Editor’s Note: This is one part of a multi-part series by the author about animal welfare in the Big Bend. Search our website for related articles by the author.

 by Dallas Baxter, Staff Writer

The issue of feral cats is not one with an easy or immediate solution. Feral cats are the offspring of stray or abandoned household pets; raised without human contact, they have reverted to a wild state and formed colonies wherever food and shelter are available. You can see them at “cat time,” the twilight hours morning and evening when cats are active. Adults are usually small, the females almost continually with kittens, moving them frantically from place to place when they are discovered. 

The feral cats in Marathon gather around bar ditches, dumpsters and in tall vegetation where they might find mice or other small animals to eat. Many are sick and malnourished. Many of the kittens are sick with a variety of diseases exacerbated by dehydration and malnutrition, and will die before they reach many months of age.

The mother cats, sometimes sick themselves, will generate another litter, and the sad cycle continues. The Humane Society of the United States estimates that in seven years, one female cat and her offspring could theoretically produce 420,000 cats.
Jean Hardy, owner of Front Street Books who has lived in Marathon for over a decade, said that the feral cat issue is a serious problem. “There is no organization to deal with this problem, but individuals can’t do it alone,” Hardy said.

Hardy went on to say that while there were many compassionate people in town who fed the cats, that a lack of city government made it difficult to tackle the problem. “We have no city government to help us, no organization,” she said. Hardy sees the problem throughout the city but especially close to the highway where there tend to be more dumpsters.

Artist Mary Baxter, whose gallery is on the highway, has tried twice to rescue feral kittens only to find, after considerable vet bills, that they were too sick to save. “There is no animal control here,” Baxter said.

Carin Crane, animal control officer for the city of Alpine, said she will accept animals brought in, but only by law enforcement, and then she charges $15 to do so. The Alpine shelter does not accept owned animals from Marathon.

 “Some people feel [the cats] will take care of themselves,” said Carrie Branum, who, with her husband Mark Hannan, operates the Adobe Rose Bed and Breakfast, a block south of the highway. Branum said that while people are happy to feed the cats, she was never aware of an attempt to control the population by spay and neuter surgeries.

Baxter agreed that so far as she knew, there was no attempt to organize a shelter or a spay/neuter clinic in the town.

And while adoption might make a dent in the problem, Branum felt that the perception was that local cats aren’t healthy or good for adoptions. “Nobody wants a cat from town,” Branum said.
Branum sees many cats that come to the inn for food. “A lot of cats come to us for help.  Many are sick – I don’t know how long a cat lives here.”

Cat owners’ unwillingness or inability to have their cats neutered or spayed often results in homeowners feeding several generations of cats and kittens, even marveling at how many litters their single cat has had. “Public education is really important, Branum said. People feed them but don’t make an effort to ‘fix’ them.”

Throughout the town, the voiced frustration is evident – while many concede there is a problem, no single entity can handle it alone, and no one has stepped up to take charge or bring several parties together.

Jim Case, Sul Ross State University professor who was a founding member of the Alpine Humane Society twenty years ago, said that his organization would work with animals from Marathon. “We work through Alpine vets and the Terlingua vet to cover the entire county and a little bit beyond Brewster County, Case said. He cited $500 to $800 spent by the Alpine Humane Society on spay/neuter for animals in Terlingua last year. Case indicated that the Alpine Humane Society would be willing to fund medical attention for Marathon animals, including spay/neuter surgeries.

Marathon’s challenge to reduce the number of feral cats through spay/neuter and adoption and to provide a better life for those that remain in the wild is not theirs alone. Because many city and county animal control agencies are mandated only to deal with dogs – not cats – feral cats have remained untouchable for decades. Because there has been little effort to control the population and because the cats can reproduce so quickly, it is estimated that there are 70 million feral cats in the United States.
The issue of feral cats, their impact on society and on wildlife is an almost “no win” argument. A 2004 National Geographic article examined three approaches to the problem.

On one side is the American Bird Conservancy that believes the feral cat population is largely responsible for the destruction of millions of birds each year and even the decimation of some species. Their solution is to keep all cats indoors and to capture those that remain in the outside environment and move them to sanctuaries where they will be kept away from other animals and the general public, or to shelters where they will be euthanized.

This point of view is deemed impractical and absurd by Michael Mountain, one of the founders of Best Friends Animal Society in Kanab, Utah, who argues that cats are unfairly blamed for the decline in bird populations. Mountain says that it’s humans who have contributed to the decline of birds through habitat loss, pollution and pesticides and that birds kill themselves by flying into windows.

Mountain contends that since cats’ diets consists largely of mice, insects and lizards, that trying to kill off all the feral cats is not going to help the birds.

He holds up a report by the U.S. Forest Service’s Northeastern Research Station and the Smithsonian Conservation and Research Center that concludes that the biggest problem for the avian population is the loss of the birds’ winter habitat in the tropics due to deforestation.

And so a middle ground is sought – finding real solutions to controlling the feral cat population.

The first step on this so far is educating, urging and paying for people to spay and neuter their cats. Although it is pretty obviously, not a “quick fix,” it does slow down the spiraling number of cats born “wild.”

Julie Levy, a veterinarian and professor at the University of Florida College of Veterinary Medicine in Gainesville, has advocated reducing wild cat populations through the TNR, “trap, neuter, return.” method. In this program, whole colonies of cats are trapped, vaccinated, treated for parasites, sterilized by veterinarians. Homes are found for tameable kittens and healthy adults are returned outdoors.

Although many would argue that TNR programs simply release neutered cats into the wild and that they continue to kill wildlife, it is clear that this approach does reduce the number of cats in the wild and, quite probably, improves their health.  One study of Levy’s shows that released cats live for an average of 7 years after being neutered and returned.  That statistic is contingent upon a caregiver who continues to feed a colony of neutered feral cats so that they are fed and observed for disease and injury.

On another front, Levy is working on a sterilization vaccine for female and male cats. The vaccine would make TNR programs more efficient by helping reduce costs and labor.

The American Cat Fanciers Association (CFA) states that policies that advocate the elimination of unowned/feral cats through trapping and euthanasia have proven to be futile. And since existing food attraction and habitat, such as dumpsters, can rarely be changed, as cats are removed, more arrive to fill the niche.

In addition, trapping and killing makes the cats the “bad guys”, creating an adverse attitude toward cats. As many as 22% of American households are feeding ‘stray’ unowned cats, according to the CFA, and over 90% of these cats are not altered by those who feed them.

The CFA states that broad-based community efforts along with cooperation among veterinarians, shelter and animal organizations are necessary in order to tame and place cats and kittens in homes and education the public to prevent further abandonment.  Advocating the humane treatment of all cats, the association supports the concept of managed colonies as a viable means to protect cats and stabilize their populations.

“Feral/unowned cats are a fact of life,” said Laura Langham, manager of the Jeff Davis County Humane Society. Cats who come into the humane society’s care are spayed or neutered immediately so that there is no question that the animal will ever reproduce.

Marathon resident Hardy said that the appointment of a county animal control officer for Marathon could be the start of an organized effort to ease the plight of the feral cat population.
“Only then would an organized effort work,” Hardy said. “It would be nice – no it will be nice when it happens. Marathon is evolving, becoming a community willing to grapple with this problem and deal with it in a sane way,” Hardy said.

It may be thought that feral cats are bad, useless or at best untameable. But those who have tamed feral cats will tell you that this is not true.

When a cat is neutered or spayed, the desire to roam and fight is eliminated, and the cat is ready to bond with people. With patience and time and respect, even the wildest cat can become a friend and responsive companion.


Spay or neuter your cat.

Keep your cat indoors.

Put a collar and identification tag on your cat, so that in case your cat gets lost, she can be returned to you.

Spay or neuter your cat.

If you feed cats, plan to trap and neuter them, taking advantage of the Alpine Humane Society’s offer of free spay and neuter. Those wishing to arrange for the society to pay for a spay or neuter can call Marilyn Shotwell at 432.837.7214.

Remember that cats are natural hunters. Even well fed cats will hunt birds and other small animals. Supervise your cats when they are outside.

Never abandon cats – they cannot fend for themselves and quickly become desperate for food and often become ill. If you cannot find a home for a cat you can no longer keep, surrender it to an animal shelter or humane organization. Even if it is euthanized, a humane and quick death is better that one that comes at the end of illness and fear.

Support and obey leash and licensing laws in your town or county that levy higher licensing fees for cats that aren’t spayed or neutered.

Spay or neuter your cat.

Do not attract birds to your yard with feeders, water, birdbaths, etc.

Remember that pet ownership, like parenthood, is a lifetime commitment.  If you cannot honestly say that you will be with your pet for the rest of its life, do not adopt it.

And remember to spay or neuter your cat.


Alley Cat
Cat Fancier's Association, article on the program of "Trap, Test, Vaccinate, Alter, Release and Maintain" (TTVARM)
Animal Spirit photo essay
Feral Cats: Rescue, Care, and Rehabilitation


Dallas Baxter, finds her garden is the natural place for her interests in both design and theology to coincide. She has been a student of the Big Bend since arriving here five years ago. She can be contacted directly at: dallasbaxter@bigbendgazette.com.