My 5 year old male does not like men and loves most women. He follows me everywhere but is sort of afraid of my fiance (and for no good reason as my three females adore him) My 3 year old female who still thinks she is a kitten LOVES most males. She adores my fiance (is a very timid cat and hates to be picked up and held. She will let him pick her up and hold her like a baby in his arms and scratch her belly. She gets this blissful look on her face when he does this. She will not let anyone else do this- if I try to pick her up she will scratch and struggle to be put down. She also loves my best guy friend who used to stay at our house one night a week. If she hears his voice on the answering machine she runs around the house looking for him. She doesn't hate women but she definately prefers men for some reason. My five year old female hates kids. She will growl if she hears one playing outside. I've never heard her growl at anything or anyone else other than children.

Let me think... We are all volunteers, and it seems like there are quite a few of us in Tampa Let me search for some info I volunteer once a month at the event called SpayDay. The whole event is run by volunteers: vets, vets techs, etc. People rent out traps, trap cats in their yards, etc - price is between 25 and 10, depending on grants available. If no grants are available, it is 25. http://www.spayday.actampa.org/ Here is some info on FCP at HSTB http://dogood.tampabay.com/nonprofits/humane-society-of-tampa-b-ay/programs/feral-cat-program Even more good info on HSTB program http://www.humanesocietytampa.org/spay-neuter/feral-free-roaming-cats/ It all boils down to people, however, willing to take their time, spend a bit of money and get cats they feed fixed. I routinely get emails/calls from people asking for help to do TNR - especially now, as in Florida, kitten season is coming up. My friend and I often help trap. We recover the cats for one or two days and release them back. My friend maintains 4 colonies - she feeds and waters every day, about 50-60 cats. All fixed, and a new cat that shows up get S/N At 10 per cat, as it is right now, it is not too hard to do TNR financially. People donate, and whenever we are tight on money (my friend and I), HSTB helps out - they allocate donations for feral cats to help out trappers who do a lot of trapping (we did 12 last weekend!) The most knowledgeable person is Frank Hamilton - he is a retired economics professor, who now runs ACT clinic with his wife. Wealth of info - he goes to different feral cat conferences, knows all the literature there is to read about it...If anyone needs more info, I can get you his email address OR, you can contact ACT clinic, ATTN: Frank Hamilton http://www.actampa.org/

Laurief, our calico, Paisley, also lived to be 23! It was a grand old age! Cheers to our old timers! All my cats, but two, have lived into their 20s. Of the three 20+ year olds, 2 were female and one male. The females lived to 23 and 21/22 and the male died at 20/21. (The reason for the uncertainty of ages, was because my vets at the time recorded each of their patient's birthdays as Jan 1st of whatever year they were born. No idea why they did this, but it resulted in a discrepancy between my records and those of my vet.) One who did not make it to 20, was a female, and she died of internal injuries at age 10. (RIP Johanna. We think she was struck by a horse's hoof). My other cat who did not see his 20th birthday was the Siamese male who was my pet as a kid. He passed away at 17. I forgot to mention that my current cat, also a female, will reach the 20 year mark this June. With good care your thirteen old kitty may have some years ahead of her, despite the health challenges she has faced. The stroke probably only used up one of her 9 lives, and left her with 8 more! This post was edited by spedigrees on Wed, Feb 27, 13 at 17:46

I owned a female dog seven years old that had never been spayded. Why did I wait so long? well, she was a purebred and i had this "fantasy" that I might breed her and sell the puppies. One night,when she was in heat, I was walking her on a leash and she got loose. I ran all over the neighborhood, flagging down cars. "Did you see a little white dog...?" I finally found her about a mile away. I knew she ran because she was seeking sex. That taught me, no matter how careful the owner is, a pet can have difficulty resisting the call of nature. I got her spayed shortly after that experience, and never had any more problems with her running away. She had a long healthy life. I know from experience with many pet, dogs and cats of both sexes, that you have to be extremely watchful ,even of "indoor" pets. Anything can happen in the blink of an eye.