The Cats of the Boardwalk

Photo: Myrtle Beach Unlocked

Walk the Myrtle Beach Boardwalk early enough — before the breakfast crowds, before the beach fills up — and you'll see them. A tabby stretched out in the first sun near the SkyWheel. A black cat slipping under a ramp like he owns the place. An orange one watching the gulls from a dune crossover, unbothered by everybody.

Most visitors never notice. Locals know better. These are the Boardwalk cats — and there's a small crew of Myrtle Beach volunteers looking after them. They call themselves Cats of the Boardwalk.

Nobody dumped them. They live here.

The cats along the Boardwalk aren't pets that got lost last weekend. They're community cats — born outside, raised outside, and about as interested in living in your condo as you are in living under the pier. This stretch of boards and dunes is their home turf, and for a lot of them, it always has been.

That matters, because it changes what "helping" looks like. You can't adopt out a cat that wants nothing to do with people, and hauling a whole colony off doesn't work either — animal folks call it the vacuum effect. Clear out one stretch of territory and new cats move into the empty spot and start the cycle over. The Boardwalk has food, shelter, and hiding spots. Cats will find it. They always do.

So the answer is TNR

Photo: King2hamster via Wikimedia Commons — CC BY 4.0

Cats of the Boardwalk works the same humane approach used all over the country: trap, neuter, return.

Here's how it goes. Volunteers humanely trap a cat and take it to a clinic. The cat gets spayed or neutered, gets its vaccinations, and gets a small tip taken off one ear — that ear tip is the universal sign that says "this one's already been done," so nobody traps him again. Then the cat goes right back to the exact spot where he was picked up.

Back home. Fixed. Vaccinated. Done having kittens.

So far, the group counts 44 cats helped this year and 73 all-time — every one of them vaccinated and fixed, and out of the kitten business for good. And when a cat turns out to be friendly, or kittens turn up young enough to socialize, the story goes a different way: just this week, the crew got four kittens by the 14th Ave Pier out of harm's way before winter — the kind that get a shot at adoption instead of a life under the boards.

A fixed colony holds its size, then slowly shrinks over the years as the cats live out their lives. No new litters every spring. Less yowling, less spraying, fewer fights at 2 AM under somebody's window. And the cats that are already here get to stay in the only home they've ever known.

One thing visitors get wrong

Don't feed them. Folks mean well, but feeding the cats at the Boardwalk is against Myrtle Beach city ordinance — the group's own site says so plainly. A pile of food left by the boards doesn't help the cats; it can get them in trouble and makes the trapping and counting harder for the people managing the colony.

The help that actually helps:

• Volunteer. Trapping, transport, and fostering the friendly ones all take hands, and the group runs on volunteers — folks like Laurie and Ron Peterson, the faces on the group's team page.
• Adopt. The friendly cats and the kittens who come in young enough don't go back to the boards — they go up for adoption.
• Buy the shirt. Cats of the Boardwalk sells its own T-shirts ($42 for the first, less for each one after), and every three shirts sold pays for one neuter for a Boardwalk cat.
• Donate. Cats of the Boardwalk is a registered 501(c)(3) nonprofit, so donations are tax-deductible to the extent allowed by law. (One honest fine-print note they post themselves: gifts bought for them through Amazon aren't deductible.)

You can reach them through www.catsoftheboardwalk.org or at 843-977-CATT (843-977-2288).

If you spot a Boardwalk cat

• Check the ear. A flat tip on one ear means the cat's fixed, vaccinated, and part of a managed colony. He's fine. Leave him to his day.
• Don't try to "rescue" a feral cat into your car. A scared outdoor cat in a strange condo is a bad day for everybody, the cat most of all.
• Found kittens? Leave them be and call the group first. Mama is usually close by, and the volunteers know when kittens need help and when they need to be left alone.

And the Boardwalk crew isn't alone out there — Horry and Georgetown counties have a whole bench of local groups doing this same work, from Bikini Beach Cat Rescue and Cat's Meow to Sav-R-Cats and the Grand Strand Humane Society. If you've ever seen somebody crouched by a dumpster at dawn with a can of food and the patience of a saint, you've probably seen one of them.

The Strand takes care of its own

Photo: Claire P. via Wikimedia Commons — CC BY 2.0

The Boardwalk cats don't ask for much — a little shelter and to be left in the place they know. Thanks to Cats of the Boardwalk, they get fixed, they get their shots, and they get to stay home.

Next time you're out for an early walk and a tabby crosses your path, check for the ear tip — and tip your cap to the volunteers who got there before you.

Spotted the Boardwalk cats on your trip? Tell us where in the comments — and if you're a local caretaker with a colony story, MBU wants to hear it.