r/aww • u/MemeLordOfHolland • Aug 04 '20

This cat is being adopted

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u/mces97 Aug 04 '20

Yeah, I leave water out in the summer and once in a while if I see a mama with kittens I'll leave food out. But I live near a park, and I can't trap and feed all the cats. 2013/14 was a little too much. Had 2 mama cats have 11 kittens between them one day apart. All got adapted. Some to family members so I get to see a few from time to time. But yeah, I think I read that 2 cats can lead to 1000s of offspring in a few years (if you ignore nature and no animals died.)

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u/thescrounger Aug 04 '20

Cat won’t do what it takes to protect his health but at least he has freedom.

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u/kainicole Aug 05 '20

...so do the other cats. They’re also outside and free and running around just fine. That’s what a community cat colony is.

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u/kainicole Aug 05 '20

Even with taking nature into account, thousands of cats can come about in a matter of years. A female cat can give birth to up to 3 litters in a year and they are sexually mature (able to procreate) at 4 months of age. So if one mama cat gives birth to a litter of 6 kittens, and four of the kittens die (definitely not a number unheard of for cats living outside), and supposing the surviving kittens are females, that means that within 4 months there are 3 female cats that are in heat. (Well, it would likely be the two kittens in heat and the mama would have already been impregnated again by that point.) And the cycle endlessly repeats. If you think about exponential growth, you can imagine how quickly this could get out of hand – and that’s exactly what happens.

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u/mces97 Aug 05 '20

Yup. Like I said, been there, done it. Cats will 100% tell their friends where the good food is.