A half-grown male cat has taken to hanging around our house. He’s friendly and gets along well with our dog. My wife, who basically distrusts cats, accepts him to the point where she feeds and pets him. But can we adopt him, get him shots, and have him neutered? In theory, not unless we are willing to lock the poor thing inside the house 24/7, which is what a new set of Manatee County pet regulations would force us to do.

I wrote several emails to the County Commissioners when the latest set of pet regulations were first proposed. Our dog barks, not excessively, at strangers who come on or near our property. This is her job. But the first draft of the legislation would have made us liable for a $200 fine if someone else decided she barked “excessively” and turned us in, with increasing penalties for each subsequent violation. I can see it now: denizens of the homeless service center the city wants to inflict on our poor little neighborhood repeatedly calling to complain about barking dogs until our canine defenders no longer threaten them.

The dog-barking regulation got gentled-down in the final bill. Now dogs must bark continuously for ten minutes before the County bites. Few watchdogs, including ours, bark that long unless something severe is going on. And if we have a home invasion or other attack, and the County’s animal control officer shows up with (or before) the police, that’s fine with us.

And now, the kitties. From this point forward, they are not supposed to roam free. If you have a cat (or dog) that is caught running the streets, you can get fined. The only way to keep a cat from exploring is to keep the poor thing in the house all the time. The local Humane Society wants everyone who adopts a cat to promise to jail it inside. And I am suddenly hearing from “animal experts” that cats kept indoors are healthier and live longer than those who breathe outdoor air.

However, many kitties don’t agree with this. They think they are supposed to be able to come and go as they please, as cats have done from time immemorial. They think they own us, not the other way around. I don’t know about you, but I side with the kitties over the experts in this case.

So we will take in the cat, get him his shots and have him “snipped,” and wait for the wrath of Manatee County Animal Services to descend on us — and on the poor little kitty.

Not that I’m overly worried; the old animal regulations were never really enforced around here, and there is no reason to believe the new ones will be, either.

This entry was posted on Thursday, March 16th, 2006 at 7:50 pm and is filed under Uncategorized. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.