Chronicles of the Xmas Kittens – Journal Entry 17

It's been three months since I last posted on the Xmas kittens. At that stage I was putting up flyers all over the local area for people who might have wanted to adopt our four young cats. I didn't get many enquiries – I put it down to the the state of the economy (people are less inclined to take on animals when there is a sense of impending doom and they have to watch their money carefully) and the fact that the cats were a little older than the normal kittens being put up for adoption (although the pet shop at our local mall had similar aged cats up for sale). The people who did enquire were very nice but were cat beginners and as such probably wouldn't have understood the behavioural complexities that could accompany ex-feral cats. In the end all four cats stayed and I now have about 22 cats on the farm.

Once the decision was made to keep them, I named them. The red and white male is Aspen, the black female is Lulu, the black male is Mambo, and the tortie is Sorrento. (In the near future I'll do another post on naming cats).

A couple of months ago I moved them out of the gym and into the rumpus room which is larger, has a lot more light and is warmer in the winter. Three of the cats have since become lap-cats – they are purrers and cuddlers and exceptionally curious. The two males are now allowed outdoors and they follow me around as if I were the Pied Piper of cats. They must have an explorer gene to them because they are the boldest cats I have ever seen. Ordinarily, when I begin reintroducing feral cats to the outdoors again I take them to a small fenced off territory where they can enjoy the lawn and climbing up a big fig tree and jump up on an elevated platform full of pot plants. They slowly explore the area in ever increasing circles. It usually takes about three to five days before they climb through or over the barriers into the wider area. Well, Aspen and Mambo didn't hesitate. They checked out the area and were through the gaps in the fence within about 20 minutes – making friends with the other cats, eyeing off our two dogs, strolling happily onto the verandah of the house, and following me into my office. Aspen (pictured) has even gone on a morning walk to the dam with the dogs and my sheep.Quite extraordinary.

I also had three of the four desexed. Aspen and Mambo sailed through but Lulu wasn't so lucky. When she woke up from the operation, she was blind. This is one of the reasons I haven't written for so long on this blog – I was extremely upset and pretty much maintained a vigil by her side for the first two weeks. As you can imagine, she was extremely traumatised. I'll do a separate blog post on Lulu and how I'm dealing with a blind cat. Needless to say I have not let her out of doors. 

In the meantime, Sorrento is the final cat to get desexed. She's content in the rumpus room but looks through the window to the farm sprawled out below her and I know she'd like to venture out. Feral cats are predominantly outdoor cats and I'm sure she'd like to get back to the land so to speak. I dare not let her out until she's desexed and has recuperated because I don't know whether I'll be able to catch her again and because we have a huge sexed-up stray male tabby roaming around who jumps on any females he sees. I declare outright and out loud – THERE WILL BE NO MORE KITTENS HERE ON THE FARM! THE BREEDING LINES ARE (NEARLY) CLOSED!

More pics to come in the next couple of days.

Socializing Feral Kittens Videos

"Not to plug but Gerber Chicken and Gravy No. 2 is the crack cocaine for kittens!"

Great line from a great set of videos. 

The Urban Cat League in the USA has put together a series of three educational videos that will help you socialize feral kittens. Some of the tactics employed are slightly different to what I've used in the past (I would never have thought to have used baby food, for example), however, it's always good to add new strategies to your repertoire. The over-riding lesson in here is that you need to be flexible in the way you work with individual kittens and cats, as they all have different responses and pathways to socialization. The vet in the series is a real hero!

US Feral Cat Welfare Groups

Here's a list of US-based Feral Cat Welfare groups that I've discovered:

Shadow Cats (Texas) – Dedicated to Trap, Neuter, Return and strongly advocates non lethal measures to reduce outdoor cat populations.

Colony Cats (Ohio) – Their primary mission is to address cat overpopulation in central Ohio through public awareness and spay/neuter efforts.

Urban Cat League (New York) – Committed to improving the lives of New York City's homeless cats.

New York City Feral Cat Initiative (New York) – Helping New York City's feral and stray cats.

Alley Cat Allies (Maryland) – Dedicated to protecting and improving the lives of US cats.

I'll add these links to the right hand margin of this blog. I'd also like to add feral cat welfare groups from other countries so please send me any appropriate links if you come across them. 

Mimsy - the Houdini of Cats

Good news, everyone. Last week I finally captured shy Mimsy, the last fertile feral female living on the farm. This has been an 18-month endeavour and I'm mighty pleased with myself. I've mentioned her before on this blog – she and the other mature feral cats have just been too smart to step into cat traps so I've had to think outside the box so to speak. I worked out a strategy similar to that used on Sweetie a few months ago, although this time I actually used two cat cages instead of one in order to increase my odds of catching her, especially when there were other cats eating at that particular feeding station. 

I set the cat cages down inside the cattery (see previous post) where I fed them breakfast and just left them there with their doors open 24/7 so the cats thought of them as benign objects. In the mornings I would put a little pile of food on the outside of the door, in the interior of the cage at the entry point with a little trail leading to the back of the cage. I then sat behind the cage while the cats ate so they all got used to me. What happened was that the other less cautious cats would walk inside the cages and eat the food. I in turn would just ignore them. Mimsy, of course, witnessed this and began gradually letting down her guard.

The timing had to be absolutely right and I had to keep refining my technique from morning to morning. For example, I had initially lined the interior of the cat cages with towels but found that it got under the cats' paws or would block their view of the food at the back. The cats also sometimes dragged out the towel when they snatched the food from the inside. I also found that if I slightly elevated the cage on a thin plank of wood it would aid in the swing-action of the doors. Furthermore, because it is getting colder over here in Australia (it's Autumn) I had to use a smellier bait (odour is suppressed in cold weather) – tinned fish did the trick. On top of that I had to position myself so that I could shift quickly and not give myself away with any sounds or extraneous movements. I also had to hold back on the milk and the dried food which I traditionally left out for the cats to get them completely focused on the food I wanted them to eat inside the cat cage. 

On the morning in question it all went swimmingly. It so happened that Mimsy was the only cat who came into the cattery. I had left two piles of food on the outside of the two cages to increase my chances of catching her and she ate the first lot then did a snatch and grab from the interior (that is, she would poke her head inside the cage, grab the food and then eat it on the outside of the cage). Then ... miracle of miracles ... she slowly walked into the cage. I had to wait until two thirds of her body was inside. I knew I would only have one opportunity and I had to make it count, otherwise she would be on to me and I'd never catch her again. But there she was – eating away with just her rump and tail on the outside. I just lurched over the top and swung the cage door closed on her backside and secured it. She panicked a little but then settled down more quickly then I had thought. I then walked the cage to my car and strapped it into the back seat with a seat belt then drove immediately to the vet (they open at 7.30 on weekdays). She did not meow once.

That night, I picked her up at about 6pm and again she was completely quiet. She was sitting up and seemed calm. I've never had an experience like this – most cats who are frightened will be very vocal. I had prepared the gym at home (where I had previously kept the Xmas kittens) and walked inside and put the cage onto the carpet. Then I just slowly eased open the cage door. Before I even had time to step back, she was out like a bullet and hiding under the mini trampoline. I left her some food and water and then quietly withdrew.

The next morning I made my way back to the gym to give Mimsy her breakfast and to check on her progress. She had eaten her dinner and I expected her to be hungry. I could not find her. I looked everywhere – behind  and on top of fridges, under exercise equipment, in boxes – nothing. I thought she may have been hiding in plain sight and then came back with a torch in daylight like a CSI investigator to see if I had missed her. Nothing. I then sent somebody else in to look for her. Nothing. I couldn't understand it. The window was closed except for about an inch and the screen door was completely shut and I knew nobody else had gone in to see her during the night. What's more, I had wedged a container against the door and it was still in place.

I was quite perplexed but thought that if she had escaped she would head straight home so I was up the hill and looked around the perimeter of the cattery. She was there – interacting with her friends Hissy Fit and Diamond. I was gob-smacked. Mimsy was obviously a Houdini and smart and supple enough to escape. My only theory was that somehow she had wedged open the screen door and squeezed through a gap either on the top or bottom.

The upshot is that she appears to be her normal self and that the entire episode didn't seem to stress her out too much. She just wanted to get back to business and for her that means reuniting with her companions and getting back to normal life on the hill.

Mimsy was an excellent mother – we have kept six of her babies who are beautiful healthy cats in their own right with wonderful temperaments – but her days of reproducing are over. Now it's her time, and if Sweetie is anything to go by (Sweetie has put on healthy weight and is having a wonderful single life) then Mimsy will do just fine.

Apologies

Apologies for taking so long between blog posts but we've had a series of animal tragedies and deaths in the family and I'm too upset to blog about it at the moment. I'll be back soon to recount the stories, which could potentially help others in similar situations.

Motherly Love Beyond Cats

This is just too beautiful to resist – it SO brought tears to my eyes.

Sweetie's Recovery

I mentioned in a previous post that I had finally managed to catch and desex Sweetie, one of the fertile females on the farm. What I haven't had a chance to do yet is tell you about her recuperation, which has given me some amazing insights into animal behaviour and has spun my perceptions around.

I ended up letting Sweetie stay for about a week in the rumpus room. She slept, ate a lot and talked to me. She appeared to be quite comfortable and relaxed during that time and the scar on her abdomen looked to be healing nicely.

On the appointed release date I opened the door and just stood back thinking she'd give me the evil eye, do a mad dash for the door and then disappear for a few days. I was SO totally wrong. She didn't move for several hours. I think she liked the room service. She finally decided it was time to vacate the premises in the late afternoon, although it wasn't without some emotional complications. 

She immediately sought out her best feral friend Boots (a desexed black male with white socks) who, after sniffing her, turned his back and walked away. She meowed plaintively and rubbed herself against him again. He just gave her the cold shoulder and moved on. She appeared to be very confused. It was like she wanted to reconnect again after a separation, but he had snubbed her. This was very unlike his previous observed behaviour. Even if she went off to have kittens and then returned after a long stay away, these two have always reunited with great affection. I suspect he smelled the trace odours of the veterinary clinic on her and that he sensed she was still not fully recovered and that was why he turned his back and walked away. I've noticed that many of our cats give their sick companions a wide berth and want little or nothing to do with them until they're better. Watching this particular interlude was actually quite heartbreaking because on some level I sensed her pain and her confusion. Cats obviously don't process thoughts like humans do but they (like most creatures) do feel and have an emotional life. 

The good news is that the next day they were fine together and since then they've been acting like a young couple in love – they curl up and sleep with each other all day, clean each other and go for strolls with each other. The affection has returned and the bond has been strengthened. Sweetie, contrary to expectation, has embraced her new life and is looking healthy (you can no longer see the scar) and has a new aura of confidence and relaxation about her. She stays close to the house and only ventured away for the first time a couple of days ago.