As you may already know, I feed feral cats in my backyard. Lydia has been coming around since around 2007. She's the one I once had to trap and take in for a feline abortion. Sylvia's been around for a year or two less, plus we have occasional mystery guests.
Once in a while, they get the remnants of a roast turkey or rotisserie chicken I have around but most of the time, I put out Friskies — a mix of dry food and wet. The dry food is always the same mix called Seafood Sensations but the wet rotates — cans of beef, chicken, turkey and various fishes or sometimes combinations of two flavors.
When I go to pick out a can of something to give them, I sometimes think, "Hmm…they had beef last night. Maybe they'd like chicken tonight." Then I stop and wonder: Do they care? I've seen zero evidence that they wouldn't be just as happy if I bought a caseload of one flavor and gave them the same thing every single night of their lives.
It's easy to make the mistake of presuming a cat — and this is true of most animals — thinks at all like we do. Sylvia was briefly affectionate when she first showed up but at some point, she went totally feral and now won't come anywhere near a human being. She sits on the back steps to indicate she wants food but as soon as I open the patio door, she flees to a safe distance, waits there until I put the grub out and won't approach it until I've shut the door from the inside and latched it.
I keep thinking that after thousands of free meals served on this basis, she'll eventually figure out that the tall being is a friend who means her no harm. Then I remind myself that's ridiculous. There is no learning curve here. Some pussycats might pick up on that but fear of people is hardwired into her and that ain't gonna change.
In the same way, I deceive myself when I select canned food for them. I buy chicken, beef and turkey because that's what I eat, even though the chicken, beef and turkey in the Friskies cans is very different chicken, beef and turkey. But even if it was similar, why presume they'll like what I like? The cat I had when I was a kid would only eat one kind of canned cat food — Chopped Kidney. I'd rather eat cole slaw…and you know how I feel about cole slaw.
For all I know, whenever I give Lydia and Sylvia some Friskies entree which from the name sounds yummy to me, they turn to each other and say, "When is he going to stop with this Sliced Turkey in Gravy crap and give us some Chopped Kidney?"
I really have no idea here. They scarf down everything I give them including the dry food which does not even seem like food to me. A few weeks ago, I gave Lydia one bite of lobster from the half a lobster roll I brought home from a restaurant. She gobbled it down in two seconds and I thought she might be thinking, "Wow, this is the best thing he ever gave me." But then I realized she gobbles everything down with the same enthusiasm. I once saw her eat part of a dead mouse just as ravenously, maybe more so. (By the way: I would rather eat a dead mouse than cole slaw.)
It's one of those things I need to remember: I'm really fussy about what I eat but the felines who hang around my back yard are not. They eat whatever I put out and if they're hungry and I'm late with dinner, God knows what they eat. Probably something a lot worse than what I give them. I'm wasting my time trying to make dinnertime interesting so I'm canceling tonight's veal and goat cheese soufflé and just ordering them a couple of Big Macs.