Eco Hvar

Cat Feeding Stations

Published in About Animals

We are delighted to see our cat feeders being put to good use! The initiative is developing slowly but surely.

Cat Feeding Stations

We welcome: 1) suggestions as to where cat feeding stations are needed and

2) volunteers who will guarantee to look after the feeders, keeping them clean and provided with (high quality) dry food and water.

The system cannot work unless there are people nearby who are willing to take responsibility for the feeders in different areas.

Eco Hvar of course will do as much as we can to help supply the necessary foodstuff and in any other way that we can .

The aims of the cat-feeding project

We are trying to provide adequate food for as many cats as possible, to ensure that the cats have a chance of living healthily. An important part of the project is the sterilization programme. In recent years, the local authorities on Hvar, as elsewhere in Croatia, finance cat sterilizations to help reduce the numbers of unwanted cats in the environment. Some authorities pay for males and females to be sterilized, some for females only. Taking stray cats for sterilization requires careful planning: the cat has to be caught in the morning and taken straight to the vet. Most importantly, after the operation the cat has to be taken into a safe environment for a day or two until it has recovered enough to return to its old haunts. The local vets cannot provide after-care unless there is an emergency.

Some people do not like animals, and cats in particular. So one of our aims is to help prevent the cats from being a nuisance, by reducing the numbers of unwanted cats and providing basic facilities for them.

Healthy, sterilized cats who are used to being handled have a better chance of finding a good home, so of course the best outcome is for the street cats to be adopted and given the right conditions for a good life. Some stray cats on Hvar strike lucky and move into a life of safety, comfort and even luxury. When they do, it can be difficult to imagine them scavenging for food and chancing their luck in the uncertain world of homelessness. The ginger cat in the picture below is a good example, the only clue to his previous life in the wild being the notch in his right ear which shows that he was sterilized under the programme for strays.

Ginger fell happily on all four paws! Photo: Vivian Grisogono

How to help

If you want to help the island's stray cats, please read the detailed information in our article 'Cats: How to help when needed'.

REALISTIC OFFERS OF PRACTICAL HELP TO EXTEND THE CAT-FEEDING PROJECT WILL BE GRATEFULLY RECEIVED VIA EMAIL This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it..

 November 2023.

back to top
You are here: Home about animals Cat Feeding Stations

Eco Environment News feeds

  • Reaching net zero by 2050 ‘cheaper for UK than one fossil fuel crisis’

    Climate change committee finds move to renewable energy would also bring health, economic and security benefits

    Achieving the UK’s net zero target by 2050 will cost less than a single oil shock and bring health and economic benefits while insulating the country against future costs, the government’s climate advisers have forecast.

    Eliminating the UK’s reliance on fossil fuels by adopting renewable energy and green technologies, such as electric vehicles and heat pumps, would be the best and most cost-effective option for the future economy, the Climate Change Committee (CCC) found.

    Continue reading...

  • This is the story of Weda Bay – and how nature is being sacrificed for mining

    Analysis has found more than 3,000 mining operations within the most naturally precious areas of the planet, a much bigger footprint than previously thought

    Weda Bay is just one example of a global trend that could see the mining industry expand into some of Earth’s last areas of wilderness in search of minerals and materials to feed the global economy.

    Analysis produced for the Guardian by a group of academic researchers found more than 3,267 mining operations within key biodiversity areas (KBAs), accounting for nearly 5% of the mining sector’s global footprint. China, Brazil, Argentina and Mexico top the rankings for total surface mining area within key biodiversity areas, the most naturally precious areas of the planet.

    Continue reading...

  • Ultrasound repellers could keep hedgehogs off roads, scientists hope

    Study shows animals hear very high frequencies, making it possible to design a deterrent to cut deaths

    Hedgehogs have been discovered to hear high-frequency ultrasound, raising hopes that they could be deterred from dangerous roads with ultrasound repellers.

    Vehicles are estimated to kill up to one in three hedgehogs, a big factor in the much-loved mammal’s drastic decline across Europe over recent decades.

    Continue reading...

  • Birdwatch: Blue tits are feisty and fascinating but often taken for granted

    They will soon be looking for nest sites to begin the huge effort of raising their brood of between eight and 10 chicks

    If there were an award for the most underrated British garden bird, the blue tit may well come out on top. Feisty and fascinating, this colourful little creature is so common and familiar that we often take it for granted.

    This could be because of the blue tit’s ubiquity. In both the main garden bird surveys in the UK – the RSPB’s annual Big Garden Birdwatch and the long-running BTO Garden BirdWatch – the species is always in the top five. With roughly 3 million breeding pairs, blue tits are as common in urban and suburban gardens as they are in rural ones.

    Continue reading...

  • Country diary: The art of noticing rewards with a mini glittering web | Jeni Bell

    Knightwood Inclosure, New Forest: I realise my knowledge of my favourite haunt is the size of the spidery-speck hanging in the heather

    In soft sunlight the woodland wakes. Brimstone butterflies boast their presence, a raven pair rattle overhead, and the first scents of warming earth drift upwards. Spring shouts its arrival across Knightwood Inclosure, home of the New Forest’s girthiest tree, the Knightwood Oak. It falls on deaf ears though; knelt in mud, immersed in undergrowth, I’m mesmerised in micro.

    In front of me, suspended on barely-there thread, hangs a speck of a spider. It was the disco-ball water droplets, clinging to its intricately woven web, that enticed me in. The spider is so small that my eyes and camera struggle to focus, flicking from a cream and tawny-coloured orb to a faded heather flower. When I do lock on, the abdominal markings gain clarity: inky black lines encasing two small spots.

    Continue reading...

  • ‘My lovely distraction’: live stream of kākāpō – world’s fattest parrot – and her chicks captivates New Zealand

    More than 100,000 people have tuned in to watch ‘kākāpō cam’, which captures a rare flightless bird sleeping, tidying her nest and fighting off intruders

    On an island in New Zealand’s remote southern fjords, one of the world’s strangest and rarest parrots – the kākāpō – is caring for her tiny chick as fans from across the globe watch on.

    Through the black and white lens of a hidden camera, a fluffy orb with a kazoo-like squeak jostles for food from its mother’s beak. The mother, Rakiura, is attentive – scooping her chick under her large green wings, fending off an intruding bird, and periodically tidying her nest.

    Continue reading...

  • ‘A sobering preview’: extreme heat now affects one in three people globally, study finds

    Rising temperatures making it hard even for young, healthy people to safely do normal physical tasks in many regions

    Climate breakdown is shrinking the amount of time that people can safely go about their lives, according to a study that shows a third of the world’s population now resides in areas where heat severely limits activity.

    Rising temperatures, driven by the continued burning of fossil fuels, are making it difficult even for many young, healthy adults to do basic physical activities, such as housework or walking up stairs during daylight hours at the height of the summer, the report warns.

    Continue reading...

  • ‘It feels like a seed has been planted’: Morecambe looks to Eden Project for revival

    Young people hope green light to build eco attraction’s northern outpost will change theirs and the town’s fortunes

    In the Lancashire coastal town of Morecambe, there has been talk of Eden Project’s futuristic biomes being built beside the shoreline overlooking the bay for a decade.

    But this summer, spades will finally break ground to make the project a reality, with the visitor attraction expected to open in less than two years.

    Continue reading...

  • ‘Everyone feels like they are being scammed’: can Central America’s small coffee growers survive as global prices fall?

    Family-run farms in El Salvador and Honduras face mounting losses, rising costs – and the need to adapt or be left behind

    On a steep hillside in western El Salvador, Oscar Leiva watches rainfall in December, a month that once marked the start of the dry season. During this harvest cycle, flowering came early and then stalled. A heatwave followed. What remains of the crop is uneven, lower in quality and more expensive to produce than the last.

    For Leiva and his family, coffee has never been just a crop. His mother, Esperanza Marinero, remembers when the rains arrived on schedule and the harvest could be planned months in advance. Today, the calendar no longer holds. Decisions about pruning, fertilising and hiring labour feel like educated guesses. Each mistake carries a cost the family cannot afford.

    Continue reading...

  • Help a toad across the road – and five more ways to save these endangered amphibians

    Britain’s toads have begun their spring migration, putting them at even greater risk than usual. Here’s how – and why – we should look after them

    There’s a touch of old magic about toads, those shapeshifters of myth, superstition and folklore. Charismatic creatures with the pleasing Latin binomial bufo bufo, common toads have astonishing copper- or gold-coloured eyes and rugged, textured skin. “People say they look warty, which I’ve always thought is a bit unfair,” says Dr Silviu Petrovan, a conservationist and toad population researcher.

    More prosaically, toads are great for your garden. “We say toads are a gardener’s best friend, because they eat all the pests,” says Jenny Tse-Leon, the head of conservation and impact at the British amphibian charity Froglife. Their spring migration is a dramatic event, during which hundreds of thousands of animals travel back to their ancestral breeding ponds. “Like the wildebeest of the Serengeti,” says Tse-Leon. “They’re just a lot smaller than wildebeest.” The males “piggyback” on potential partners: “You see them riding on the female’s back to get a lift to the pond.”

    Continue reading...

Eco Health News feeds

Eco Nature News feeds

Copyright © 2026 Eco Hvar. All Rights Reserved. Developed by Orion Informatika.