Seven strays gone – Campus vet euthanizes seven feral cats during the summer

This summer, University of Idaho Campus Veterinarian Dr. Peter Autenried euthanized seven stray cats found on campus.

Autenried said he approached UI Facilities early this summer after hearing several complaints about feral cats prowling around Morrell Hall. It is up to Facilities to send trappers to capture the animals, he said.

Facilities used to have a licensed trapper available a few years ago, said Assistant Vice President of Facilities Brian Johnson, but the trapper no longer works for the university. In the past, trappers would find homes for the captured animals, Johnson said.

Autenried also reached out to the Humane Society of the Palouse (HSOP). He said the people he talked to made it clear that HSOP was not interested in taking in feral cats.

“I did not want to euthanize these cats,” Autenried said. “But something had to be done.”

Feral cats have become a problem for UI because many people want to feed the animals, Autenried said. This makes the feeder more responsible for the cat than that person may realize, he said, and the cat will return to the same areas with the hope of getting more food.

Peter Wolf, cat initiatives analyst for Best Friends Animal Society, said most universities and other large areas across the U.S. have systems in place to deal with stray animals, and those programs manage the problem well. He said there wasn’t a good reason why the cats at UI needed to be trapped and euthanized.

“It was a very manageable situation,” Wolf said.

With limited options, Autenried said Facilities had staff set traps for the cats in June. Six of the cats were caught fast, and given to Autenried. The traps remained set up through the summer, and another cat was caught earlier in August. All in all, he said the captured cats were a mixture of kittens and adults.

When the cats were captured, Autenried said he gave each feral cat a check-up and made sure they weren’t tagged. He said this process took less than a day for each cat, and he decided that all of them couldn’t be helped and needed to be euthanized. The check-up was cursory and could be improved, Autenried said, but he is confident in his ability to tell when an animal is completely feral.

“I am a veterinarian, and I can tell a pet cat from a feral cat without a long evaluation,” Autenried said.

He said it was obvious that the cats were both feral and sickly. He knew that they had never been under the care of an owner by how undernourished they were. The strays had prolapsed eyelids and nasal discharge.

Beyond the cats’ symptoms, Autenried said the captured cats were more aggressive than normal house cats.

“The young ones hissed at you,” Autenried said.

Wolf said in extreme situations when animals are in obvious and extreme pain, euthanasia is acceptable, but he does not believe this situation warranted the measure.

“If it is truly an act of mercy to euthanize this particular cat or kitten, that’s one thing,” Wolf said. “And those things can be — and often should be — decided very quickly.”

After Autenried determined that the trapped cats were beyond hope, he euthanized them in a carbon dioxide chamber. He said a lot of people mistake carbon dioxide gas with carbon monoxide, but carbon dioxide is much more humane. Done right, the animals will fall asleep and die painlessly.

According to the American Veterinary Medical Association Guidelines for the Euthanasia of Animals, euthanasia by carbon dioxide is at its most humane when the chamber is slowly filled with the gas instead of rapidly, as to not bring the animal fear or pain.  Autenried said he followed the gradual procedure while euthanizing the cats.

Wolf said it doesn’t matter how the cats were euthanized, because the entire situation could have been avoided.

“Regardless of the method that was employed, it was entirely unnecessary,” Wolf said.

After the cats entered respiratory arrest, Autenried gave each of them a lethal injection. He said this second method is widely practiced among veterinarians to ensure the animal does not go through any unnecessary pain. When each of the cats were dead, their bodies were incinerated.

There are more stray cats that roam the campus. Autenried said he is currently hearing complaints about feral cats near the Lionel Hampton School of Music. He said he does not have plans to trap the cats with Facilities yet, after hearing the response from the Moscow community.

The Moscow-Pullman Daily News broke the news last week, and there was immediate outrage from community locals and Vandals alike. A petition to stop the practice of euthanizing stray cats was posted online the same day the story was published, and has nearly reached 10,000 signatures as of Monday night.

Wolf said he was surprised at the petition — not just at the number of signatures, but by how many were Moscow locals who cared enough to comment about the issue.

Autenried said he was taken off guard when the story broke. He said HSOP gave him a much different answer when he asked them what they could do with the cats than the answer they gave in the article.

Executive Director of HSOP Autumn St. Amand said she was not a part of the conversation HSOP and Autenried had earlier in the summer. In fact, she said she wasn’t aware of the situation until a week before the story first broke.

She said HSOP currently does not have the resources or the space to take in feral cats, but the organization is willing to work with UI to find other homes for them.

Autenried said he is grateful for the funding HSOP provided the university for diagnostic work and their offer to work with the university in the future. He said there will be a post-case analysis done with Facilities and he will evaluate his practice in terms of what is best for public safety, the environment as well as what best meets the public opinion.

Erin Bamer

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