just a cat

Today Thomas explained to me that the spring water stays warm even on the coldest days and that if I put the food there, it won't freeze.

I moved the food to a partially submerged stone in the ruins of the old pump house. Thomas approves.

The weather is warm enough for the next few days that I'm comfortable trapping and releasing a cat.

Today was Sylvester II's day.

Does anyone recommend a good free web page/blog site where I can keep an online Cat-a-Log to track the cat colony?

The Sylvesters have a similar look, but different patterns of black on the body.

For (my) future reference:

OG Sylvester neutered Feb 6th 2023. Left side is mostly white with a few spots:

OG with Callie a year ago:

Sylvester II Neutered today, Jan 24th 2024:

Sylvester III not trapped yet, rarely present:

Sylvester II's release went well this morning and he is watching me from a distance as I post this.

I've been trapping for over an hour now. Making an extra effort to get Nike before she is 'with kittens'.

Her best friend Fluffy is making an effort of his own, but he is neutered.

Today's catch of the day is Boots. Most of these cats smash their face pretty bad trying to escape. I wish I could prevent that.

New cat!!!

Probably MY2020 (~4 y.o. = late 2019 or early 2020 production?).  Registration and tags were not a problem despite no VIN or MSO.
Nominally she should be an adult, but obviously she can still be quite goofy:

Her shelter name was... 'Slurp'?  I'm sure if I had to come up with 100's of cat names every year I'd get "creative" too.  Another cat was 'Munch', so it sorta makes sense...?

I think her new name will end up as "Sonett"  (yes, Saab reference, although "so loud she is" would apply more than "so neat it is").

Or, fully expanded with a diminutive language mismatch plus cultural appropriation: "iiná-Sonettchen".

Or maybe it will default back to "Little Squeaky Cat" which I've been using while trying to figure out a name.  [obligatory link to XKCD 'words for pets']

Her eye color changes from burnt orange to dark gold to olive green.

You know how a Cappuccino makes a Miata look big?  My other cat Coal is not exceptionally large at 8#, although he is extremely lean with very long legs.  New Cat is quite literally half his size and makes him look huge.  Observation: "kei cat" sounds like saying "kitty cat" with poor enunciation.

Here's a picture taken with a scale for scale (the scale is 12" x 1" wide; I realize 6" x 1/2" wide would look the same, but she is not that small!)

Random song association related to her first encounter with Coal.  He is pretty easy-going (he also frequently had a much larger tortie cat hiss at him), so he wasn't too bothered and more than willing to give her plenty of room.

Choose whatever specific "Gamer versus Real World" comparison you like: she is very good at some Cat Skills (amazingly patient at stalking, very good with toys on the ground) but somehow awful at others (like short-term memory or situational awareness or thinking to look up).
She'll look across the room at Coal sitting top of a chair and hiss; then she'll see a toy sitting on the floor under the chair and trot over to pounce on it; then she'll look up and be completely astonished to see a cat sitting on top of the chair!
Also, I'm no expert, but if you are in the middle of a close-quarters growling stare-down with a Dangerous Black Cat, I think it is not a good idea to suddenly curl up where you have been sitting and take a nap.

Apparently my phone uses a potato for the selfie camera (like I ever cared about using it before)

Sometimes it's hard for me to tell cats apart. As with the Sylvesters, a simple description can match several of them and I try to find specific keys to identify who is who. It's most important when I'm using the drop trap, to catch the ones that I have not caught yet.

I think that I have the brown Tabbys pretty well recognized now as long as there's good lighting. Tanya is more gray than brown like Allie. The stripes on Molly's back are very undefined and she's more of an amber color. James is larger than the females and has a more distinct brow...  What I'm worst at is initially guessing which sex they are. I think I've been wrong more often than right until I get a clear look at their back side while their tail is up.

I recently figured out that Bob is Bobbie - as in Roberta.

Bobbie has a tough time with the colony still, but is becoming more accepted. Tonight there were four cats about ten feet away as I was putting food out. Bobbie came running down the hill, came within arms reach and meowed at me. None of the ferals 'meow'. As soon as the food was in the bowl, she gulped it down in big bites - clearly very hungry. As I backed away the other cats approached and after a moment forced her out. I went back to the house and grabbed another small bowl of food. Set nearby they managed to eat without any more spats.

James from the back, Bobbie from the side, Allie looking at the camera, and 16 year old Caesar sitting on my desk:

Fluffy pausing for a photo on his way to morning feeding.

I was working in the yard with wife this past weekend when this guy aproached us. Very friendly and definitely not feral. It seems like he was lost or dumped.

We fed him and he was hungry.  We already have two cats so we made some internet posts to try to find the owner.  

No luck after a few days and he kept coming around for food.  I made him a cardboard box with bunch of towels to sleep in, but he didn't like it. 

Last night he showed up around 10pm for food. It was going to drop down to 25 degrees so we coaxed him into our enclosed porch for the night.  Turns out that he's playfull and cuddly. Definitely not a feral cat. 

Still no leads on the owner so we are taking him to the local no kill humane society later today.

I really think that he's a great cat and I hope somebody gives him a good home.ok

Peanut has definitely settled in. 

He's figured out how to used the cat doors to get in and out of the house, but appears to have decided to have had about enough of the outside to last him a long time. 
 

He's been a mouth-breathing little shiny happy person to the other cat. As he's spent most of his life so far just trying not to starve or freeze to death, it appears that he's just now starting to try to grow a brain. 

Had the crap surprised out of me when I found this state of affairs while walking into the bedroom. 
 

Perhaps some kind of detente has been reached. 
 

This morning, the house looks like a crime scene, but with feathers. 
 

I have some ideas regarding the perpetrator.

Ever have the feeling that someone is watching you?

...All the time.

A little over a week ago a neighbor texted this:

"And this beautiful ivory colored cat on my back deck I would love to keep her but you know this black cat that's next-door he terrorizes the neighborhood he whipped my cat just about every night that I didn't put them up somewhere and he goes down to the spring every day I don't know what he does down there I don't hear fights down there anymore but anyway Jon is this one of the spring cats?"

With this pic:

This beautiful ivory cat has settled onto her deck now and is gentle and tame. Mrs AAZCD gave her some cat food and a bed. She has lived alone since her husband died about 10 years ago. Even though she says she can't keep a cat, she loves having it and has named it Snowball.

Tomorrow I'm planning to pick him up and bring him to the vet for a check up, vaccinations and neuter. Hoping that she keeps him because they are good for each other.

We're having 2 bathrooms gut renovated.  After some down time, today has been a very busy day.

25% of our indoor cats are currently missing in action.  Hopefully they'll come back when it gets darker and colder outside, and quieter inside.

In reply to Duke :

I bet they will be back soon. Mine have 'disappeared', then turned up watching everything from a dark corner.

Snowball was great for the trip to the vet and is mostly recovered back at my neighbor's house.

My neighbor, Anne, said that her granddaughter wants to take him, but then listed reasons why that might not be best. She is going shopping for a cat box and some litter now.

AAZCD-Jon (Forum Supporter) said:

In reply to Duke :

I bet they will be back soon. Mine have 'disappeared', then turned up watching everything from a dark corner.

And, indeed we're back up to full tail count again.

I live on a fairly busy street.  We had previously lived in the sticks and were used to letting the cats out any time they wanted.  When we first moved here we had a few cats that could not adapt to the 100% indoor life style, and we lost a couple on our street.  Since then we've kept our cats indoors at all times, so it is stressful when one potentially gets outside unsupervised.

AAZCD-Jon (Forum Supporter) said:

Snowball was great for the trip to the vet and is mostly recovered back at my neighbor's house.

He seems like a good guy.  Hopefully it works out with your neighbor.

Last night feeding the ferals, I looked around with a light around to count eyes. One pair looked a little different. Opie trying to blend in. He cleans the bowls when the cats are finished.

Karacticus said:

This morning, the house looks like a crime scene, but with feathers. 
 

I have some ideas regarding the perpetrator.

Another bird delivered this morning-- this may be the fourth or fifth.

He's a freaking murder machine.

She's my favorite leg warmer. 
 

In January Nike was in heat. Gestation is about nine weeks. She's looking like she may drop kittens pretty soon. Here's a pic from this morning at the predawn feeding.

She's a small cat about one year old. I'm considering trapping her, but that gives me a big obligation for a couple months. It's probably best to let nature be nature and continue to care for her and her kittens as  have for all the ferals over the last year.

Edit: I read some web page articles about pregnant ferals. Trapping and holding a pregnant feral is strongly discouraged. The added stress can produce bad results. One article recommended a trap and spay to eliminate the kittens - Nope, not me. The best recommendation (my opinion) is to let it be and trap the kittens after they are weaned for TNR or socializing and adoption.  https://www.alleycat.org/community-cat-care/tnr-scenarios-pregnant-cat/

My best friend turns 16 next month.

https://www.alleycat.org/community-cat-care/caring-for-neonatal-kittens/

Nike had kittens. Abandoned and dead except for one. I was leaving home for work when a neighbor ran up to me and said they were on her porch and one was still breathing. We cut the cord from the sack, I ran back into my house for a heat pad and some syringes. The pet store was open still and I grabbed a can of kitten milk.

I'm at work now with a kitten. It was in a fetal position, cold and barely breathing at first. I have cleaned him, fed and burped him.

He's in a pet carrier now on a bed with a heat pad underneath and wrapped in a towel. At first he crawled out of the towel and almost out of the carrier. All settled in and napping now. I have gone from expecting it to be dead within an hour to thinking he's going to make it. No plans other than caring for him through the night and going to see Bill the vet in the morning. Hoping for a quiet night at work - feeding and burping every two hours.