1. Leave canned cat food and fresh water outside your back door. If possible, leave something that has your smell on it—a blanket, towel, etc, outside. If your cat is near your home this will anchor him/her to the area. Also, leave a light on at night.
2. MOST IMPORTANT: Make up flyers with your cat’s picture, using a font large enough to read from a passing car, and immediately blanket the neighborhood with them. Start close to home; then, distribute them in an ever-widening radius, dozens of them. Post them where people will see them from their cars when stopped, or out walking. Print them on bright, eye-catching paper. Go door-to-door and talk to as many neighbors as possible, enlisting their help. Also (very important) drop them at people’s doors or mailboxes. Typically cats do not wander far, but "hunker down" until they feel it is safe to move (usually at night). Your cat could very well be at a neighbor’s house a few doors down the street and your neighbor could be feeding him/her, unaware that he is lost! If you do this and someone contacts you and says they’ve seen him, ask if you can put food in their backyard to anchor him to that location. Then hang out and call your cat’s name—your cat won’t wander if he/she has food and feels safe.
3. Drive around your neighborhood at night and call for him. Lost pets will hide during the day. They may even recognize the sound of your car.
4. Please contact your local animal shelter and file a missing cat report; you may have to do this is in person. There is a list of local animal shelters on our Resources page.
5. Talk to your neighbors, and especially children! Children are often outdoors and ride their bikes around, and thus know what's going on in the neighborhood. They are often the first ones to notice a newcomer.

In one case, a cat companion followed these suggestions and found their cat 4 weeks later—a neighbor down the street had been feeding their cat, and didn't know he was lost. Another family had lost their cat, and found it by walking the neighborhood at night while calling its name. Don’t give up too quickly!

Good luck!

You should always charge a sufficient fee for the adoption to ensure that the potential adopter is serious and is likely able to provide medical care for the cat. This call screening guide can help you to interview and assess potential adopters. Always keep in mind that you must be able to sleep at night with whatever adoption decision you make, so don’t ignore any nagging doubts you might have about a potential adopter.

Although we do not charge for a community listing, we would always welcome a donation to help us continue our rescue work.

Adoption fair attendance information is often not finalized until a few days before the fair, so please check back just before a weekend fair.

An adjunct part of a TNR program is feeding and monitoring the colony. By providing food and water on a regular schedule, the cats remain anchored to the area and will appear at the regular feeding time so that a caregiver can see if there are any symptoms of illness or injury that would require intervention.

Please contact us if would like to find out more about using a TNR program for a colony of cats near where you live. We can always use more volunteer feeders and trappers! You can see what is involved by reading our trapping instructions.

Other organizations that rent/loan traps for short periods:

• Palo Alto Animal Services. They require a $75 deposit and the rent is $15 for the first three days and $5/day for each additional day. Call ahead to ensure they have traps available.
• Palo Alto Humane Society. They require a $50 deposit.

If you expect to be trapping often enough to own your own trap, our members use Tru-Catch and Tomahawk traps, depending on personal preference. Please visit their respective web sites for purchasing information. Our volunteers also recommend Animal Care Equipment & Service for a full range of cat handling equipment.

For especially trap-wise cats it may be necessary to use a Drop Trap (known to our trappers as the "Magic Trap" for its high rate of success). Please contact us to find out about the availability of a drop trap. These traps are not commercially available and require a team of a least two trappers to use. You may of course, build your own drop trap.

If you are new to trapping and wish to protect your hands, you can find heavy gloves that fit ladies hands for $10-$15 at MADCO (Welding Supplies) at 1988 Old Middlefield Way, Mountain View. (650) 969-2323. Other animal handling gloves are available through Animal Care Equipment & Service.

Vouchers are accepted at the following veterinary clinics. If the clinic has a web site you may click on its name. Click on a clinic’s address to get a map or driving directions. Some clinics may charge a small additional fee in addition to the voucher for the spay/neuter surgery.

There are probably colonies of homeless cats near where you live. With luck someone is already feeding them and you could share the work to help out the other feeders. Please contact us so we can put you on the schedule and help organize a backup if occasionally you cannot feed.

Please take a look at these feeding guidelines.