'He looks so happy': Warm-hearted person befriends feral neighborhood cat and saves them from a winter storm, causing the kitty to show their emeowtional side

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    How do I get this feral adult cat to be comfortable with me and come into my house? For context I have been feeding him treats and food every day for the past month and he also has a small shelter and water source in my backyard. However, I live
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    somewhere with frequent bad weather and semi-close to a busy road so do not think it is the best idea for him to live outside permanently. I also have a 16 year old female cat who does not like other cats very much.
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    A few weeks ago I posted asking if it would be possible for me to tame a feral cat even though he's fully grown. Thanks to advice I got I was slowly able to get him comfortable with me petting him and he even took some baby steps into the house! Over the
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    weekend we were warned about frigid temperatures that we would be getting due to a polar vortex this week and I was so worried about this guy being out side for that (-6F without considering wind chill). I used a friend's crate to trap him and
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    bring him in the house and this is about day 4 of his new life inside! He is even calmer than my 16 year old cat that's lived inside her whole life! Once again thank you to everyone who replied with tips and hints could not have accomplished this without that! I have a name for him I have been using but I am open to different suggestions if anyone has any!
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    grumpygumption • 15d ago
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    This dude is an adult, was fully feral, and let me pet him (completely his idea) for the first time today. He's been very interested in canned food and churu so we got a big like giant cage so he can explore and stretch his legs. He came up to me several times.
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    Sharkywaters88 Probably need to live trap him to get him inside (we do this but after we have trapped cats in our garage-lured by food first). I just found socialization saves lives method (we are currently using on feral kittens that were 4 months old and have made
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    such amazing progress I will use this going forward! We caught semi-feral kittens who were younger before I knew that method and they took longer.
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    They say any age cat can be socialized/tamed. I haven't done it on an older cat myself.
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    It takes 30 mins a day and preferably a play pen you can sit in. (Ignoring works wonders) we built a pen to fit our room, I can't sit in it but have sat outside and still gotten great results.
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    Beat of luck, it's so rewarding to build up with them if you can. I use Jackson galaxy videos on YouTube to follow introductions for cats. We have 5 and will be integrating 3 feral kittens once they have a clean bill of health.
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    Thank you Op for helping this little guy lovely to see warm souls like you
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    narquoisCO Good luck, op. He looks like a beautiful cat who would blossom into a big cuddle bug if given the opportunity.
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    Select-Poem425 I have had feral cat that just "got it" he understood I was friend and was a most loyal companion. I have one now that took forever. At a point she just knew the house was safest place and once in, never wanted out. She is t a lap cat, but she is friendly in her strange way.
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    shinyidolomantis All of my former ferals were already adult cats when I stared socializing them. I'd say I can pet 80% of the cats in my colony these days.
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    I also have two that I moved indoors permanently. It took a couple months for the first to get used to it, and about six months for the second one (although she was very sick when I caught her and I think that slowed her down a lot on getting used to things since she was in a lot of pain for those first few months).
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    I also have a couple regular pet cats too. one doesn't mind other cats if they leave her alone, and the other cat hates everyone.... But they both got used to having new housemates. I just took it really slow and followed the guides online on how to introduce a new cat.
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    How will it go for this guy? It's hard to tell without trying. Some kitties may never fully socialize or get used to indoors, and some do surprisingly great. Both of my former ferals are very sweet, happy, indoor cats now and have no interest in going outside anymore.
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    Is he fixed? I find that is the number one thing you need to do in order to socialize an adult cat. They tame faster once they've been sterilized.
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    • No_Warning8534 10h ago Great job. Op! Bringing them inside is most of the battle... Once they are in, they realize it is actually great. Once they are fixed, everything gets even easier.
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    BellaSquared • 10h ago . That's amazing! Well done you cat whisperer you.
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    relapse_account • 5h ago He looks like a beautiful, happy kitty. He looks like he's acclimating really quickly too, given how he's sleeping next to you like that.
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    I adopted a stray/feral boy cat at the beginning of last July and it took him a few weeks to be comfortable enough to sleep out in the open like that. Of course it probably didn't help his comfort level too much that he moved in to a house with five other cats.
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