How to Work With Your Neighbors

Do you feed a group of community cats? Do you have a neighbor who may not be as excited about having community cats in their yard as you are? It can be a common occurrence on how to figure out How to Work With Your Neighbors and   you may have to put in a little extra time with them to be accepting of the practice. There are many ways to work with these folks in finding a peaceful solution for all, I assure you! This week, I’ll be going over a few tips and and tricks, which will hopefully work for everyone in your little corner of the world.

How to Work With Your Neighbors

1. Promote Sterilization

Make sure that all of the cats in the colony are spayed/neutered.  Unsterilized cats will fight a lot more and become a nuisance day and night in the neighborhood. Understandably, this may upset some neighbors and have them working against you. With all of our colonies, we need to strive for 100% sterilization, but in these sensitive areas we need to especially focus on high-end colony management. With active colony management, the size of the colony will decrease quickly and the concerned neighbor will see the results of the shrinking population.

2. Listen

As frustrating as it may be at times, listen to what your neighbors have to say and try your best to understand where they are coming from. Even if you don’t agree with them, work to see if a middle ground can be reached. Let them know that you hear what they are saying and would like to work together to see if there is a way that a happy solution can be found for everyone. Always, always, always, don’t become aggressive!

3. Invest in Gadgets 

There are many gadgets for your yard and garden that can be used to prevent cats from being in someone else’s back yard by mistake. Consider investing in things like motion sensitive sprayers, scent repellents and ultra sonic devises.  Our friends at Neighborhood Cats have put together a great listing of options on their website that may be significantly helpful in your neighborhood. Just remember, you are going to have to work on investing in and setting up the equipment, but if it means healthy neighbor relations, it will be worth every penny!

4.  Protect the Cars

Don’t forget, it may not just be issues your neighbors are having with cats in their yard and gardens. It may revolve around their car! Many people don’t like cats on or around cars and find it difficult to be around neighborhood cats because of not knowing just where they might pop up. We have had several situations where we bought car covers for neighbors and that helped keep the peace in the neighborhood and was much appreciated. What a quick and easy way to avoid conflict!

5. Provide Education

Many people don’t understand that if cats are removed from a colony, there is a high probability that new cats will move into the territory instead! This will cause a never-ending cycle of conflict between neighbors that are trying to rid the area of community cats, but unfortunately, they don’t understand how a colony may work. This is the time for you to step up and stress that the current cats are going to prevent more cats from moving in, potentially causing more problems. Invite neighbors over for information sessions, or send out information to them and ask them to read it. By keeping the current colony in check, it will ultimately help to prevent more cats and kittens from entering the area.

In my personal experience, once 100% of the cat colony was sterilized, neighbors, who in the past had be ardent complainers about the cats, now were believers in the benefits of a managed colony.  In most cases these folks became active supporters and helped manage the colony with me. So have hope! It can be done, but may take a patience and understanding on your part to help your neighbors feel more comfortable with the practice.

Please take the time to work together to help the cats in your community.