New Tom that was attracted by female kitty pre spaying is now scaring the life out of my colony after moving into a shelter box post TNR
tl;dr at the end, sorry for the wall of text!
Hi everyone, Jackie (top left tux) showed up in my backyard as kitten season started, lured in by a queen that I’ve been trying to trap for months (got her finally last weekend when she came for food more often – kittens averted!)
When more intact Toms kept showing up I eventually managed to find the other unneutered kitty unfortunately only after she had given birth to two kittens living with a man down the road who was delighted when I replied to his missing cat post on FB that she was trapped as part of TNR and didn’t seem to have a home as she was so tiny and wolfing down multiple packs of food every night at 2am…
Sorry for the detour, I’m still not over the fact she that this was probably the last time that sweet little girl will have been to the vet… at least she knows there is food at my place if she’s hungry or hurt!
Anyhow… ever since I released Jack post TNR he was hanging around and eventually moved into an unused shelter box.
I’ve never seen him attack or confront any other cat, yet 100% of cats treat him like he’s the meanest, most aggressive and dangerous cat around.
He’s been neutered about 3-4 weeks ago and is still spraying sporadically. The latest two boys I got neutered are still a bit more territorial and one of them is a huuuuge orange boy who will absolutely lose his shit when he sees Jack and starts chewing and yodelling while Jack will go full on statue mode and not move a muscle.
I’ve adopted three of the cats from the colony or they pretty much chose a life with me I guess as the first one just walked in, the second one was the first cat I TNRed and the third one was the brother or the one that walked in who is the most social and friendly cat I’ve ever come across. (Unfortunately most cats don’t understand that him walking straight up to them is just to say hi and maybe give them a boop and so he’s gotten his fair share of swipes and hisses already.)
The three insiders are not even going to the back of the backyard anymore and have since started jumping the wall right next to the back door and are now mostly hanging out in front of the terrace close to the street which is absolutely keeping me up at night leading to putting in a curfew between midnight and 7am.
I am absolutely lost as to what I can do to restore peace in my colony as I haven’t seen two older, gentle males in almost a month… Jack is best friends with the “kitten” I’ve been trying to get spayed for seven months after socialising and rehoming her brother and sister… so to me that’s an indicator that he’s not always aggressive and right now I’m trying to befriend him more in the hope he’ll be less on edge around me and that I can mediate between him and the rest of the colony…
More than happy for any ideas as to how I can restore peace in my backyard colony (without evicting poor Jack obviously)
Thank you all!
tl;dr:
Tom I TNRed four weeks ago, moved into a shelter in my backyard and everyone in the colony as well as all three of my own cats are absolutely terrified of him despite me/the camera in the backyard never witnessing him attacking anyone and him being best friends with one of the younger, spayed female cats in the colony.