Lady you don’t know me or my cat, I have sacrificed large amounts of money (i guess i should probably have thousands saved up to deal with a congenital defect nobody could’ve known about) to be sure he was 100% healthy when unexpected health issues came up , he is currently and always up to date on all of his shots and paperwork, microchipped, collared 20 times over cause he keeps losing the damn things and i keep replacing them, never without food or a pristine litterbox, and actually begs relentlessly to go outside, not the other way around.

But you’re right, I guess. I’m so terrible to this guy. I’ll let him know when he wakes up from the nap he’s taking on my lap right now. Maybe I could give him to a shelter where they’ll destroy him in a week.

But honestly, you can’t be mad at anybody for cat dander going from one house to another, which by the way i’ve never heard of. What’s the solution there, ask the neighbors to keep their windows closed all the time instead? Nobody wins.

I NEVER trained my cats to use a litter box, they take to the consistency of the litter naturally.
You’re fooling yourself. There’s very little “training” one can do with a domesticated cat. Unlike dogs, they don’t aim to please you.

Gotta tell ya though, from what you’ve said about your cat in here, he’s an outdoor cat tragedy just waiting to happen. That cat has no business being outdoors on his own, and you have no business owning a cat.

You drastically underestimate a cat’s ability to fend for themselves. Mine hides under the bed when the street sweeper is 2 blocks away. When something scares him outside, he runs home, from one of the two yards he has access to. Trust me, if he could go further, he would have a long time ago.

And I would seriously like to see “something” get access to him in a two yard complex with a 7 foot fence and no trees. Last time I checked foxes and coyotes can’t fly.

You’re not animal control, you had zero right or responsibility to take that animal in. And 99.99999 percent of the time, that animal would have gone home if you would’ve never touched it.

Don’t underestimate your cat’s capabilities. He can probably gain access to much more ground than you give him credit for. Just because he has yet to do so doesn’t mean that he can’t if he should ever decide to. Cats can climb fences. They can jump pretty damned high when they want to too. Dogs can dig under fences pretty well also. Especially if there’s a tasty cat on the other side.

That having been said, I don’t know where you live. It may be quite safe for you to let your cat out. Others may be in more congested areas than you may be.
You are still responsible for your cat’s safety. If you cared about that aspect of pet ownership, you’d think about it.
I mean, a cat so skittish that it will run for home has little chance of defending itself if it’s caught by something on its way back, does it?

This ain’t rocket surgery, my friend. Your cat’s life is in your hands. Make wise choices.

Cathy said “when i looked through the fence,I saw a terrified cat running for its life, followed by my neighbor’s dog.”

That means the dog was fenced in!

My feelings on the matter are that ALL pet owners should be responsible for their pets.
A dog owner can fence his dog inside his yard. Cats can easily climb fences, so, in my humble opinion, cat owners need to exercise a greater degree of diligence over their pets to ensure their safety outdoors.

Lots of cat owners here have expressed their concern for their cats’ freedom, very few have voiced much concern about their safety.

Isn’t that odd?

A dog owner can keep his dog fenced in, but he cannot stop a free-ranging cat from climbing his fence and getting a severe case of dead.