I am after some advice and would be grateful for your input or anyone who has been in a similar situation. This is rather long winded so please bear with me as I think you need the whole picture.
Meet Garfield, this is him currently curled up safe and warm on our sofa.
He is not our cat, however his owner has seemingly abandoned him. Let me tell you his story. Garfield (we didn't know his name at this point) has been coming over our way for years and is a friendly cat who wouldn't hurt a fly because he is so laid back. I have never seen him raise a paw to another cat even when they scream at him. He loves attention and purrs his head off very loudly when he is stroked (when I say loud I mean very loud and I have never heard any cat like him). Something changed a couple of years ago and has kept spending more and more time around here including sleeping rough in the garden under the bushes. What particularly worried me was that he would cower from us when we first reached out our hand to pet him so was someone hitting him? We tried to find out who his owner was but gave up in the end. Things continued and he followed me around the garden when I was working in it, if I was under the car he was there with me. One day I was under the car fitting a new exhaust and lying a big sheet of cardboard. I reached out for a spanner only to snatch my hand back quickly when it disappeared into a load of fur. I quickly turned over and there he was lying next to me. I didn't even hear or see him coming!! Another case of that stealth cat thing that they do.
Last winter we started to get concerned as he seemed to be here all of the time and was here at 5am when the wife was getting ready for work. By Christmas his coat which is not that long but it isn't anywhere near as short as my two cats coats are, was in a bad state with matted bits everywhere and he couldn't clean himself properly. We took him in on Christmas day to see if he would settle and he spent most of the day with us and had some turkey and proper cat food. Same thing on Boxing day. In the meantime I had come across our slicker brush which we had from back when we had a house bunny. Not knowing how he would respond to brushing I got the wife to stroke his head while I gently started to tease out the matting. I needn't have worried because as it turned out he actually loves being brushed and it fire up the purr monster within him again. I got all of the matting out of his back and sides a lot of which had formed around those damn sticky ball seed things (our houses back onto fields). His belly wasn't too bad and he wouldn't let me touch it anyway. We still didn't know his name but we all called him drooly cat around here as he dools a lot due to not having many teeth. I Had a knock on the door on Boxing day evening and it was my cat loving neighbour from next door who through a friend of a friend had tracked down where he lives. I put on my boots and big coat and picked Garfield up and carried him home (the next couple of streest over from us) and he lay down on one arm while being stroked by the other. I knocked on the door to be met with a scruffy drunk chap who just said "what do you want"? Charming. I said is this your cat to which he called his wife and said "your bloody cat's here". She came and said Garfield where have you been. I explained that he had been coming over our way for years and had started spending more and more time over there including overnight. She said that he hadn't been home for several days and he only stops off for something to eat then disappears again.
Now I don't know about you guys but if either of my cats are out longer than their usual times I go into full on panic mode and go out searching. I even cancelled my honeymoon because my youngest cat, Abby went missing while my neighbour was cat sitting them. She told me the Sunday evening (we got married Saturday morning) and we dropped everything and drove the 720 miles from Cornwall to here overnight only to find her within 15 minutes of getting home and starting my search!! Anyway, I digress, back to Garfield.
It turns out he is called Garfield and is 15 years old. His owner explained to me that she has 3 young children and a dog and thinks that he doesn't like the noise. She also told me that he doesn't like staying in, is not really a people cat and doesn't like being stroked. All of this time he was still lying on my arm with the other hand stroking him and hw was purring his head off. This didn't sit right with me especially as he has spent the last two days in with us being brushed and generally spoilt. He was her cat though so I handed him over and gave her my name, address and mobile number. Next morning he was around again but we were off out so didn't take him in. We came back in the evening and no Garfield so we hoped that he went home. He was briefly in the garden the next couple of days but we didn't see much of him. A couple of days later I got a phonecall from his owner asking if I had seen him to which I replied not for a while. It was snowing outside so I turned on the outside floodlight, grabbed my torch and went to look for him only to find him curled up and shivering under one of our bushes so I picked him up and took him home again. I took him home several more times over the next few weeks after recieving texts from his owner asking if I had seen him. March came around and there was a knock on the door. It was his owner looking for Garfield and about bloody time too. I took her into the garden and pointed out the places he sleeps and said that she could come around anytime she likes to look for him. She did for another couple of times then at the end of March there was a knock on the door again. It was his owner and she explained to me that they were going away on holiday for two weeks as they have just found out that she is pregnant again (how the hell anybody could give her a portion once to get her pregnant let alone four times is beyond me!!) and asked if I would mind feeding him when they are away and that she would pop around with the food before she goes. First thought I had was why not put him in a cattery but didn't ask her and instead said that I would. Needless to say the food never materialised and off they went. I didn't mind feeding him as he is gorgeous and such a affectionate chap. He was still sleeping rough but at least it was warming up by now.
Two weeks came and went then another and another and no sign of his owner. Garfields coat was starting to get matted again so I gave him another brush. One of my other neighbours found out that the mother of his owner lives on the other side of the estate and is the local Cats Protection lady. We went around to her and explained what had been going on. She said that her daughter (garfields owner) had been going through a rough time. Her husband lost his job again last year and was drinking heavily (about the time that Garfield started cowering from anyone reaching out a hand to pet him) and now she is pregnant again which was unplanned. She said he has a loving home with her daughter but that the children are noisy and pull his tail which he doesn't like. She asked us to pass on to our neighbours could everyone stop feeding him and petting him and he will go home. I agreed even though this was a load of bull because he had been coming around long before we were asked to feed him. Of course this didn't work and he was still spending most of his time over our way. My neighbour went around to see the mother to see if she would get Cats Protection to rehome Garfield. The mother gave her a load of abuse stating that he already has a loving home. A couple of days later Garfield had a bloody nose and blood in the corner of his mouth. I looked him over and he had a cut nose that I gently cleaned up and looked in his mouth to see he had cracked one of his fangs in half. I phoned his owner only to go straight to voicemail. I left a message to which I still didn't have a reply a couple of hours later. I sent a couple of texts to which I also got no reply. I took Garfield around to the mother and explained how I had found him to which she thanked me and said she would take him to the vets. That was pretty much the last contact I had with that family.
Since then Garfield has still been staying over our way. My neighbour who also has two cats of her own has a spare shed so rather than have Garfield sleeping rough I gave her a spare bed to put in there for him and he know sleeps in there at night. During the day if it was nice he would be in our or our neighbours garden, in her shed if it was raining. We take turns feeding him and both put out fresh water for him that gets changed several times a day. In all this time there has been no contact from his owner and she has not been looking for him, in other words she couldn't give a damn. Well I do. Garfield has gotten under my skin and with the very cold days and nights we have been having it has been breaking my heart seeing him outside so my wife and I mad a decision and started letting him in two weeks ago. He now spends all day with us and is in for around 14 hours a day getting spoiled. His coat is in a much better condition but I still need to do his underside for which I have ordered a couple of dematting brushes. He looks so different that my neighbour was at the owners mothers last week and she didn't even recognise him and had to be told it was Garfield. We can't get him to settle at night though so he is still sleeping in next doors shed. We are trying every night and thought we succeeded last night until he wanted out again. It's too cold now for him to be out, it was minus 5 last night and I worry about him. We will keep trying.
We are probably on dodgy ground with regards to garfield. We don't actually own him so don't know when his booster is due. I have been worming and spot on flea him but I imagine that if he should require attention from the vet that they won't do anything on my say so as we are not the actual owners. So what should I do. Do I confront the owner and try to see if she would sign him over to me or carry on like this bearing in mind he will need his booster at some point? I just don't know as I have never been in this situation before. We love him to bits and he is a gorgeous cat. He has a loving, safe home here (during the day anyway) and to be honest he is so much better off with us. Even our cats are ok with him. Abby our youngest gives him a hiss but that come down from the full on orchestra that she used to perform. Jade, our eldest get's on with him fine. So what should I do?
