‘How do we get ahead of this?’: Feral cats pose growing problem across Napa County

Over by Salvador Creek in Napa, behind the in-progress construction of apartments at the north end of Valle Verde Drive, feral cats are aplenty.

Cats can be seen staring, with glowing eyes back among the trees and the grasses there, long-haired and short-haired, coats with a variety of colors and patterns — black, tuxedo, gray, silver and striped.

What most stands out is the sheer quantity of cats among the small, roughly 1/8-mile loop, adding up to at least several dozen. Several people walking the Salvador Creek trails Tuesday estimated the population is around 65.

Neena Heitz, who volunteers with Wine Country Animal Lovers, was there Tuesday morning to feed the cats.

For over an hour, she methodically moved around different parts of the creekside to set up five feeding stations. One of the heftier cats — an older-looking tuxedo cat with dirt browning up its white patches — followed Heitz to each feeding station.

Several people walking along the nearby trail shared their frustrations about the cat population. One warned of an ill-looking cat. And an off-leash dog ran into a wooded area and scattered the cats that had gathered there.

Heitz said one main goal of regularly feeding the feral cats — which she said neighbors push back on — is to create routines and make them more susceptible to trapping, for the purpose of spaying or neutering them, or to get them medical care.

Feeding also helps cut down on some bird and rodent hunting from the cats, Heitz said, given they don’t need to hunt to fill their bellies. If the cats were seeking food, they’d probably cause more problems for the residents who live in the area, she said.

But Heitz said the feral cat colony in the area is the biggest she’s personally seen, and it’s continued to increase in numbers over the years. In part, that’s because people dump unwanted cats there, she said. Ongoing efforts to spay and neuter the feral cat population — she said 50 or so there had been spayed or neutered, as evidenced by a notched ear — can be thrown off as a result.

Yvonne Baginski, who lives on nearby Montclair Avenue, is a regular walker of the Salvador Creek area — a habitat restoration area. She said she noticed a feral cat problem in the area about five years ago.

At first, she said, she assumed they were domestic pets from a subdivision east of the creek. As years went by, “I started seeing more and more and more cats.” At some point, small houses have been put up on the creek bank to help protect the cats from getting wet.

“The whole bank, which was at one point restored as a riparian habitat, is now like a cat condo association,” Baginski said.

She and her neighbors together have trapped 17 cats, she said, and she’s personally trapped four to spay and neuter them. But she takes issue with being required to release the cats back to where they were trapped; she contends the cats stalk birds in her yard, including her free-range chickens, and leave feces.

“The problem is not the fact that you trap them and you take them and you get them spayed, but you have to release them in your own backyard,” Baginski said. “I am furious about that, because I also have wild birds and I have doves. I have a yard that has been set up for bees and butterflies and birds, and the cats hunt in my yard.”

Baginski also referenced the larger environmental impacts cats cause, both feral and domestic, and noted there are many feral cat colonies scattered around Napa.

“The people who own cats need to keep them indoors, period, no exception,” Baginski said. “The billions of birds that they kill and the damage they cause to other people's property, it’s not fair. If there were dogs that were running around like these cats are, we would be up in arms.”