A working cat isn't dropped off and forgotten. It's crate-acclimated for three weeks so it bonds to the site, taught that a buzz means food and the litter station means a treat, fed every day by a paid caretaker, weighed and watched by the mesh, and recalled for a vet check when anything looks off. And if someone falls in love with it — it goes home with them.
Spay/neuter, rabies vaccine, microchip, ear-tip, collar fitted while asleep. 24 h hold at the partner facility.
A large wire kennel at the work site with a hide box, litter, food and water — the standard working-cat placement method. Every meal, twice a day, starts with a 3-second collar buzz, with the caretaker present. By week three: buzz = food = this place = these people.
Crate door opens; the crate stays as a den. Feeding continues at the same spot and time, buzz first. Most cats never leave the site — that's the whole reason for the three weeks.
Covered litter box on a sensor pad beside the feeder. Collared cat uses it → treat drops. Within a few weeks the colony prefers the station to the neighbours' planter beds.
One message to the collar and the cat walks to the feed station. Battery swaps, boosters, a limp the camera noticed — a two-minute visit instead of a trapping operation.
Cats are placed in pairs or small groups from the same colony — never alone. Sites need a warm, dry den, shade, and a caretaker who can be there daily. No site, no placement.
| Cadence | Task | Who | Time |
|---|---|---|---|
| Daily | Buzz, feed, fresh water; empty the litter station; eyes on every cat (or its camera log); note anything off in the app | Caretaker | 1–2 h per site |
| Weekly | Station camera + scale check; collar battery levels; swap batteries by recall; den and shade check; restock | Caretaker + field tech | 1 h per site |
| Monthly | Weigh-in via recall; parasite prevention; count vs dashboard; sponsor report | Caretaker + data checker | 2 h per site |
| Yearly | Rabies booster and exam on a clinic day; collar and shell replacement | Clinic | Clinic day |
| When flagged | No movement 24 h, missed meals, weight drop, injury seen on camera → recall → clinic | Caretaker → DVM | Same day |
Caretakers are paid staff placed through city job programs, not volunteers who drift away. That's the difference between a colony that's managed and a colony that's just fed.
Every cat in the program came off a shelter euthanasia list as "unadoptable." Then a warehouse crew sees the same cat every morning for six months — and one of them wants to take it home. The cat is already fixed, vaccinated, microchipped and known. The shelter partner finalizes the adoption; the collar comes back to us; a new cat takes the post.
Colonies produce friendly cats and, until the 80 % line is crossed, kittens. Both go straight to the shelter partner's adoption program instead of back outside. The mesh tells us where they are.
Some "ferals" are lost house cats. The microchip scan at surgery, and the collar's position afterwards, reunite them. That's an adoption metric too — a return-to-owner.
| Part | Job | Weight | Est. cost |
|---|---|---|---|
| Seeed XIAO nRF52840 (or ESP32-S3) | Brain; runs Meshtastic firmware; accelerometer wake-up | 3 g | $6–10 |
| Wio-SX1262 LoRa module | 915 MHz mesh radio; talks to other collars, gateways, the drone | 3 g | $8–12 |
| L76K GNSS module | GPS fix every 15–30 min when the cat is moving | 2 g | $5–10 |
| 300 mAh LiPo | 3–7 days in tracker mode; swapped by recall | 7 g | $3–5 |
| Coin vibration motor | The buzz — driven by Meshtastic's external-notification module | 1 g | $1–2 |
| Optional BME280 temp/humidity | The ground-level climate data | <1 g | $3–5 |
| Printed shell + breakaway collar | Snaps open under load so a snag can't strangle the cat | ≈ 12 g | $6–10 |
| Total on the cat | ≈ 28–30 g | ≈ $35–55 | |
Under 30 g is well under 5 % of an adult cat's body weight — the working limit for wildlife collars. Every part is off-the-shelf; the firmware is open source. Nothing here is a prototype we have to invent.