wild few days....

Sorry we have been scarce for a few days.

Thanks for all the comments about Bug.

Mom was gone for a few days. Our grandpa is in Minnesota getting some medical treatment and mom and her brother drove up on Saturday, spent a couple of days, then came home on Tuesday. Grandpa is doing better and they enjoyed seeing mom and her brother. It gave them all a break.

Taquito is no longer limping. And....she, Blanco and Queso were spayed/neutered on Wednesday. Which means next step is Petfinder and to the adoption center. Salsa and Tostado will go for surgery on Monday.

Tuesday night mom heard and saw a couple of big tomcats out on the driveways having a fight. Mom broke it up and then set the trap hoping to get one of them. No luck....but we know they are out there so mom will keep setting it and hopes to catch them both. Cross your paws.

Saturday morning on the way out of town, mom had to drop Rome off at the rescue's adoption center. He was VERY snotty and not feeling well. He hasn't come back to us yet. Mom has been in touch with the rescue lady and they are having to syringe feed him. Please send him some purrs.

London and Cairo are doing great. London is a little snotty. Cairo is so full of himself that it is hilarious.

Mom is going to spend the weekend with all of us and all the kittens just unwinding. And we hope to get around to visit our blogger friends too.

the sads

Mom got a call yesterday morning. It was from the lady who adopted Bug.

Jane was out all day on Sunday and heard Bug crying. She was under the sofa and couldn't move her back legs. Jane ran her to the emergency vet but they think she had a blood clot. There wasn't much of anything that could be done.....so Bug was helped over The Bridge on Sunday. She was our sweet bottle baby and mom had to work hard to be able to adopt her out. She didn't live a long life but we've had contact with her family and know how much she was loved.

Throwback Thursday

Mom was going through some pictures and found these of the state kittens from September of 2010 and they cracked her up.....

Nevada in the back

left to right: Bug, Carolina, Utah, Georgia, Main and Dakota 

(and yes, mom had to refer to her foster list to get that right)

 Maine sleeping on top of Utah

Utah was the tiniest of the bunch so mom would give her extra canned food

Bug was the clean up crew 

this cracks mom up every time....

Chiclet and some of the kitts

Remember, mom found Bug under some steps that Labor Day weekend and then took in Chiclet and her kittens in hoping that Chiclet would adopt Bug. No such luck, but at least Bug had someone to grow up with. Hard to believe it has been four years.....

National Feral Cat Day.....

Today is National Feral Cat Day started by Alley Cat Allies.

The rescue we work with started out doing TNR as their main goal....and while they do adoptions and rescues, their main purpose is still very much TNR. From helping those that request help to going into neighborhoods (they are working in a trailer park right now) to help out, there are many trappers and colony care takers in this group. One couple takes care of two colonys and feeds about 100 pounds of food per month. All of the cats are fixed and vaccinated - and they can track new cats and make sure they see if any of the current colony needs medical care. The rescue helps with their expenses as much as possible, but they cover a lot themselves as well. It is an act of love.....  If you go to the rescue's facebook page, you can even vote for your favorite feral cat house as part of a contest they are having. :)

Of course, for us, this is personal.....  our baby Bug was found as a tiny kitten born to a feral mom and abandoned - but raised as a bottle baby and then adopted.

Of course, the great Junior was trapped later that summer and now lives with us.

Junior checking out the tiny kid in baby jail

In our neighborhood, mom and the neighbor lady (on their own) TNR'd 6 adults and trapped an additional 5 kittens (the memorial kittens) after Junior and Bug.

Grace and Audrey

Jimmy Stewart

Annie (or Oakley) either the kittens mom or aunt

 Blackie (not the daddy but a big boy hanging around with his girls)

And of course, there is our Allie girl that gave us the alcohol kittens and after being spayed, ear tipped and released, lives in our garage.

So, how can you help?  Support a local TNR group....either with your time or donations. Honestly, there is a great satisfaction to putting out a trap and coming back to find a cat in it and helping to stop overpopulation (mom still does her happy dance when it happens). Can't do that? Consider donating money or old towels/sheets (to cover traps), food or even live traps (check your local farm stores - you can find them on sale sometimes). Any little bit helps. And contact your local humane agency and let them know that your support TNR - not trap and kill (which a lot of communities are still doing). And for fun, you can follow the Spartanburg Animal Services in South Carolina on facebook....they are being a great example of animal control being feral friendly!!!

National Feral Cat Day.....

Alley Cat Allies is celebrating National Feral Cat Day....  TODAY!!!

Most of you know that we are BIG fans of TNR. And we are lucky enough to live in a city that has a very good local low cost clinic (SOS) that will take feral cats - the same day you trap them (ok, provided the clinic is open, but still.....)

TNR is how this guy came to live with us:

(who knew this would grow into the 16 pound orange menace)

And there are the cats we have trapped in the neighborhood over the last two years - and the kittens that we caught and have been adopted. Bug's mom was TNR'd, so was Doc and Sally's mom and the memorial day kittens.

Most recently there was Allie and the alcohol kittens......

 

Not only have the kittens found home (or are looking), the adults are no longer able to reproduce and are being cared for the best we can (shelter and food).

There are lots of ways you can help:
   1. see if there are events in your area
   2. TNR in your neighborhood - or contact a local group that is doing TNR in your area
       we have two around here that mom supports: Colony Cats and Black and Orange Cat Foundation
   3. Like Alley Cat Allies on Facebook

And there are so many other ways to help. And every little step takes us one more step closer to a day when ferals are not killed for being feral.

You can only laugh.......

Mom says it is a good thing she has a sense of humor.....

Thanks for the words of encouragement. It means a lot to mom. She got a little choked up reading some of your comments. :)

Oh and to @Furries - Silver is pretty snotty. She has an upper respiratory thing. Silver has been very good about eating, but Friday afternoon she was acting a little more....blah. Mom thought she was a little dehydrated - which can happen when she is eating little bits at a time (of canned food)....so mom had the rescue lady give her fluids to give her system a boost. And it must have worked. :)

Annie and Wild Bill got baths on Sunday.....they were a mess. Mom is hoping since they are getting their teeth in, she can start to wean them. That is the plan.

Oh - and baby-jail has been resurrected:

Annie trying the food - first and only time so far

Silver trying to figure out what is going on

(and yes, she has gone INTO baby jail to check out their dinner)

aww - Annie on the left, Wild Bill on the right

Here's the laugh or cry part of this: yesterday during lunch at work, she got a text from Bug's mom. They have seen Grandma around the house. With.....4 white kittens. (mom says she is having problems typing this without laughing) We know, it shouldn't be funny, but......

For now, Bug's family is keeping on an eye on the kittens (the neighbor can see them from her screened porch). Depending on how the weaning goes, mom may get them next weekend. We just don't want Grandma getting ideas and moving those kittens. And we tell mom it could be worse - she could have 6 bottle babies (wow - she went pale when we brought that up).

Not what we planned....

Mom got an email about a week ago from.... Bug's mom!!! Not a Bug update though - they have a momma cat and kittens and needed some help and suggestions.

Mom looked back at the blog and realized not all of you may know about Bug. She was found Labor Day 2010 and was mom's first (and really only) bottle baby. That is the tiny white kitten you saw yesterday. She is now a year and a half old. Her mom says she isn't too wild about new people but LOVES her daddy. You can read more about her here.  Mom got to scratch her ears and love on her a little. She has grown into quite the big girl!! And she is a biter too..... some people's kids (wait - that would be our fault - oh well).

But, the call was really about the mom and kittens. The goal was to leave the kittens with mom and keep an eye on them. But, the kittens were getting bigger and the kids were getting worried. Mom agreed to help them with the kittens and the goal was to trap the mom, give her time in a crate with the kittens until they were weaned and then spay/release mom.

Mom ended up taking the kittens and the trap was set. And we caught.....a male orange tabby. Took him to be neutered (one more stop on mom's adventure Tuesday). The family agreed to keep the trap and try again. As of this morning, they have 2 traps and caught: a raccoon and another orange male tabby. That momma cat is being pesky.

So, let's do a head count: there is us. Wendy and the kittens in the bathroom. Silver running around (mom gave up on the crate - it was an issue of contagiousness but mom figured that ship had already sailed and Silver was screaming in the crate). And now this:

the bigger one is the girl (Annie), the smaller her brother (Wild Bill)

Bug's new family doesn't live that close to us, but don't they look suspiciously like a certain tiny white baby picture from yesterday??? Anyhow, mom guess them to be about 3 weeks old. And yes....this means we have bottle babies unless that momma cat gets her furry butt in a trap (please please let her get in the trap). Oh, and mom says don't do the math and get the total number - it might make her look even more crazy than she really is. :)

wacky week.....

Didn't mean to panic anybody yesterday..... we are all fine. And so are the kittens.... mostly. :) Mom ended up taking an emergency "vacation" day yesterday to get it all together.

Before we get to that, could you please go visit Finn & Tucker? They are holding a comment-a-thon to support Best Friend's Back in Black 2 event!!!

Silver was not acting right was had gotten snotty. Mom got the rescue vet to check her and she is sick. So, now she is crated and taking meds. And she is NOT happy about it. However, so long as she continues to eat, she should be fine in about a week....

Wendy and the kittens are doing ok. And we now have a list of who is who. Mom had the shelter vet check out Arby (male black/white) and BK (tiny male tabby). Arby is now on meds as his eye swelled up. BK is about half the size of his siblings. The goal is to give Wendy some time to herself to gain some weight and monitor BK to make sure he is gaining weight....Mom tried that last night.... yeah, she doesn't so much like other cats. Not sure how this is going to work. Mom said something about leaving the shower door open to give her a place to escape.

We don't want to this to get too long.....so we will leave you with this picture as a teaser for mom's other adventure:

Does this kitty look familiar????

600 posts.....

Wow.....that doesn't seem possible. When we first started out on 8/10/09 mom was writing about us but she was doing all the posting. We have since taken over.

 We have had 122 fosters in that time - lots of ups and downs and serious amounts of cuteness!!

(two of the g's - George & Gigi)

Mom raised her first bottle baby (Bug):

 And got involved in TNR - which got us this:

And along the way we have met great people, kitties and woofies!!!

Mom will be laying out the tempations, niptinis and some peanut butter treats for the woofies. Stop by and party with us......