Do Feral Cats Want to Be Indoors? The Surprising Answer!

It can be easy to see cats outside living their lives and wonder if they’d be happier or healthier indoors. To answer your question regarding whether they would want to come inside, no, feral cats don’t want to live indoors ¹ . The great outdoors is their home, and you wouldn’t want anyone yanking you out of your house either. Unless a feral cat appears sick or wounded, it’s safer to just let them be.

If you’re interested in learning more about feral cats, keep reading below, where we touch on the difference between feral and stray cats, as well as more relevant info.

Stray vs Feral vs Outside Cat: What’s the Difference?

When we’re talking about cats that live outside, there are three major types: strays, feral, and outside cats. Let’s check out what those mean in more detail down below.

Stray Cat

A stray cat is a housecat that strays from its home. Stray cats are socialized with humans and sometimes other animals, meaning they’re more at ease near people than wild or feral cats. Many strays run away because of their reproductive instincts, so it’s important to spay or neuter domesticated cats.

Strays can display feral characteristics, but many are still house cats at heart. Strays are much, much easier to reintegrate into human domesticity than feral cats, even if some of their wilder instincts have taken over. A stray cat has underdeveloped hunting skills compared to a feral cat and can’t usually survive on its own.

Feral Cat

A feral cat is a wild cat that’s never lived or socialized with humans, and sometimes strays that run away while young can end up almost completely feral. A feral cat will avoid contact with humans and other animals as much as possible, while also looking for prospective mates to have litters of wild cats. Essentially, these are cats operating on instinct alone.

Outside Cats

Some cats live indoors part-time and outdoors part-time, and we call those outside/outdoor cats. These are the cats that have a strong bond with their home and family but like to roam outside too. Outside cats may go away for hours or days at a time and survive off their own hunting skills, unlike a stray cat, but they almost always return back to their humans.

Can Feral Cats Become Inside Cats?

Rarely, but it’s possible. Feral cats aren’t raised around humans and can’t become indoor cats overnight. They’re used to roaming whenever and wherever they please, foraging and hunting to survive. You’d think that a feral cat would love the transition to a clean, comfortable place to live with plenty of food and water, but that’s just not the case.

Feral cats are equipped with the skills and instincts they need to survive in the wild, and bringing them indoors could be construed as cruelty. They don’t know that you want to help them, and they typically just hide. If cornered inside, a feral cat could scratch or bite, which isn’t fun for anyone.

With all that said, some feral cats are more friendly and sociable than others. Young feral cats under 3 to 4 months, for instance, have the best chances of becoming a housecat than an older cat. Their personalities and experiences “lock in” as they get older, much like other animals, and older feral cats are almost never able to become inside cats.

While it’s possible to tame a feral cat, it’s a long, arduous process that’s simply not worth it in most cases. To make a comparison, it would be like kicking you out of your home and forcing you to live in the wild—you’re not going to adjust easily.

Conclusion

Feral cats are cats that live in the wild, which is way different than a lost stray or outside cat. They live outdoors and, in the majority of cases, don’t actually want to live indoors or with humans.

Featured Image Credit: Martin Fowler, Shutterstock