MaryC

Shannon, I can relate to your ordeal. I have rescued a number of cats (and other creatures, including birds) in my life and somewhere along the line you may get bitten. It can happen when they are defensive, scared, or in great pain. Overall my bad experiences have been very few compared to the good ones. I am always sad to see bird lovers react so negatively to cats. The problem is irresponsible pet owners who do not spay/neuter their animals, and don't keep them safely confined. But I don't think that the moral is that you should not feed a hungry, homeless animal. Maybe, you just should not approach one too closely. Feral cats are a lot more unpredictable than the domesticated lost house cat. I applaud your refusal to let animal control trap the cat. (I made that mistake once after a wild, stray bit me and I felt terrible after the unfeeling Nazi-prison-guard-like animal control person took him.) However, the best way for you to handle this would be to see if your local no-kill shelter will lend you a humane trap so that you can give the cat to them. As all shelters are overrun, particularly in spring and summer, you hopefully won't trap a neighbor's cat who accidentally escaped. And if you know which neighbor is letting their cats run free you can express your concern that people may call animal control and with no tag to ID their pet, it would likely be put to sleep very quickly.

My stance now is that, if you care enough to feed a cat on an ongoing basis, you should also care enough to trap him humanely, and to get him shots and neutering. Even if you can't provide an inside home for him, you can then continue to feed him outside and hopefully provide some shelter from the weather, without worrying about him creating more homeless babies or infecting other cats or people. And, of course, a neutered animal will be less aggressive too. I know cat-hating bird lovers won't like this, but a hungry cat would probably be a lot more of a threat to your backyard birds than a well fed one.

So, that's my more than 2cents worth. And also, for people to see a doctor quickly anytime you're bit so you can start on antibiotics immediately. I hope you recover very soon, and continue to love all of god's creatures.