When I first started talking to Kim a few months ago about all of the cats she was seeing in her colony and neighborhood of Avondale, I was determined to help her mostly because of a cat named Big Daddy. Her Big Daddy Colony is named after him to honor his memory.

Big Daddy was a colony cat that kept coming back to her yard the past two years, looking worse each time. He evaded all of her trapping efforts, and in the meantime she TNR’d 22 other cats.

Big Daddy would only come to visit Kim’s yard to feed sporadically. He was clearly sick, but still surviving. 

Some of the following photos may be upsetting to see.

Joann helped Kim trap at the end of May and they trapped a lot of cats. In the meantime, they also trapped Big Daddy. We think that at this point he was so sick that he went into the trap because he knew he needed to. Big Daddy was dying. 

Despite all of that they could not get near him. He was only safe to handle once he was in the trap. Kim took him straight to Roscoe Village Animal Hospital. They have been amazing. They are close to us, open seven days a week, will treat cats in traps, and we can normally get an appointment the day we call. This is all invaluable to us colony cat caregivers providing care for feral cats in traps. The low-cost clinics can only do so much. These colony cats need full service vet care.

But this vet care is expensive. Big Daddy’s total vet bill was $341. If you’d like to make a donation towards his care, you can do so through the Paypal donation link at the top of this page, or directly through paypal.com with [email protected]

Big Daddy had to be sedated for an exam because even though he was weak, he was still feral.

He was first tested for FIV/FeLV and tested negative. We were all very surprised. They then thought he may have been coming down with pneumonia. He was underweight and very sick. A few days before he allowed himself to be trapped, Kim found him in her garden defecating on himself, but not allowing her to come near him. His body seemed to be shutting down. Any treatment would involve more tests, and most likely extensive recovery in a crate indoors. That would be very stressful for him, and the outcome was completely unknown and could not be guaranteed. They decided to humanely euthanize him instead.

RIP, Big Daddy. You were loved. We are so thankful to Kim for caring for you while you visited her garden, and letting her help you in the end. You deserved a dignified death at the end of your hard life.

We think Maribella is the mama cat to at least some of the kittens being fostered from the Avondale TNR Project.

In true mama cat-like fashion, she’s been very hard to trap. George, the feeder there, will not stop feeding, so that doesn’t help either. In fact, there’s been a lot of things happening here that have thwarted our efforts and things escalated last week, including involving the police, angry neighbors, and more dead cats, but I’ll be writing about each in separate posts. It’s hard to wrap my mind around it otherwise.

So, since traditional Tru-catch traps weren’t working because the cats are being fed no matter what, Joann spent a few days last week using a drop trap in Ray’s courtyard. We’ve been trapping there behind the gate so that we can stay out of George’s way.

This is what it looks like.

The cats were quite interested in the trap.

This one was even playing with the string.

You can see that those cats are ear-tipped. But finally the tabby mama cat went in after two days of trying. Joann transferred Maribella from the drop trap into the Tru-catch trap.

Maribella is now currently at PAWS Chicago for her TNR treatment. She is the 21st cat we trapped so far at this project, all almost within the same alley.

Cats #19 and #20 trapped from the Avondale TNR Project ended up belonging to a neighbor that lets all of their pet cats outside.

Panther was trapped last week and taken to PAWS where she received their TNR package, including spay surgery, ear tipping, microchip, vaccinations, and parasite treatments.

She was also acting friendly in the trap. We’ve been talking to neighbors all around there and Joann figured out who she belonged to. They said they have four other cats they let outside, and Panther was their only intact cat. They gave descriptions of their other cats, but there are so many cats outside in this neighborhood it is hard to keep track. The ear tip is the only universal sure sign that we know that the cat is already fixed. We’ve trapped several ear tipped cats in this project, and as long as they look healthy, we let them out immediately again in the same place they were trapped.

Joann talked to them about cat behavior, keeping their cats inside, registering the microchip in their name, and continued vet care. They were happy to have Panther returned to them.

Thursday night she trapped another cat, and took him to Anti-Cruelty Society for their TNR package.

Hamlin was already neutered, but he received updated vaccinations, microchip, and an ear tip. Because he was already neutered, we thought maybe he was from the same house as Panther. Joann talked to them, and turned out he was, and they wanted him back. They’re going to register the microchip in their name.

At least now these cats are ear tipped so if they are going to get trapped again, they will be let out immediately long as they are not sick or injured.

Ivan is the second cat that has died since we started the Avondale TNR Project. With every TNR project of this size – here we are talking about estimates of 50 cats within three blocks – there are always inevitably sad endings along with the happy ones.

Ivan was trapped and taken to the clinic on May 31st for his TNR treatment. He was feral and his surgery went without a hitch. He was returned back outside to the colony after recovery without a problem, along with a few other TNR’d adult feral cats. They are all healthy, even tested FIV-/FeLV-, and have lots of feeders and garages for shelter. 

The next photos may be upsetting to people, so consider this a warning.

Last weekend Joann got a call from George, the feeder who is trying to stop us from trapping, to say he found a dead cat in the alley. He was furious, and most likely blames us for killing this cat. He also texted Erica from PAWS this photo of Ivan’s dead body, without an explanation. Can you imagine? George also then called Erica and screamed at her for twenty minutes about us and the cats. She has been trying to help him for the past few years now with TNR. We wish we could get him to listen to us, but at this point there is no time or reasoning with him. We want to concentrate on helping the cats as much as possible with the time we have. The only good thing is that at least he called to tell us. Even when the outcome is tragic, it is better to know what happened, rather than just having a cat disappear. When Joann talked to George and other residents, they said someone already threw out his body. Joann and Kim searched the alley and found his body in this dumpster, right near where we’ve been trapping this past month.

This is not the proper way to dispose of an animal’s dead body. Also, they wanted to make sure to scan him for a microchip so that we were absolutely sure that this was Ivan.

Joann took him to MedVet Chicago. They scanned him for his microchip, and examined him. They did not find any signs of trauma or broken bones. They found his mouth was clenched shut and full of blood. They thought he may have died of rat poisoning, but said they could not tell for sure without a necropsy, which costs $900 there. They then disposed of him free of charge. We are very grateful for their help and compassion in this matter.

Ivan also may have died from trauma from being hit by a car. I have found other cats like this, and so have other trappers. Cats get a glancing blow to the head or body, and then die a day or two later from internal bleeding. Yes, a necropsy is needed to know for sure.

RIP, Ivan. We wished we could’ve helped you sooner, but we know you are free of pain now. We will keep trying to help the rest of the cats in this area with TNR.