Why "Do It for You" Doesn't Work

Over the past four years, as both an independent trapper and now as the director of my own 501c3 nonprofit animal welfare organization, I have spayed and neutered over 500 cats. I firmly believe sterilizing community cats is the only ethical and humane solution to the cat overpopulation crisis. Unfortunately, despite many success stories, including the well maintained colonies in the Ironbound section of Newark that I am responsible for, I have become increasingly disillusioned with the “trapper for hire” model of TNVR (trap-neuter-vaccinate-return). 

Here are just a few examples of common, real life scenarios that I have experienced when working with colony cat feeders. 

• A colony feeder in Newark feeds approximately 100 cats per day in various locations. They have received assistance over the past several years from a number of different trappers and TNR organizations. The feeder reaches out for help whenever new cats show up. They have been repeatedly asked to carry a trap in their vehicle, trap the newcomers and bring them to me to get fixed. The feeder says they do not have time for it because they are too busy feeding. They are waiting for someone else to come do it. The cats continue to multiply.

• A feeder in Woodland Park was assisted with about a dozen cats she was feeding behind an apartment complex near her home. Two years later, new cats arrived and she posted online asking for help again with the new cats. The usual excuses are offered - she doesn’t have time to trap due to work and family obligations. She waits for help to arrive while the cats multiply. 

• In Glen Ridge, a woman has been feeding one intact male for over a year. The cat repeatedly shows up with wounds. She reached out to local organizations and animal control. No one gets back to her. Eventually, her information gets passed around to me. I spend over an hour trying to trap the cat to no avail. In an effort to get the cat, I loan her a trap. I demonstrated how to use it and offered my advice on trap training. Four months later, she still hasn’t trapped the cat and is asking who she can call for help. The cat remains injured. 

In all these cases, the common theme is waiting for someone else to come take care of the problem. Unfortunately, there are disproportionately more feeders than there are volunteer trappers.

Despite the best of intentions, trappers and rescuers are doing a disservice to community cats everywhere when they enable the “do it for you” mentality.

It’s okay to help. I’ve done it for years. However, it’s unrealistic to expect that the help will be all encompassing and never ending. As the saying goes, “Give a man a fish and you feed him for a day; teach a man to fish and you feed him for a lifetime.” As long as the onus of trapping and fixing the cats falls on the shoulders of a small, underresourced, unpaid group of volunteers, cats will continue to breed, get sick and injured, and die in our communities. We simply cannot do it alone.

All across New Jersey, hundreds of thousands of cats are proliferating our city’s streets, backyards, apartment complexes, and both industrial and commercial properties. There are no longer any areas without a “cat problem”. Spaying and neutering community cats can no longer be treated as optional. Without strict enforcement of existing laws on the books and the passing of new laws to hold feeders and property owners responsible, no amount of TNR assistance from do-gooders and trappers will come close to solving the cat overpopulation crisis. 

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 Liz Farkas is founder and director of Ironbound Cats, a 501c3 nonprofit organization dedicated to keeping cats in their loving homes where they belong through increased access to low cost spay neuter and pet food resources.

A fixed colony cat retrapped by a colony caretaker to treat his injuries.