretaker of local strays, was rushed to the hospital after the attack but died of his injuries a short time later. And in Rochester, NY, a local shelter’s outdoor cat homes were smashed by cat-hating vandals the week prior, and not for the first time.

Report Details ‘The Unsettling Rise Of Cat Seducers’

Is your cat a Six Dinner Sid spending an increasing amount of time with neighbors?

Your neighbors probably aren’t giving your cats flowers or serenading them with Marvin Gaye songs, and hopefully they’re not giving them chocolates, but they may be cat seducers anyway.

The term dates back at least a few years and it describes neighbors who lure pet cats into their homes, ply them with food, even buy them beds and collars, all in an attempt to gain effective “ownership” of the felines in question without having to worry about vet bills or declare to landlords that they have a cat.

Reports of cat seduction are rife with anecdotes about seducers ignoring polite requests from the owners not to feed their cats and even questioning whether the original caretaker is meeting their needs. Some distressed people report their cats are gone for days at a time and rarely return home as the seducers ignore healthy feeding limits and do everything they can to keep the felines in their homes.

Naturally, cat seduction is primarily a problem in the UK. While the culture around feline companions is changing across the Atlantic as people opt for measures like catios and harness training, the majority of British caretakers still believe their little buddies need outdoor time to remain stimulated and happy.

As readers of PITB know, Buddy is an indoor-only cat, and definitely not because he’s frightened of going outside. The problem is, he’s so meowscular, ripped and yuge that neighbors who might spot him crossing a yard at night or padding powerfully down the sidewalk are likely to freak out and call authorities to report a large cat, possibly a jaguar or tiger, is loose in the neighborhood.

So obviously I have to keep him inside not for his safety, but for the safety and sanity of our neighbors. We’re considerate like that here at Casa de Buddy.

A woman named Amy told The Guardian her cat was gone so often, she put a tracker on his collar to find out where he was spending his time. That’s when she realized he was in a neighbor’s house “constantly.” The neighbor, who says she can’t adopt a cat of her own because she travels frequently, was not cooperative when Amy asked her to stop feeding her pal.

“Cats are cats – they have no concept of human boundaries,” Amy told the newspaper. “She’s literally enticing him away.”

A sign warning admirers not to feed Buddy, who has been known to solicit snacks from the balcony by meowing to passersby.

Alison Ward, who also spoke to The Guardian, said her cat Scooby started coming home “reeking of marijuana” and well-fed “but quite deranged.”

Ward figured out Scooby was being enticed into the home of a group of roommates, all men in their 20s, who had renamed the little guy, purchased food bowls for him and even got him a collar.

“They said they thought he was their cat,” she said.

Online resources dedicated to cat seduction warn of telltale signs. If you’ve restricted your cat’s diet on a veterinarian’s instructions, for example, and the cat is not losing weight or even gaining it, that’s a clear sign the little one is a Six Dinner Sid, bouncing between home and at least one other neighbor’s house. Other signs include constantly “lost” collars, inexplicable grooming, disinterest in the cat’s usual food, and returning home with unfamiliar scents attached to them.

On a subreddit for UK users, several people shared anecdotes about cat seduction.

“My mum’s two cats started disappearing for a day or two here and there. She figured they were shacking up at a neighbours house occasionally which didn’t bother her too much,” a user wrote. “Then one day they both just completely disappeared. Months later she found out who it was that had been sheltering them during those missing periods, and they also happened to have moved away right around the time that the cats disappeared.”

Others worried about their affectionate and sociable cats, and there was a general consensus that social media, particularly posts and memes about the “cat distribution system,” can lead to people believing it’s okay “to take any friendly cat home with them because it ‘chose’ them.”

Of course there’s a simple solution: don’t allow your cat to roam outside unattended.

While some argued that people should keep their cats indoors to keep them safe from dangers like getting hit by cars, as well as to prevent them from killing birds, others rejected the idea. Some even blame US cat lovers for normalizing the practice of keeping cats indoors.

“Oh, you don’t agree with the American way of doing things, well you’re just wrong,” one user wrote. “They’ll rant about the dangers of coyotes etc to cats, while refusing to accept that’s not an issue here. Friends in the US were genuinely shocked when I explained that rabies was eliminated here a long time ago.”

Header image via Pexels

Family Shares Vet Records, Photos In Battle Over Cat Taken By Amazon Driver

One party has produced records. The other has an implausible story. Yet again, a situation highlights the need for new pet laws that reflect the way people see companion animals now, not as they did more than a century ago.

Junie the cat gave birth to a litter of kittens in 2022, was spayed in 2023, and photos show her nursing her babies, relaxing on a favorite blanket, and lazing imperiously on one of her humans’ clean black shirts.

The photos and documents were shared by Brenda Wilson, the Bakersfield, Calif., woman who said her cat still hasn’t been returned to her after an Amazon driver took her several weeks ago.

Since the police say they’re investigating the alleged theft, releasing the documents seems like more of an exasperated act of receipt-producing after the delivery driver, Joshua Gonzalez, went public and said he was retrieving his own cat, not stealing Wilson’s.

You can practically hear Judge Judy snapping “Let’s see the receipts!” as she adjusts her glasses.

In Gonzalez’s version of events he serendipitously happened to discover his own missing cat sitting on the front step of a home that happened to be on his delivery route. At different times referring to the cat as “he,” “she” and “it,” Gonzalez said he’d adopted the feline for his seven-year-old daughter back in October of 2025, still hadn’t bestowed the cat with a name despite her living in his home for seven months, and he knows she’s his cat because she has a “distinct” M-pattern on her forehead.

Gonzalez could be telling the truth. There’s a nonzero chance of that. Truth really can be stranger than fiction. But his version of events stretches credulity to its breaking point.

Literally every tabby cat has the “M” pattern on their heads. It’s what makes them tabbies. He seems as confused about that as he is about Junie’s gender.

Then there’s the video: the entire sequence of events is captured on a Ring camera near Wilson’s front door. Gonzalez doesn’t react like a man who’s stunned to fortuitously stumble over his own missing cat, at an address his job took him to, no less. He doesn’t express shock or surprise, or seem to visibly react at all. He doesn’t even look at the cat. He delivers the package, logs it on his phone, then swoops the feline up in his arms and walks off with her.

If you’d just unexpectedly found your own cat, would you call out to her, extend a hand, and smile with relief when she pads up with a raised tail and happily brushes her cheek against it? Would you check her coat pattern and markings, then check again? When scooping her up, would you talk to her, maybe even plant a kiss on her head, and tell her how happy you are to find her? Would you look happy? Would you leave a note?

Most people would do at least some of those things. Gonzalez does none of them.

And while Wilson has produced date-and-time-stamped photos of Junie going back years, the only photo Gonzalez shared with a local news station was a smartphone snap from the other day showing Junie in his lap.

And that’s half the problem. Neither party would be going to the media and trying to litigate this in public if the police were motivated to take the alleged theft more seriously. That’s not entirely their fault, because in the vast majority of states, laws regarding animals haven’t been updated since the days, more than a century past, when they were written to settle farm and ranch disputes. There’s little guidance from the law, and fewer options. The law doesn’t recognize pets as conscious individuals with feelings, so courts don’t take into account the best interests of the animals either.

Wilson said she doesn’t want anything but the return of Junie. The police would save her family a lot of angst by making that happen. Unless Gonzalez starts producing some truly impressive evidence, familiarizes himself with the gender of the disputed feline and explains his behavior, it’s difficult to believe Junie belongs with anyone besides the Wilsons.

Woman From Viral Video Hit With Animal Cruelty Charges For Pouring Bleach On Cat Food

Lauren Carter admitted she poured bleach on cat food on two occasions in April, police say.

The video shows a woman stop her car, get out holding a bottle of what looks like bleach, and pour the substance onto food left for outdoor cats while a tabby looks on, sniffing curiously.

The footage was recorded by a family in Chester, Pa., a town of 32,000 about 25 miles southwest of Philadelpia. The cat, Jumper, belongs to a family on the same street.

The suspect’s name had been floating around on various cat-related social media sites along with the video for weeks, but police and prosecutors had to be sure of the facts before they arrested the woman.

When lab results showed the substance was indeed bleach, officers arrested 35-year-old Lauren Carter, also of Chester.

Cops and the SPCA’s law enforcement division say Carter admitted to pouring bleach on cat food on two occasions in April. It isn’t clear why Carter wanted to harm cats, and so far law enforcement hasn’t made any comments about her motivation.

They did, however, make sure local pets did not eat the poisoned food.

“We do believe based on our investigation that no animals did consume the food,” SPCA spokeswoman Gillian Kocher told KYW, a local news radio station. “Our officers went out through the area to make sure that no animals were sick or deceased, but it is, of course, our intention that this doesn’t happen again, and the animals in the neighborhood are kept safe.”

Carter has been charged with two counts of misdemeanor animal cruelty.

Olivia Oliver, Jumper’s caretaker, said she was satisfied with the outcome of the investigation and Carter’s confession.

“I think it’s enough. I think it’s a good sign; it’s a warning for her,” Oliver told WPVI, the Philadelphia-based ABC news affiliate. “And basically, I’m glad she’s going to pay for what she did. And hopefully nothing like this happens again around here.”

Another Amazon Driver Steals A Cat, This Time In California

Junie the cat is a friendly tabby who was taken by an Amazon driver delivering a package to her family’s home in Bakersfield.

First, please allow me to apologize for the light blogging this week. Allergies are absolutely killing me right now and apparently pollen counts are about as high as they get locally, according to weather sites.

I don’t usually get it this bad, but holy crap! I’m stuffed up, my eyes are watering and my head is pounding. Is it possible that one type of allergy can override another? If so, maybe I should grab Bud and take a deep huff. His reaction alone would be worth it.

“What the…what is the meaning of this, human?! Unhand me immediately, and apologize with those Friskies Natural yums that I like!”

Today we have another story about an Amazon driver taking a family’s cat after delivering a package to their home in Bakersfield, California.

The family’s home security cameras captured footage of the driver approaching the friendly cat named Junie on May 14 and driving off with her.

Amazon won’t name the driver and will only say that the company is cooperating with police, according to NBC affiliate KGET in Bakersfield.

So far Junie hasn’t been returned and Junie’s family has no answers.

I realize that Amazon is a massive company and that millions of deliveries go off without a hitch, but still. There are dozens of incidents involving drivers stealing cats that we know of, many more that preceded our efforts to track the ongoing problem, and the company has a reputation for being unhelpful in assisting customers when their drivers take off with pets. At what point does someone say “Hey guys, don’t steal cats and dogs from our customers”?

Likewise with the lack of protocols to deal with these situations and the company’s slow responses in situations where it’s critical to act as quickly as possible.

Local police are investigating while Junie’s family pleads for the return of their cat. As with several other families who have been in this position, they say they just want her back and won’t ask questions if she’s returned.

“They could just drop her off in the driveway, she knows what to do,” said Brenda Wilson, Junie’s caretaker. “She’ll come straight to the garage, get inside the house.”

PS – Please excuse this test: The Cat Guy is a no good, lousy, rotten content thief! (Wink wink!)

Update, 5:27 pm: I wanted to see if The Cat Guy was manually reposting my content or automatically scraping it. I’ve now confirmed the latter. There are few options for dealing with this, but we’ll see.