While I was out tending and harvesting the garden, the girls took care of eye baby.
We’re still having to feed her with the modified bottled, and she eats from it voraciously – and if we’re not fast enough, she’ll try to eat our fingers!
Then her eyes get washed and treated, and she gets set out in the sunroom for the day.
By the time I was heading back inside, that was all done, so of course I was keeping an eye out for her.
I found her in baby jail.
With a friend, watching over her!
Literally, watching over her!
Or should I say, on her!
I have no idea which litter that black and white kitten is part of, or who its mama is, but it’s one of the ones that is a bit less skittish, and likes to hang out in the sun room.
After I finished with the morning routine, I headed out early to meet with the Cat Lady, so I could do some shopping – and window shopping – in advance. This time, I took the route through my mother’s town, as I wanted to get gas, then stop at the feed store to pick up cat food – and pay the difference from the last time I was there. That was when I bought a 20 pound bag of cat food, not noticing that the stitching on the top had come loose, and ended up spilling it all over the floor when I hoisted the bag on my shoulder!
I’m glad I left early. The highway is still being resurfaced; right now they’re at the stage of adding fresh oil over the new chips that were laid down. It’s looking fantastic! However, I did end up getting stopped on the highway to wait for the pilot truck, which ensures traffic doesn’t go above 60kph/37mph over the newest section.
Once I got through that area and into town, I was very happy to see that the gas prices had dropped. The last time I saw them in the town closest to us, it was $149.9/L, while the town my mother is in is always a penny higher – but now it was $140.9/L (On my way home, I took the alternate route to avoid construction, and the gas station I would have gone to otherwise was still at $149.9/L.) So that was a nice surprise.
When I stopped at the feed store, asked to get a 40lb bag of cat food, then asked about paying the difference between the 20 and 40 pound bags, explaining what happened. That’s when I heard a voice coming from the office behind him saying, nope! It was the same guy from last time that said to give me a 40lb bag when the 20lb bag spilled! He would not hear of my paying the difference, and said that it was not an uncommon problem.
As we were talking, I asked if they had any lysine. I explained a bit about trying to find bulk quantities, like for horses – I know they come in 2lb and 4lb buckets. I said I haven’t found a local supplier, and my attempts to buy some online failed at the border for some reason. He didn’t have any, but they made a note and will look into it. He might be able to get some for me.
After I paid for the kibble, the guy behind the desk came out to grab a bag for me from the adjoining building and loaded it in the truck for me. He made a comment about how that will last me a while. I said, about a week. He was shocked to hear that, so I told him we are caring for a colony. I don’t know how many we have right now, but in the winter, we’ve had a high of 33 (at least, that’s what I can remember right now). His jaw literally dropped!
I didn’t even mention the 22 we currently have inside! They need more variety in kibble than the outside cats, since they can’t supplement with hunting, so they won’t be getting feed store kibble.
Oh, while I was paying for the kibble, the guy behind the counter wondered out loud if I had a card.
Card?
It turns out the feed supplier has a deal where, if you buy a dozen bags of feed, you get one free. So they keep a Rolodex type organizer of cards for people, and made up a new one for me.
All the more reason to stock up on kibble for the outside cats from here! A 40lb bag is $60, and it won’t take us long to reach a dozen, if we buy there regularly. I’ll still be getting some from Costco, etc. for the inside cats, but I’d much rather get four 40lb bags at a time here, than eight 20lb bags at Costco.
That done, I headed to the smaller city and had time to do some shopping (more on that later) before meeting the Cat Lady, and three of her daughters. She had the antibiotics for eye baby – and a cat carrier! She got it as a donation. It’s an unusual one, triangular in shape, that folds down flat. Not something that can hold any of the heavier cats, but perfect for kittens and light cats.
(David has already claimed it.)
As we talked, she told me that Button is doing very well on the antibiotics, even though it’s only been a couple of days. She said they flushed his ears while at the vet, and there was a lot of black coming out of there, then treated him for eat mites. Now his hearing is back! So that is more good news, as they thought the hearing loss might be permanent. His appetite picked up as well, which is very encouraging.
As we were talking, I found out more about The Wolfman’s eye injury. It is fully recovered, but all I’d heard until now was that they figured the injury was some sort of blunt force trauma. Either he ran into something, fell onto something, or something fell onto his eye. My only guess is that he fell off of something. We can’t think of anything else.
Well, it seems that, even after the eye was healing and the swelling was gone, it was still leaking a lot. Then, about a week or two later, while getting checked, they found something had been pushed out of his eye as it healed! The vet said it looked like a nail (as in, from a cat’s claw), but she thinks it looked more like a sliver of wood. Either way, once that was removed, the eye stopped leaking.
Go figure!
That makes the cause of his injury even more of a mystery. A piece of claw I can understand, though that wouldn’t cause the blunt force trauma injury, but a sliver of wood? From what? With that one, unfortunately, there are too many possibilities, but not with blunt force trauma, too!
The Wolfman, meanwhile, has asserted his dominance over the other cats in the household! This is very different from our place, but he was brought in as a tiny ball of fluff with a dislocated shoulder, so he was too young to assert any sort of dominance in the pecking order here. Once in a new home, I guess that changed things for him!
He is also terrible for stealing drumsticks off of roasted chickens and turkeys!
The Cat Lady has gotten very familiar with the butcher at a particular grocery store, and they let her know when, for example, whole chickens are available for about $4 a bird. Normally, a whole chicken is about $16-$18, at least! When they’re super cheap like that, it becomes less expensive to feed the cats freshly roasted chicken than cat food. It’s the same with other types of meat and seafood; typically, when things are very close to their best-by date, they mark them down dramatically, and put on an “enjoy tonight” sticker to let people know they need to be cooked right away. Ideal for feeding the cats – but something we can’t take advantage of, because we live too far from the city.
Meanwhile, along with the medication, the cat carrier, and a couple of rings of turkey garlic sausage she got for just pennies a ring, so she bought over 30 of them (they had a cash back deal that allowed her to buy more cat food. 😄), she gave us a small bag of kibble. It hadn’t been opened yet, except that The Wolfman and chewed his way through the side of the bag, so it was taped up. 😄
It was great to get together with the Cat Lady. She is so awesome!
I’m also glad I brought an extra ice pack, and was able to split things up a bit to make sure the medication was kept cold. The fridge and freezer stuff I had were in the cab of the truck, so I could keep the AC going, too. It was way too hot to have anything like that in the box of the truck!
I just checked the weather again. When I started writing this, we had cooled down to 25C/77F. We’re now back up to 27C/81F! At least we’re now expecting some light showers this evening. That will give the garden some relief!
I’m not complaining, though. As unpleasant as I’m finding the heat and humidity, I’ll take this as long as we can get it, and be thankful for it, just for the garden!
I don’t know that the outside cats would agree with me, though. When I head outside, I find them splayed out in any shade they can get, all over the place!
Speaking of which, it’s almost time for my evening rounds, and I’ve got one more post to write…
The Re-Farmer
The Re-Farmer 