Yesterday evening, I headed outside a few times, just to try and get over my funk. Plus, I just couldn’t be inside and not do anything productive, even though I did rather waste the day.
The first time I headed out, I was checking on the kittens, but only saw two.
That little tabby looks so angry all the time! 😄 That’s the one I found in the garage.
I have not seen that blue eyed black and white kitten all day today. Not sure what’s going on. That is one of Lady Hypotenose’s litter.
I also haven’t seen the other two foundlings I wrote about here. I don’t know who the mother is, but it seems they’ve been moved.
I started to check on the old kitchen garden when I heard the tiniest of meows from… somewhere. It took a while of listening before I could pinpoint a direction, and it was most definitely a distressed meow.
I found Ink’s litter. They’re in the collapsed log building by the fire pit.
One of the kittens had fallen down!
There’s an old tire leaning against the wall on the outside. The kitten was on it, crying out to its three siblings, above. The adult cats can get in and out of this old building fine, but small kittens like this… well, they can fall out, but they can’t get back in!
I was able to quickly grab it and lift it up to the top of the wall, where its siblings were. It did NOT like it, but it took only a fraction of a second, and it was free of the scary human. After they all scattered, I lifted my phone as high as I could and took a picture in the general direction they ran to. That’s the last picture in the slide show above, cropped down to just the two kittens that were visible.
I was happy to see that white one’s eyes were open, because in the other pictures, they looked glued shut! What I can’t tell is if the kittens are just starting to get into their leaky eye phase, or if they are getting out of it.
Later on, I took the log I’d removed the the old kitchen garden bed, where it’s being replaced with wattle weave, and brought it over. I was able to lean it in that low spot in the top log and settle it in place firmly. The kittens can now get in and out of the building on their own, rather than Mom having to try and carry while jumping down from the top, herself!
That was yesterday evening.
This morning, as I was in the old kitchen, about to prepare food for the outside cats, I saw this through the window.
Note that cat in the carrier. That turned out to be Frank. In the next picture, you can see she slammed herself into the cuddle puddle in the cat bed! The Grink is in that bed, along with Eyelet, Grommet and Sir Robin. The Grink isn’t much bigger than the kittens!
Frank didn’t stay, though.
As I was going around to all the food bowls and trays, I was watching Frank. She was in the water bowl shelter, checking out the cat beds and box in there. She was in the sun room, checking out the cat carriers. She was going from place to place, poking around and moving on.
I realized she had to be looking for a place to give birth.
I messaged my daughters and asked them to put fresh puppy pads in the cat carriers in the sun room, in hopes she would use one of those.
The sun room littles have discovered the cat cage. They are really skittish and quick to run away, but I’ve been seeing four of them consistently.
Three of Lady Hypotenose’s babies were snuggled in one of the beds in the cat cage – I put a small bowl of food in there for them, too. They started to use the cat bed in the other cube as a littler, though, which was something I needed to deal with later.
Angry kitten, meanwhile, was snuggling with Grommet in the shelf at the window.
I could not see the black and white anywhere. Hopefully, it’s just under the counter shelf. Even Lady Hypotenose seemed to be looking for it!
I pretty much finished off the kibble with the morning feeding, though, so I headed out after breakfast. I decided to go to the feed store in the town north of us, instead of my mother’s town. I got two 40 pound bags, which should last us two weeks. After picking that up, I went into town and checked out their Red Apple store. I found a cat cave of a particular design I’ve been looking for for a while – one that doesn’t collapse easily. I was actually thinking to pick up a clear storage bin and finding a way to turn that into a secure cat cave a mother might like to give birth in, but the only ones they had that were the right dimensions was insanely expensive. The fabric cat cave I found was expensive, too, but I haven’t been able to find it anywhere else, so I snagged it, anyhow.
After a brief stop at the grocery store across the street, I headed home.
I was too late.
I saw Frank moving around the yard, and the first thing I could see was the blood on her back end. She had clearly just given birth – and yet, there she was. Not only was she going around the yard, but she was roughhousing with Sir Robin and Havarti, too!
That is not the behaviour of a cat that’s just given birth so recently, I found drops of blood on the floor of the sun room.
I still set up the new cat cave, in hopes she will find it and move her babies there. Given her state, I thought they had to be close by and checked all the usual places. Nothing. I was even bracing myself to find remains. None of that, either.
Given her behaviour, I strongly suspect she lost her litter.
One of the sun room kittens and Lady Hypotenose, however, have discovered the new cat cave and checked it out. I might find other littles in there, instead!
Meanwhile, I took out the cat bed the littles had started using as a litter box and put in an actual litter box. I used a garden hose to wash out the cat bed as best I could, and it’s now hanging on the line. I don’t expect it to dry anytime soon, though. We’re under a severe thunderstorm watch right now, so it’ll probably get rained on.
In fact, I think I’ll check on the outside cats and see if they need a kibble top up now. It’s early, but if the weather apps and warnings are right, a thunderstorm will be hitting us around the time I would normally be heading outside to do it. I did top up the kibble after refilling the bin, though, so they should be fine.
Time to see what I find!
The Re-Farmer
The Re-Farmer 