After the tragic death of poor Tessie the Tortoise last June, my wife and the kindhearted folks of the Woburn Feral Cat Coalition tracked down and captured the combined litter of Tessa's and her sidekick Pepi's kittens so that they could be socialized and placed in good homes. One of wee kits managed to dodge the feral kitten round-up and started tagging along with Pepi to our house during feeding times. We named the orange and white ball of fuzz "P.J." as in "pajamas," "Pepi Junior," or perhaps as a subconscious homage to the Intrepid Mariner (and Friend to Felines) of the South Coast.
Over the past few weeks, Maura and the folks from the WFCC have been staking out the feral cat feeding sation in our driveway in hopes of trapping the dynamic mother-and-child duo so that Pepi could be spayed and released and little "Peej" could be socialized for adoption before his feral ways could become too ingrained (though I've yet to encounter a feral in our colony that didn't become human-friendly after spending some time around the wife and I. Maura tells me I'm a "cat whisperer," whatever that means).
Pepi, however, has turned out to be as elusive as Robert Denby, and can smell a set-up a mile away even though the irresistable aroma of canned sardines. While Peej has inherited his mom's cunning ways, the WFCC was finally able to trap the little fellow last night while Maura was at a roller derby bout and I was at Target trying to recapture my lost youth via action figures. (What, the Kid Flash shirt didn't already clue you in that I'm a major fucking geek?)
Pepi, alas, still remains at large, and quite possibly pregnant again, but Peej is now chilling out in a little pen we set up for him to feel secure as we try and get him acclimated to humans and indoor life. I've been letting him curl up on my lap while I read so that he can take in his new, strange surroundings from a safe vantage point, and it's been working out pretty well so far (apart from the savaging my right hand took when I tried to clean off some of the dingleberries he brought with him). Our house's resident feline population isn't sure what to make of the new arrival yet, but we're hoping they adjust fairly soon so that we can let Peej roam free and discover the many comforts of housecatdom.
The First Gear - Leave My Kitten Alone (from the Pebbles, Vol. 6: The Roots of Mod LP, 1980) - Here's some fine tooth-and-claw freakbeat from the British Invasion period, possibly featuring (the sources aren't entirely in agreement) the guitar stylings of a young Jimmy Page.
Sunday, August 10, 2008
my kitten is a dream
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5 comments:
Whether the homage is "subconscious" or not (I prefer "semi-" or "un-"), it's a thrill to be mentioned in a post that may possibly feature a possible Jimmy Page.
Tommy, Maybelline, My Beloved, and I join in piping aboard your new shipmate. Assure him, O Cat Whisperer, that it's taking me some time to acclimate to The Beach, but it's also turned out pretty well so far.
WOW, what an honor, to have a feral kitten named after you!
Greetings. I am also honored to be the namesake's "beloved," Karie.
Congratualtions on another rescue. Your new addition, PJ, looks like a wonderful little imp. He is very lucky. Best wishes with his happily settling-in!
Congrats on the new addition.
My wife and I are pretty much the Pocono, Pa version of you guys (geeky, yet cool popculturephile - and - the "queen of all animals").
We've got a few feral colonies out on our property that we take care of (the two recent batches let us pick them up, groom them a bit and whatnot).
Sadly, there have been some heartaches, and for SOME damned reason, we have NO such wonderment as a feral cat coalition... heck, the last time I caught one of the most beautiful feral cats I've ever seen, I brought him to the vet, but they were full up with strays looking for homes and no other agency would take him (and I won't bring them to a "doomsday clock" timeline-centric kill-shelter), so I was forced to release him again, only for him to later get some harsh ear-mites and such.
He (and many others) still come around for the free grub and shelters we set up, but it breaks my heart that I can't do more about their plight.
(I know that some of my neighbors also take care of him - and other cats that make the 'rounds).
I gave some "Frontline" flea/tick meds to her to apply on him, since he lets her brush him).
There are no spay/neuter & release programs or discount facilities anywhere that I can find, and I really can't afford the heath-care of all these little guys.
Anyway, we have several of our own indoor-only cats, but one of the cutest and friendliest of the outdoor litter follows me around like a puppy.
His face alight whenever he sees me and gallops over to play.
(We called him "Bucky", because he was a fairly fearless sidekick to me. However, "Bucky" sounds too much like "Buddy" which is one of our indoor guys (who also follows me around like a pup), so we changed Buck's name to "Spanky", since he IS a Little Rascal).
He recently appeared, after a day AOL, looking miserably ill, and we took him in (I slept with him on the bathroom floor - to keep him company while isolating him from our indoor guys), and several vet visits later (he had conjunctivitis, respiratory infection, parasites, tapeworm, weird little tick aphids and a bloody sneeze. All of a sudden.
Healthy and happy one day - miserably ill a few days later obviously it was forming, but then he hit the wall)... I'm doing my best to get him back in the pink.
I'm giving him his meds and sleeping with him in the bathroom at nights (a comforter and a pair of "contamination clothes" that I only wear in that room with him).
But we still have a long way to go.
THEN, he'll have to go for the leukemia/aids tests and if he passes those, we'll neuter him and take him in.
If he fails those, we'll have to look for a safe-house for him.
One of those leukemia-colony houses.
It breaks my heart that I can't do all of this for the others (especially the two tiny step-kittens, whose sibling vanished after a terrible rainstorm and their mother vanished a month later after a different one (it rains here CONSTANTLY, and not any light spring rains either).
My wife believes that their mother knew that she was ill, and kept going away for longer periods, while pushing them to her sister/friend cat's brood.
Now they're with "spanky's" siblings and doing fine, but I'd love to get them as well.
Sadly, those two are quite small and hard to get anywhere near.
I can pick up two of the three other siblings, but I wouldn't have any recourse for them. One of them is waay to crazy and wild for our guys, and the other WOULD probably be a good fit, but I can't take him in as well - yet, if ever.
Thus, we keep them dry and well fed, and they play with abandon on our forested acres. They haven't left the immediate premises as of yet, but I know that one day they'll branch out, only coming back on occasion.
Anyway, didn't mean to be a downer or anything.
I just don't know what to do sometimes.
How do you take in all your strays?
Do you get them checked for contagious stuff (ie; worms, infections, diseases) before doing so?
If so, do you have separate quarters for them?
And if so, how do you handle the rotation of attentions?
Two of our indoor guys don't quite get along well.
"Buddy" loves everyone, but gets a bit frustrated with our only girl "Cissy", who since day one has done nothing but antagonize him.
She runs up to him, hooks a paw around his neck (with her incredibly long lemur-like arms) and punches him in the face. Then, while he's recovering from that shock she beats a hasty retreat.
So, due to all this, we have shifts of who can come out into the main part of the house at different times.
Buddy is alone in his room.
Cissy shares a room with Abbott, a big, black bear of a cat.
Buddy and Abbott get along, but Abbott gets timid.
Abbott and Cissy are wonderful together.
So, due to all this, we have separate playtimes for them.
Buddy & Abbott get "brother time" some mornings, where they play together while Cissy in in her room.
Then, Buddy has the house to himself.
Or they have the house while Buddy is in his room sleeping.
It's a juggling game.
We're hoping Buddy & Spanky (who are similar in nature) will be friends.
Especially after the loss of some of our other cats. The dynamic keeps changing.
Damn.... how did this get so long?
Sorry.
I guess I just had to vent a bit.
There's so much more to the insanity than what I related here.
Including various ailments and psychosis of the cats (and the wife and I)... it all gets to be a bit much at times.
PJ is a cutie.
I hope he will fit in just fine.
~P~
PTOR
Don't sweat it, P-Tor, I know exactly the feelings your talking about. We found the WFCC though a stroke of luck -- a flier posted in a petstore two towns over. Before that we had no idea how we were going to manage things.
Our colony has pretty much stabilized size-wize, so it's pretty easy keeping track of how the crew is doing. Most of the problems we've had to deal with have been minor so far -- wounded paws, colds, bite wounds -- an easily, if not cheaply taken care of. (It helps that I picked up some animal first aid skills from my late grandpa.) We try to keep the ferals vaccinated for rabies best we can.
We currently have one FIV positive cat in hospice scare in a large dog crate and let him out for a while each night under strict supervision.
Our adopted cats started off as a pair of pregnant sister ferals that the vet's wouldn't spay for health reasons, and we kept four of their eight kittens. We also took in one of the mamas' cousins when he got bit, had to be kept inside, and showed no interest in going feral again. The family bonds have kept the crew pretty close and free of fights. (Again, we were really lucky.)
It's rough, heartbreaking business, and you seem well aware, but what else can you do?
I think I glimpsed something about the beach in your blog. That said, do you think it's a good idea to take indoor kittens to the beach - I am thinking of popping over to the beach and am super curious to see what my beautiful Max will do. He's 4mths old. Any thoughts?
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