Kitty HMO

Six months ago Uncle Onslow was diagnosed in the early stages of stomach cancer. He was not showing signs of it yet, the cancer was diagnosed through blood work. We decided to make this year his best yet. His favorite activity is gardening. We let him out of the cattery so he can work with us while we are in the garden. Of course, his idea of working doesn't include weeding. Or watering. Or planting. Or harvesting. Actually, he doesn't do any work at all. He just lays in the shade and supervises us.

Onslow is the patriac of our herd of cats. Two days ago he had his first bad day from the cancer. He didn't come in to eat. I found him laying on the straw next to the cat mint. He didn't wake up right away and he was cold to the touch. Eventually, he did raise his head. When I stood him up he would just lay back down. I was certain he would not make it through the day. But by evening he perked back up again. He seems OK now but it was a long day waiting to see whether he would pull out of it. The cats have been together for years. It was interesting to watch the other cats. Throughout the day each of the cats went over to Onslow and groomed his face. For the past two days Padme has slept next to Onslow, wherever he is resting. It was touching to see how each of the cats took time to take care of him.

My neighbor and I take care of a lot of cats. I always joke that the cats stand on the side of the highway with a sign that says 'kitty HMO and kitty soup kitchen this way,' with an arrow pointing to our houses. Somehow they know that if they end up on either doorstep they will be taken care of. So we will keep watching Onslow. When he can't handle being outside anymore, we will have the indoor HMO ready for him in our spare bedroom.

Newt

Newt was a feral calico female cat born in 1998. She lived in a stone two story abandoned building behind my house. We named her Newt after the little girl in Aliens. This cat was tough, clever and sharp. She lived six years, which is double the life span for a feral cat. She figured out that the higher up off the ground she stayed, the safer she was. To get to her safe place, she would jump onto a dumpster, then up on a first story roof, up once again to the second story roof line. From there she would walk about fifty feet, then turn and walk straight down a ledge that was as wide as a stone on its' side. After about six feet, she would cross to the next roof line and walk into a rotted hole just under the eave of the top of the building.

It was a great spot for her. No other cats seemed to know about it and dogs couldn't get to her. Newt would come to the house twice a day to eat, but we never really knew where she spent the rest of the day. Sometimes, in the winter nights, she would stay in the first cattery we built because it was warm.One spring we knew she was pregnant and we were pretty sure she had the babies in the abandoned building. I had to limit my search since the building was not safe to be in. It was officially condemed in 1966 after a tornado, but 40 years later had never been repaired. One evening after work we came home to find the building had collapsedWe didn't see Newt for almost three weeks. We were sure that she and the babies died. Then one Sunday afternoon, she came down the driveway from the alley. She was weaving and stumbling. Though we will never know the real story, we surmised that the babies were still alive and that she refused to leave them. It was obvious that she hadn't eaten or had much to drink in the time she was gone. Two weeks later she brought two kittens to the house. They were very cute!We brought them in the house to socialize and litter box train them. We were able to find a good home for them. It took the rest of the summer to tame Newt enough to let us hold her. As soon as we could catch her, we had her spayed. For the next five years, within minutes of working outside in the yard, Newt would show up.

She would stay with us as long as we were outside.She loved getting attention, then she would tuck in some place where she could see us, but where we could not touch her. In the fall I started putting her food just inside the back door so she would get used to coming in the house. She would come in to eat and visit, then want back out. Her second winter she soon realized that sitting by the fireplace in a cuddler was much better than being outside. But at nightfall she wanted back out. We never could get her to stay inside with us at night. Then one summer evening in 2005 she didn't come home. She was the first animal that I lost to anything other than old age.

Sleeping Cats

Cats will find the oddest places to sleep. Sometimes they will actually use the bed you bought them. Sometimes, they will use the bed you bought the other cat, even though this bed is too small.

They tend to take over your bed

And if that doesn't work, they will take over the dogs' bed.

There are cats that need more than one bed.

Of course, there are two cats who like to sleep in one bed.


Up high places are warm and safe.


Cats get stuck in the sun.


Sometimes, they just like to be alone in the linen closet.


And sometimes, they like to sleep where the action is.

The Cattery

We live downtown in a small city of 700 people. While not the busiest city, it does have traffic and sometimes not so nice people. We also live behind main street, where there is some commerce. As a result, we built a cattery to house the stray cats that we adopted.
Our cats range in age from four to ten. They have the inside back 8x10 foot of a building. They can also go outside as they wish to almost 900 square feet of kennel area that is fenced and covered with bird netting. We have grassy areas, ground cover, shrubs and flowers planted for them. I will go into detail in a different post about what plants we have found useful.
At first, it was hard for us to pen them up. Tom and I grew up where cats are never collared or penned. Cats just come and go as they please. But, except for Dobbie, all the cats thought the pen was great. Dobbie liked to hunt and had a large range he traveled. The entire first year he was in the pen he sat in the catnip patch both stoned and pouting. Now he thinks it is great to be in there. The two oldest cats, Onslow and Emmett, prefer the cattery and will decline chances to go out into the real world. Toula, the calico, thinks the cattery is great. She was two years old before she had a chance to go outside at all. The cattery is all she wants to know about. The cattery is five years old now. We had to rearrange some of the interior to accommodate older cats who cannot jump as high.

December 11, 2007 most of the outside fencing was damamged in an ice storm. The cats had a much smaller area to wander in for the winter. However, the next spring we increased the size of the outside area from 720 square feet to the current size of 900 square feet