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.

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.

You are here: Home about animals Cat Feeding Stations

Eco Environment News feeds

  • The bizarre vertical flight pattern has long puzzled experts but new research reveals why it may play a crucial role in the insect’s survival

    On a spring evening along the banks of the River Thames, thousands of mayflies can be seen engaging in what may be one of the world’s oldest dances. In the fading light, the males make a steep vertical climb, flip over and float back to Earth – wings and tail outstretched in a skydiving posture so as to drop slowly through the sky.

    Mayflies are among the world’s oldest winged insects, emerging roughly 300m years ago – long before dinosaurs walked the Earth. Even the Mesopotamian poem the Epic of Gilgamesh, one of the oldest pieces of literature, makes reference to the short-lived mayfly. Over the epochs, the insect’s basic design has changed very little compared with the fossils of their ancestors.

    Continue reading...

  • A KCL study has found that exposure during the first trimester of pregnancy delayed speech development

    Babies exposed to higher levels of air pollution in the early stages of pregnancy take longer to learn to speak than those exposed to lower levels in the womb, new research suggests.

    A study by researchers from King’s College London found exposure to nitrogen dioxide and fine and ultra-fine particulate matter during the first trimester of pregnancy delayed speech development at 18 months.

    Continue reading...

  • Scientists find annual sea surface temperatures across Europe reached highest levels recorded, while deadly wildfires set large parts of continent ablaze

    The Nordic heatwave that pushed temperatures above 30C (86F) in the Arctic Circle in July was part of a record-breaking year that saw abnormal heat sear more than 95% of Europe, a report has found.

    Parts of Scandinavia were scorched last summer by 21 days of punishingly hot weather that led to “tropical nights” in typically cool countries such as Norway, Sweden and Finland, according to a scientific report campaigners said showed “all the emergency warning lights are flashing red”.

    Continue reading...

  • West Dartmoor, Devon: On the moor, every puddle and pool is quivering with whirligig beetles, carving circles and rotating in pairs

    A calm, clear morning on Dartmoor and the shallow pools I pass are smooth as glass – scattered wedges of sky reflected between the grass and gorse. I am wandering the western edge of the moor, close to the village of Lydford, best known for its plunging gorge and waterfall. This is a place shaped by rain, from the peat bogs blanketing high ground to the rocky gullies carved by streams.

    There are endless puddles and pools, and on this windless day they appear completely flat and still. Only when I look closely, I see that something is agitating the surfaces of the water. Every one of them quivers with life: whirligig beetles.

    Continue reading...

  • Exclusive: 839,000 homes in urban areas face threat of surface-water flooding, with social housing tenants most vulnerable to costs

    Eight in 10 of the homes that are at high risk of flooding in England are now in towns and cities, according to analysis by the National Housing Federation (NHF), which said social housing tenants are disproportionately vulnerable to the financial cost.

    Research found that 839,000 homes in urban areas are now classed as being at high risk of surface water flooding, a threefold increase since 2018.

    Continue reading...

  • After her sister died, Victoria Bennett left Cumbria for the remote Scottish archipelago, where she learned to go with the ebb and flow of life

    It was during her first winter in Orkney that the nature writer Victoria Bennett experienced the joy of baying into the sea during a storm. “There’s something very physically releasing about howling,” she says. “It’s quite animalistic and powerful.” On a stormy beach, when waves are crashing on the rocks, “you can really let rip”, she says. “The sound just disappears.”

    Until that moment, Bennett had been struggling with her decision to move to the remote archipelago off the north coast of Scotland. “I was beginning to feel like I was in a fight against the sea, and against the weather.”

    Continue reading...

  • Heatwaves reach 45C across India as unseasonably cold weather affects parts of central Canada

    Widespread heavy rain is sweeping over southern China. By Wednesday, rainfall totals are expected to exceed 100mm across many parts of Guangxi, Guangdong, Fujian, Zhejiang, Jiangxi and Hunan provinces, and in some areas as much as 150-200mm.

    As a result, the Office of the State Flood Control and Drought Relief Headquarters and the Ministry of Emergency Management have been holding meetings with meteorological and hydrological departments to emphasise the importance of reinforced patrols and emergency responses to mitigate against the probable flooding that the intense rainfall is expected to bring. In particular, reservoirs with known safety concerns must remain empty during the period, as well as through the coming rainy season.

    Continue reading...

  • Researchers found the loss of just a few eggs to opportunistic predators could greatly increase the songbird’s risk of extinction within 20 years

    Captured on one of Bianca McBryde’s tree-mounted cameras, the brush-tailed possum crawls into the frame, lowers its head into the nest and bites into the egg.

    The snack was a shop-bought quail’s egg and the nest was artificial – a crafty construction made of half a tennis ball, some brown paint and fibres from the husks of coconuts.

    Continue reading...

  • Authorities are yet to decide how they will move the body of the massive creature, which is attracting humans, eagles – and plenty of sharks

    Thin strips of flesh hang down like rotten tinsel, swaying in the wind. Glistening fluid trickles on to the stone where insects buzz. On the windward side, the odour is masked by the salty air. But step downwind, and you enter a sickly, sour-sweet blend of garbage and rotting fish. A passing couple pull their T-shirts tight over their noses.

    On a rock shelf at the southern end of Era beach, the estimated 25-tonne body of a sperm whale rests like a melted candle. Looking down at the rock pools, floating chunks of white fat bob in the water.

    Continue reading...

  • Pace of sea-level rise has turned Outer Banks coastal area into a ‘canary in the coalmine’ for other east coast communities

    Moving house has a more literal meaning on Hatteras Island, the slender hook of land that juts off the coast of North Carolina. After a slew of houses toppled spectacularly into the Atlantic Ocean recently, entire buildings are now being lifted on to wheels to flee the rapidly eroding coastline.

    Since September, 19 homes have been lost to waves that tore them from their pilings, sending them crashing into other structures like bumper cars before breaking up in the ocean. Spooked homeowners have turned to the unusual services of Barry Crum, a lifelong Hatteras resident who has become the island’s main house mover.

    Continue reading...

Eco Health News feeds

Eco Nature News feeds