Liz Buchanan BVSc MRCVS
Keymaster
Hello! I can hear your frustration; your cat is hissing and crying when you go to pull him out from under the house. You think that he could get out if he wanted to, but he prefers to hide.
I'm afraid that there are two broad possibilities :- 1) your cat is simply scared and doesn't want to come out. Leaving him alone, leaving him food and shelter that he can access if he needs to and giving him some distance might help in this case. Or 2) he is sore / in pain / hurt / ill, in which case he needs to be removed from there and taken for medical attention.
The frustrating thing is that I can't tell one from another from this distance and that you are in a hard situation. All you can do is to assess it best you can - is there another cat or something else he might be afraid of? You say 'he,' but might he be a female with kittens etc.? and largely follow your instincts. I know that some cat rescues use humane traps to retrieve cats in extremis, but this needs to be done responsibly. Some cat rescues are particularly good at this.
Best of luck and please let us know how the story ends.
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