Helpless feral cat saved on Christmas

Photos Courtesy of John Debacker
The cat after it was rescued.

A feral cat was seen wandering the streets of Irvington with her head stuck in a jar.

Concerned residents tried to help, but the cat was frightened and wouldn’t let people near her. On Christmas morning, the cat was spotted near a house on Hennessy Place. People used social media to contact John Debacker, who is the 30-year-old vice president of Long Island Cat-Kitten Solution.

Luckily, the Long Island resident was in Middlesex visiting family for Christmas. He immediately came to the site and rescued the kitty.

“Once she was in the carrier, I let her calm down and slowly pulled it (the jar) off,” he said.

Given another day or two, the cat would have died, as she had no food or water.

“She’s extremely lucky she was found in time,” said Debacker.

The reason the cat’s head got stuck to begin with was because she was seeking food.

“Animals get hungry and stick their heads in jars and cans,” Debacker said. “She couldn’t get the jar off herself.”

This was not a unique situation, according to Debacker. This is something that happens all the time. Anyone can get a cat out of a jar.

“They can’t hurt you,” he said. “There is no danger until the jar is off.”

The female cat who was named “Merry” for Christmas is being called “a Christmas miracle.” Currently she’s under the care of Marcia Sandford Fishkind and Eileen DiNicola, who were among those who reached out to Debacker.

Merry is around 1- or 2-years-old, healthy, and calm. She may be adoptable.

What would make a cat “not” adoptable, would be if you try to touch a cat and it lunges at you. Adoptable cats are those you’d call a lap cat—cats that can cuddle.

“Feral cats want to live like everybody else,” said Debacker, who recommends trapping, neutering, and releasing ferals to keep their population to a minimum.

“A cat can have a litter every three months,” he explained. “Kittens having kittens, as young as four-months-old.”

Normally he doesn’t do New Jersey rescues. But Merry’s situation was unique, with Debacker being at the right place at the right time.

Debacker, who works full time at LICKS as a trapper, said he has loved cats his entire life. No one taught him how to rescue cats, it was simply “on-the-job” expertise.
He’s always getting tagged on social media regarding cats in dangerous situations. Last year he rescued a cat on the Belt Parkway in New York City. He’s also saved cats from sewers and trees.

“I learned as I did it,” he said.

Debacker currently has four of his own cats. He recently adopted a kitten who nearly drowned in a garbage pail, climbing in and being unable to get out.

Being on call 24/7, Debacker doesn’t have time for anything else but cat rescue. One thing he really wants people to know is that they should crush empty jars, so cats don’t get trapped in them. He said the jar that was stuck on Merry’s head looked like a peanut butter jar, but there was no label.

To learn more about LICKS, visit: https://www.licatskittens.org/.