do you think this cat is a stray??

[girliefriend]

A pretty little ginger and white cat keeps turning up at my door and occasionally lets herself in through the window, she is always hungry, looks skinny and will put up with my grumpy tom hissing at her to creep in and get some food. She is also quite grubby and has some black smudges down her back legs and tail. She always looks quite scared and eats and runs iyswim.

The thing is I can't decide if she is a stray or not, wwyd? She obv doesn't have a collar or anything!

Why wouldn't you think she was a stray?
I would contact Cat Protection's League for advice; locally the volunteers have their own micro-chip readers & could come around & see if she's chipped, at least, save you the stress of getting her to a vet. They can give you advice about find her home. RSPCA would do similar, I imagine.

I think cpl do paper collars you write on for the owner to call you if she's owned.

Happy cats usually groom and keep clean so she does sound a bit miserable.

Yes, she's a stray. Feed her regularly and she's your's. Congratulations on your new little moggie!

If she's not a stray then it sounds as if she's being very badly treated. If she's not chipped, I'd assume she was a stray at least as far as food and shelter go for a few weeks at least. Would you give her a home if she was?

How strange that I've just come across this thread!

I'm sat in the back garden looking at a black cat which I think is a stray. He's constantly habging about in the garden with my 4 boys and often sleeps in the garage. He's very thin but seems clean, has no collar.

He's been coming here for the last 4/5 months and gets on ok with my lot. He's very nervous though if any of us approach him.

He did come into the house once and managed to find his way to the food bowls and started tucking in before my scottish fold found him and chased him out! :)

He has no collar, but I guess that doesn't mean much, lots of owned cats don't have collars - mine do, with bells and tags in the hope that little creatures will hear them coming and have some chance of escape!!

I've never given any of mine a collar. 4/5 months, nervous and thin would make him a stray in my eyes. Go for it.

mine tend to leave their collars on bushes
my ginger doesn't really bother that much with washing and would eat until he exploded

Hello I don't mind feeding her when she pops in but not sure can afford to take another cat on permanently, they add up with their boosters, flea treatment, worming, insurance etc!!!

I haven't seen her today but she was here ystd, still not really sure if she is a stray or not but because she looks scruffy will give her benefit of the doubt (am tempted to give her a bath but that would probably scare her off for good!!)

My own cat is microchipped but have heard of an horrific accident of a cat getting stuck in her collar and nearly loosing leg so he doesn't have a collar but because my cat looks fat well fed and clean would assume that its fairly obvious he has an owner.

Is there an easy way of telling if a cat is young or old? Because if the cats old that might explain if thats why she is a bit more skinny and scruffy?? Maybe??!

Most roaming cats are not strays. There may be all sorts of reasons why the cat is thin. As many animals are obese our view of what a thin cat is is distorted. He may be healthy thin, lean. He may be unhealthily thin but have an owner at home desperately hoping he will come back for his tablets/kidney diet etc. The number of people desperately looking for their missing cats is enormous. The number of people desperately trying to diet their cats or feed them special diets for diabetes (often caused by overfeeding) etc and being thwarted by friendly neighbours feeding the cats is also very large. As the owner of a very greedy cat who I struggle to keep healthily lean its so disheartening having people constantly try to steal her (feed the poor hungry stray in their eyes) by making her obese and unhealthy. Cats are selfish creatures and will choose the place they can get fattest! I have a friend who recently recovered their cat after a three year absence (during which it had grown to the size of a small house). They had searched for him desperately for over a year before giving him up for dead. He was chipped, but that was the first time he was scanned. Some cats are naturally wary and running and looking scared is absolutely not a sign of being ill treated!

I always talk too much - but to either of the people with the 'strays' - please do contact the CPL and have them scanned and get a collar, also contact local rescue centres and vets to see if they have been reported missing. If that all fails, then yes, you probably have a cat!

Hmm thats more or less what OP just said only with more ranting sorry!