10/04/2025
Lincoln celebrating his birthday - see pics in comments!
Yesterday a post was sent to us that was put on an Aurora page about a cat with a wound on his head. We do come out to trap during winter for sick or injured cats, but our regular TNR operations are shut down during Winter. Yesterday on my lunch break I was able to drop trap this fellow. I noticed he had an ear tip when I saw him on the porch steps when I got to the site. It had been a long time since we had done any TNR in that area so I was curious about this fellow. When I got him back to the garage shelter I applied Revolution which is our standard practice. The wound behind his ear was from scratching himself likely due to ear mites which the Revolution would take care of. There was no sign of infection so he will heal up just fine. We have a special AVID wand microchip scanner that allows us to scan cats in a trap for a microchip through the forks of a trap divider. His microchip number came up and I searched our records. So who is this fellow? This is Lincoln. I trapped him 7 1/2 years ago on N. Root St. His caretaker fed and sheltered him on a porch of a house where she rented the bottom floor apartment. She moved away about 4 years ago and notified me. Unfortunately with Aurora not having a TNR law, which would include having registered colony cat caretakers (colony managers), and with feeding even fixed cats being illegal as a result of not having even a TNR friendly law, when someone moves they often cannot find a neighbor to agree to continue to take care of fixed colony cats.
At the time I originally trapped and had Lincoln fixed I was an individual TNR person (I did not have an organization). I started doing TNR in Aurora because while living in Aurora I came across a neighborhood by my townhome that was full of feral cats and after doing some research discovered that the second largest city in Illinois (Aurora) did not have a dedicated Trap-Neuter-Return group. Something just felt wrong about that. This was also just over 2 years after the economy downturn in 2008 and in that same neighborhood I was also seeing friendly abandoned cats (abandonment happens more often during economic downturns) who had been outdoors for at least 2 years and they were some of the sickest cats I had ever seen. I spent a lot of money trying to save as many abandoned cats as I could those first few years but a lot were too sick to save. So there were overpopulated feral colonies and sick abandoned friendly cats and no dedicated non-profit resource for the outdoor cats. I had to do something and thanks to the amazing Feral Fixers who lent me space in their weekly clinic transports and even their vet if I asked, despite having their hands more than full handling all of DuPage County, for the first 4 years I was able to do TNR in Aurora without having to plan clinic transports and coordinate transport volunteers which is a huge effort, which I did not have the time to do having a toddler and a full-time job. And also thanks to Feral Fixers and them always using best practices in TNR which includes microchipping I was able to identify this fellow who I trapped yesterday, for a second time in his lifetime.
Now how he survived 7 1/2 years outdoors, well that is a testament to him! It is also a testament to the good people of Aurora who I always say are so kind to the outdoor cats and look out for them. And they make our job much easier when it comes to helping us with TNR work in their neighborhoods.
Meeting Lincoln again yesterday made my day. And guess what else made my day? He has become friendly and his caretakers for the last year are welcoming him into to their home to be a part of their family. They love him, and learning how long he has survived outdoors has made him even more special to them. Thank you Maggie and Mom!
They will not have to wait long to be reunited because there was a dental cancellation at our amazing vet Oswego Animal Hospital on Monday so we are getting his teeth checked for any broken teeth that would need to be extracted since he was outdoors so long and probably got in a few fights, as well as a dental cleaning since he is about 8 1/2 years old and for sure should get a cleaning.
I talked a little in this post about how I got started with TNR and cat rescue, and my gratefulness to Feral Fixers. I am most thankful for my husband. At any point he could have said ok, no more licensed cat shelter at our house and no more cat shenanigans for our family, and well none of our work would have happened or would still be happening in Aurora and the Fox Valley area.
Heather Abraham
President
