At Rose Hill, Feral Cats Find a Welcome Home

Fordham Newsroom

The official mascot of Fordham is the ram, but at the Rose Hill campus, a smaller, more skittish four-legged animal has taken up residence.
Feral cats are regulars at the parking garage, near the Metro North railroad tracks, around the Bathgate Avenue entrance, and even near the McGinley Center, where food is left out by members of the community.
According to Robert Freda, director of campus operations, wild cats have lived on campus for as long as anyone can remember. But two years ago there was a noticeable uptick in their numbers. Capturing them was not an option, as adult feral cats cannot be rehabilitated for adoption. But their breeding was not sustainable either, he said.
Holly Malkasian Staudinger leaves the Rose Hill parking garage with a recently trapped feral cat.
In January 2016, Holly Malkasian Staudinger, a volunteer from Rye, New York, began trapping and transporting the cats to veterinarians in Westchester. After the cats were spayed or neutered, Staudinger released them in the same spot where they’d been caught.
Since September 2016, she’s trapped and released 16 cats on campus.
Staudinger learned about the Rose Hill cats through a friend whose daughter is a Fordham student. She said that “trap, neuter, and release” is endorsed by most humane societies, as the procedure keeps cats from reproducing but also allows them to live in a familiar environment. Kittens born in the wild can be taken from the mother after six weeks and put up for adoption, but by their 14th week in the wild, they’re unfit for domestication, she said.
There are benefits to having feral cats around, though.
“Cats are great to have outside because they keep the rodent population down,” she said.
“A dozen cats on a campus like Fordham is great, but you don’t want 100 cats—they’re also wild animals. They might look like ...

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