photo of the day

Snagged some kitties and, can you see them?

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This morning, my morning rounds included snagging outside cats.

Not these ones.

The heat bulb inside the cat’s house is clearly working!

Nosencrantz was easy. When I go to fill the kibble tray under the shrine, she always goes to eat there, instead of the kibble house. The tray is there because Rosencrantz had Nosencrantz and Tosencrantz in the junk pile on the other side of the fence. We wanted to make sure they got some food and didn’t have to push their way through other cats at the kibble house to get food there. Nosencrantz still prefers to eat at her own personal kibble tray. :-)

Butterscotch often joins her there, but not this morning.

She’s in the corner, on the left. After I finished with the food and water, she wasn’t there anymore. I finally found her eating at the kibble tray on the outside of the kibble house.

She is why we had to make sure to snag them early in the day. Nosencrantz hangs around but, after breakfast, Butterscotch will take off and we might not see her again until the next morning.

When I picked her up, she was pretty good with that and enjoyed her ear skritches.

Then I started walking to the sun room.

Oh, she did not like that!

I managed to hang on to her and get her inside, but she immediately started trying to get out. Nosencrantz was already settled and eating, but Butterscotch started jumping up the door to reach the window. I had both outer doors closed, and we’ll have to be careful to keep them that way. When we turned the sun room into a maternity ward a couple of years ago, bringing a very pregnant Beep Beep and Butterscotch in to have their kittens where we could socialize them, we still had the old, broken storm door on there. It had a screened window that couldn’t be closed. No matter how many times we patched that screen up, she would tear her way through.

I’m sure she remembers being able to get through the closed door.

I left them be while I finished my rounds, making sure to message my family that they were there, and Butterscotch wasn’t happy. My husband came in to visit with them for a bit, where he found Butterscotch somewhat settled on a pillow. He was able to pet Nosencrantz, but that was it.

When I got back, she was prowling around. She even was standing on her hind legs, looking at the highest shelves we stuffed with gardening supplies, trying to see if she could jump up there.

We will need to check on them a few times and make sure they are doing well and getting along, then to take away the food and water bowls when it’s time for them to fast.

We have 2 carriers to bring them to the vet tomorrow morning. We’ll have to make sure Butterscotch goes into the hard sided one, because she’ll be able to tear her way out of the soft sided one. Thank you again, M, for gifting the kitties with that hard side carrier!

After finishing my rounds, I went through the trail cam files and was very amused by some files on the sign cam – aside from many files of the roads being cleared. They broke out the big plow, that’s higher off the ground and has a MUCH bigger front plow attachment. The snow was too deep to see clearly, but I’m sure the side plow attachment was quite a bit bigger, too. Beautiful machine!

The deer much prefer to use the nice, clear roads to move around!

I just had to put in the arrow to show where the second deer is. This is the mother and her little one we see outside our living room window all the time. Her little one is almost fully grown now, but still small enough that only it’s ears showed above the snow piled up on the sides of the road!!

The date and time on about half the files from this camera were completely wrong. It got so cold, the batteries “died” enough that the camera reset itself to the default time and date. When it warmed up enough that the batteries started working again, all the files after that started from midnight, Jan 1, 2020. LOL There were also a lot of black files, because there wasn’t enough power for the infrared flash.

It’s supposed to stay warm enough over the next while, that this should not be a problem.

I just got a phone call while I was writing this. The vet clinic was confirming tomorrow’s appointment for Butterscotch and Nosencrantz. Drop off time is 8:20, and no food after 8pm tonight. She did say water was okay. I double checked, because the cat lady had said no food or water. Which is good. I won’t want to be fussing with the heated water bowl, if I don’t have to.

We will be in touch with the cat lady tonight; she was planning to call us to follow up on these two. I look forward to hearing how Cabbages is doing, too. The fact that we haven’t heard from her means that Cabbages has not taken a turn for the worse, at least.

If you would like to read more about Cabbages and our fundraiser to surprise-reimburse her for vet expenses, click here. Or, you can go straight to the fundraiser page here.

Today’s focus will be to keep an eye on Butterscotch in particular, and try and keep her calm.

The last time we tried to bring her indoors was when we set her and Beep Beep up in the basement to have their kittens. When we had no choice was to send her back outside, with Beep Beep adopting her last, surviving kitten, it took months before Butterscotch would let us come near her again. I expect, after she is recovered and we can let her out again, it will be at least that long before she trusts us enough to pet her again. But it will be worth it. I get the impression she is so done with the whole “mother” thing! I’m sure she’ll forgive us. ;-)

Eventually.

The Re-Farmer

A quick good morning

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I have just a bit of time, and decided to make a quick post, while I can. I expect to be on the phone for much of this morning.

So, here is a quick good morning from the kitties!

The heated water bowl was completely empty this morning! I was not fast enough with the camera, but as I was coming back from putting kibble in the tray under the shrine, I spotted Rosencrantz (the blurry cat in the foreground), sitting in it!

I guess a dry heated bowl makes a good butt warmer. :-D

Clearly, the cats were more interested in water than warm butts! It must have been empty for a while.

I did my morning rounds earlier than usual to get them done in time for my conference call. I would have been well on my way to court today right now, had our overlords not decided to re-impose more restrictions again. For my new visitors (hello! Welcome!), this is for a civil suit our vandal filed against me, in retaliation for my applying for a restraining order against him after his last attempt to break our gate again. More than a year ago, now. The shut downs and restrictions keep pushing things back, again and again.

This conference call will be just to reschedule, because this has to be done in court, in person. We haven’t had our first court date yet. He has no case, so I would hope a judge would see that right away (our vandal is suing me for $13,000 over things here on the farm that I don’t claim to own in the first place) and throw it out, but who knows.

If things go well, he’ll withdraw his suit, but that is highly unlikely.

As the court clerk will be running through a docket, the files with lawyers will be done first, and I don’t think our vandal has a lawyer for this, as he did for my restraining order application against him. If he does, it’ll be over fairly quickly. Otherwise, we just wait our turn with the rest of the people representing themselves. It could be over quickly, or I could be on the phone for hours.

Whenever it’s finally done, however, I still need to go out. I don’t think I’ll have the energy to do our full monthly stock up, but I at least need to go to the small city the courthouse is in.

We shall see after the conference call is done.

What a waste of time.

The Re-Farmer

Morning kitties, a mini convoy, seed sorting and s Cabbages update

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Late last night, I got a message letting me know that a convoy was going through our area this morning, to join the main one heading for Ottawa. I was invited to be there to cheer them on. So I headed out early to do my morning rounds and make sure the van would start.

At -27C/-17F, with a wind chill of -35/-31F, the cats weren’t too keen on coming out!

Unfortunately, we’re using some of the donated cat kibble (we got one bag for the inside cats, one for the outside cats), and they don’t like it. It’s a Superstore no-name brand. I’m happy to have it, but the cats, not so much!

Once that was done, I headed out. There was a group of us that met up in a parking lot along the main road (I later saw there was another group at the one other area we could park and face the road at). Thankfully, I was able to keep in touch with someone in the mini-convoy, who was letting people know how things were going. There was a huge turnout at the starting point, with trucks, tractors and personal vehicles. An estimated 150 or so. It took them a longer time than expected to get organized, and a long time just to get through town and onto the highway.

Of course, none of those farmers in their tractors, and other supporters, were going to be joining the main convoy to Ottawa, so it was a smaller one heading our way. By the time they passed by, there was a bunch of us waiting, including a family with young kids, holding signs and making noise to support our truckers. The kids got a lot of horn honking and enthusiastic waiting. :-) I don’t have the winter gear to be outside for long in these temperatures, so I cheered them on from inside my van while taking video. It ended up being more than 7 minutes long!

This was the lead vehicle.

This, btw, is “downtown” in our little hamlet. LOL

As to the lies mentioned on this sign, to give one example, the CBC – a Crown corporation that gets about $1.6 billion in taxpayer dollars every year – had the most insane headline talking about the convoy leaving BC. It was described as people protesting dangerous road conditions. !! I haven’t trusted what the CBC says for decades, having had too many first hand experiences of how incapable they are of reporting accurately, but that is bad, even for them.

As I write this, the mini-convoy continues on its way to the city to join the main convoy and, from what I hear, as they pass through larger towns and another small city, more truckers are joining.

The truckers have been put through so much over the past couple of years, it’s insane. They have massive grassroots support.

Since I was there for so long anyhow, I hoped to pick up the mail on the way home, but it was still too early. The mail was in, but not sorted yet.

Of course, it was after I got home that my husband got a notification that a package is ready for pick up.

I am not going out again, today!!! It’s still -26C/-15F with a wind chill of -37C/-35F out there!

When parking the van in the garage, I saw Potato Beetle was perched on the old tire we use to keep the doors to where my mother’s car is. The black rubber is a favorite sun-warmed seat for the cats! As I tried to pet him on the way by, though, he didn’t want me to touch him.

He has a wound on his head!

He kept squirming around and wouldn’t let me look too close, but it seems like he’s had some fur torn out, a bit above and to the side of one of his eyes. It’s not bleeding, and the wound looks small. Mostly, it’s just missing fur. In this cold, however, we need to keep an eye on it.

That’s what he gets for all the fights he’s been picking! I’m guessing it was the Distinguished Guest. She doesn’t back down.

There were other cats out and about, too, but not this one…

Nosencrantz usually comes out for pets, but not this time. She was staying in their nice, cozy house!

I noticed the timer got knocked off its perch again, which means the light sensor is not facing the window. That means the heat bulb will be on, all the time.

At these temperatures, I’m good with that. When things warm up again, we’ll pop open the roof and set it facing the right way again.

We’ve got one more day of this cold, before things heat right up. I’m seeing all kinds of crazy temperatures in the forecast for Wednesday. The Weather Network is saying we’ll reach -1C/30F. The weather app that came with my desktop says -4C/25F. Accuweather says 0C/32F.

The only consensus is that we’re going to warm up by more than 20 degrees Celsius in less than a 24 hour time period!

I am not complaining. :-D

After that, we’ll be dropping back down and hovering around the -20C/-4F range and staying there for at least a couple of weeks.

It makes me want to start planting something. :-D

Last night, I went through our seed packets and sorted them. They had been sorted by how they arrived; by whichever company’s seeds arrived first. Since we have several things with multiple varieties, I sorted it by type, first. Then I put all the ones that need to be started indoors in their own box. Today, I’ll go through those and sort them by when they need to be started. The onions and luffa will be started the earliest. I’m also eyeballing what I might be able to do more winter sowing with, even if it’s just using the sun room. Oh, that might not be a good idea. That will be where Butterscotch and Nosencrantz will be recovering from surgery for 2 weeks. Butterscotch, in particular, is going to be hard to keep in there, and she’ll knock over anything on the shelves, trying to get out.

One of the other purposes of sorting through the seeds is to figure out where we want to plant things, and where we need to build new beds once things start warming up in April or May. Most of these will still be temporary beds, as we move things closer to the house, in preparation for planting trees further out. I am thinking, with all the winter squash we are planting, we may want to let those sprawl on the ground, rather than climb, to help shade and kill off the weeds. They would do better on trellises, though, and be more protected from critters. Hhmm. Something to think about.

Along with how to fence things off from the deer and groundhogs!

When I stopped to buy some honey from my cousin, after dropping Cabbages off, we chatted for a bit. They have gardens around their bee house (not the hives, but the little house they’ve got for their honey business). They have one small garden with a deer fence around it, but the rest is open. When I told him about our plans to plant sea buckthorn, he told me they have some – but no berries! They ended up with only female trees! They’re about 8 feet tall and bloom beautifully, but no berries at all. We’re getting only a 5 pack, so it’s possible we’ll have all males or all females. It’ll be at least a couple of years before we find out, one way or the other.

Oh, and before I forget. I got a Cabbages update last night. They are still force feeding her, but she did eat some food on her own, as well. I was sent a photo, and she’s being kept in a large kennel with all sorts of things to play with and climb on. She was looking right at the camera was HUGE eyes, and looking very alert. I am encouraged. She’ll be seeing a vet again tomorrow, if things stay to plan.

I think she will be fine, but I’m so glad our contact with this organization was able to take Cabbages and get her to a vet, just in case.

I will keep updating about her, as I hear more.

The Re-Farmer

What I woke up to this morning

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Since I no longer had to keep my door close, to make sure a sick Cabbages didn’t take off somewhere, I actually got a lot more sleep. I didn’t have cats constantly clawing at the bottom of my door, to get in or out!

This morning, I was awakened by this cuddle pile.

They actually started out on the other side of my head, where there was just a few inches of space, clambered over me and settled in to this aggressive grooming session.

Which I can’t complain about. We had to keep Turmeric in my room with me for about a week, because she kept turning into a snarling beast at the other cats for some reason. Particularly when a tuxedo came by. Beep Beep would also go after other cats, but she would stop as quickly as she started, and just always does that. It took days for Turmeric to calm down, and now she’s back to grooming and snuggling with cats she had been snarling and growling at. !!

I could feel another cat at my legs, so I used my phone to find out which one it was.

Only to discover it was two cats! I wasn’t twisted around enough to see Tissue. :-D Which is funny, because the cat I felt was not the cat I could see!

Tissue really, really loves jamming herself against the back of my legs, or my lower back.

The cats are all very happy my door is open again. They missed having access to my bed. :-D

Silly kitties!

The Re-Farmer

Saying goodbye; a Cabbages update

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Well, it’s done.

As I write this, Cabbages should still be on the road to the city.

Last night, we tried her on some of the cat milk we picked up. She wouldn’t do it while I was close by, but once I stepped away, she did drink from the little bowl. Which was adorable, with her snout completely hidden, but no chance of a photo!

We also fed her food goo, thinned with the cat milk, using the syringe. She definitely liked it better than thinned with plain water.

So did Turmeric. While the girls were feeding Cabbages, Turmeric tried to eat the food goo right out of her mouth!!

Once she had a full belly, she got to enjoy some cuddles and grooming.

I think Beep Beep is going to miss Cabbages!

Here she is, getting some post-breakfast cuddles from “grandma”. :-)

I got texts this morning from the woman that is helping us with the cats. She was going from town to town, so we arranged to be her last stop before returning to the city, to reduce the amount of time Cabbages would be in a vehicle. She had a kennel for Cabbages, and was also picking up six (!!!) other cats along the way.

Then I got a text saying they had an unexpected extra cat, and were using the kennel intended for Cabbages. She was wondering if we had one they could borrow, though she might be able to borrow one from the vet clinic. We have three carriers in total, but won’t need all three until they start taking more cats in, so we’re okay with lending one of them. We’ll still have enough to bring Butterscotch and Nutmeg in to get fixed, at the end of the month, and can get it back then. Plus, it meant not having to transfer Cabbages from one carrier to another, while in a parking lot! I’m good with that.

I had an awesome surprise when I headed out early to meet them with Cabbages, and an even bigger one when I got back, but I’ll share about those in my next post.

I left early with Cabbages, because I expected to have snow issues. I didn’t, but I didn’t mind being early. They got to the place we arranged to meet early, too. We got two big bags of donated dry cat food and a case of wet cat food they couldn’t use (the wet cat food had no labels on the cans!).

She let us know that Cabbages would first be tested for Feline Leukemia – she made an appointment for her at the vet this afternoon, and it’s a quick test, so she will be able to let us know by this evening. If she does test positive for that, all the cats will need to be tested. !!!

She was happy to hear that Cabbages has been doing better and starting to eat and drink on her own. She hasn’t been throwing up anymore, and there has been no blood in her stools, which are other positive signs. Hopefully, the blood tests they will be doing will answer some questions.

So there we are. One cat, already gone. She is hoping, over the next few weeks, to be able to take 3 cats at a time. Including Cabbages, we have a total of 8 cats to be adopted out, so that should work out to 3 trips.

The house is going to feel pretty empty with “just” eight cats left in the house!

The main thing is that Cabbages is now going to get the vet care she needs, and that makes us happy.

The Re-Farmer

She ate kibble!

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We are so thrilled!

Last night, I actually saw Cabbages eating some kibble! It was just a few pieces, but this is the first time I’ve seen her eating in days.

I’m pretty sure she would have eaten earlier, but when I saw her by the food and water bowls, I topped them up, and every other cat in the room came running. I made sure there was some kibble right in front of her, but any Turmeric kept trying to groom her, and she finally left. :-D

We’re still feeding her food goo with the syringe, of course. Which is why she’s looking so dishevelled in the above photo. :-D I had just finished feeding her, and she was most displeased with me!

She still looks like crap, does not seem to be regaining weight yet (still not enough calories getting into her. :-( ), but she is drinking more often, is more active, and has even been trying to get out of my office/bedroom. If we didn’t have to worry about her hiding in some crevice where we can’t find her or reach her, we wouldn’t be keeping her in.

We’re also still steaming her when we shower, if there’s even the slightest hint of wheezing when she breathes. She seems to like it. The fact that the house is so dry and chilly, and she’s so skinny, she’s probably quite enjoying her saunas.

We like it when we have happy, steamed Cabbages. ;-)

The Re-Farmer

Digging our way out (and a Cabbages update)

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What a beautiful day today!

The weather app tells me it’s -25C/-13F, with a wind chill of -36C/-33F right now, but it’s bright and sunny, and actually felt a lot warmer while we were out this morning.

While doing my rounds this morning, it was time to assess just how much the storm affected us. We got most of the snow during the day, then mostly high winds overnight.

The cats that shelter under the storage house were having issues! This path was cleared yesterday morning. One spot was mostly drifted over – you can see it further back – with a bit of space the cats could get through. The other was a steep, narrow drift they had problems jumping over!

So one of the first things I did after putting food out was shovel around the kibble house, digging out the metal water bowls in the process, and opening up their paths.

Then I went around the house with feed for the birds and deer, and startled a deer that was right next to the house, almost at the dining room window! I’ve never seen them go on the house side of where the lilacs and cherry trees are. Not even tracks.

Once the food and water was done, I made my way to the gate to unlock it.

Opening it took a fair bit of effort! Most of the driveway wasn’t bad. We could have left it and driven through the snow, just fine.

We would not have made it through the end of the driveway, though.

Once I got it open (and shovelled out the path to the gate cam), it was time to break out Spewie and start blowing some snow.

I cleared in front of the garage, first, which was a more difficult area. The wind swirls around there, so the snow was deeper, and the top more hard packed. I did eventually make it to the end of the driveway, though!

I didn’t try to go too close to the ground, though, as I didn’t want to be hitting gravel and rocks, so the snow is actually deeper than the furrow made by the snow blower by about 2 or 3 inches. More than that at the end, where the remains of a plow ridge is.

The plows had not gone by yet, but it looks like some farmer cleared a lane with their tractor. At first I thought it might have been done by a truck with a plow attachment I’ve been seeing in the trail cam files lately, but those treads are not from any pick up!

I had managed to do about 4 passes with little Spewie, all the way to the road, when it stop running. I’d tripped the power bar, where it’s plugged in, in the garage. While I was trudging to hit the switch, I could hear the reverse warning sound of heavy equipment, nearby.

It was the plow.

*sigh*

You can see how much I’d done on the left, where the snow is a bit lower. There was no way little Spewie could make it through that! So I had to shovel a lot of it away. Thankfully, being almost immediately after the plow went by, it was still loose and light. Once I got a fair bit of it shoveled, then I could redo the end with little Spewie.

It was still a bit much for that little machine, and one of my daughters widened the end of the driveway with a shovel while I continued working on the rest of the driveway. I didn’t stop to take any more photos, but I was able to clear enough that we will be able to back the van up to the little gate in the chain link fence to unload. The girls, meanwhile, finished shoveling out all the paths in the inner yard. The path to the compost pile was almost completely filled in!

By the time I was done, I was completely soaked from all the snow blown back onto me. My down filled coat is not as waterproof as it used to be, and my shoulders were soaked right through the layers I was wearing under it! I was wearing both a hat and cowl, which was bulky enough to hold my hood in place, so I didn’t have to close it up in front, obstructing my breathing. They were wet, all the way through, too. My glasses weren’t just frosted over. They were iced over! I was very happy to come inside and make a nice, big pot of tea to warm up with!

While all this was going on, I got some texts from the woman who will be helping us with the cats. She told me that she will be in town on Saturday, and can pass on some cat food for us. This will be much appreciated, as the store shelves have been quite empty, so we’re not as stocked up as we should be. She also expects to be able to start taking some of our cats in the next week or two, once they have finished adopting out their current batch!

She also asked about cabbages. I told her she seems to be getting a bit better, drinking water on her own again, but still not eating (at least not while I’m there to see it), so we are feeding her with a syringe. She said she should probably take Cabbages back with her when we meet on Saturday, so that they can get her to a vet right away. This is greatly appreciated, since we won’t be able to do that until the end of the month. She said she can’t make any promises, since we don’t know why she’s sick, which makes sense, of course.

So it looks like we’ll be saying goodbye to Cabbages this weekend, and she will get the vet care she needs.

I do hope this works out for her, and I am very grateful that she offered to do this.

Which makes getting ourselves dug out just that much more important!

The Re-Farmer

Morning critters

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First up, I’m happy to say that Cabbages is seeming better this morning. She got more hydration last night, and we even got some solid food into her – also through the syringe. She didn’t like it, but she ate it!

We are still keeping Turmeric closed up with me. I’ve been letting other cats in and out, and while she did growl at the tuxedos, once they were inside, she seemed okay with them. As soon as she’s out of my office/bedroom, however, she still turns into a snarling beast for some reason.

Beep Beep has pretty much moved in and taken Cabbages under her wing, so I had the three of them with me last night. I was awakened by the sound of a cat scratching under the door to get out, and it was Cabbages! That’s the first time she’s made the effort since we brought her into the room.

It turned out their food and water bowls were empty. When I refilled them, Cabbages parked herself at the water bowl and stayed there. I did see her drinking, but mostly, she was just a loaf. I was in and out a few times, and she stayed like that for at least an hour. Right now, she’s back on my bed, next to Beep Beep.

We will keep up with the hydration and the semi-liquid food, even though she is a bit more active.

The other cats still seem very confused by my closed door. I usually have the majority of them splattered all over my bed, finding myself trapped by several when I wake up in the morning. They’ve had to find other places to sleep. A couple of them already preferred my husband’s hospital bed, but now he’s finding his bed covered with 4 or 5 at times. That bed is pretty narrow, so they basically take up the whole thing when that happens! Mostly, though, they have been converging on my daughters, upstairs.

They have not been getting much sleep, lately!

I do wish I knew what was going on with Turmeric, and why she still hasn’t settled down, yet!

Anyhow.

When I head into the sun room to get kibble for the outside cats, it’s not unusual for me to see a cat on the hand rail outside. It’s usually Nosencrantz or Potato Beetle. Sometimes it’s Agnoos or Tuxedo Mask. Not this morning!

The Distinguished Guest had her butt parked there this time! I managed to get a picture before opening the doors, at which point she took off. Not far, though. She knows it’s breakfast time!

She is really looking to be a permanent “guest”.

I counted only 13 this morning, though I did see Ghost Baby show up soon after. We were short two orange tabbies. I didn’t see Butterscotch or Nosencrantz this morning, either. It’s not unusual for Butterscotch to be missing, but I usually see Nosencrantz.

Chadiccus came over for pets, and I was happy to see he’s all cleaned up. No sign of the blood that was all over his front, yesterday. Since no cats look injured, I’m hoping it was just from some rodent he caught and ate.

I can see that the cats checked out our winter sowing experiment! The jugs themselves were undisturbed, though, so that’s good.

Once I was done my rounds and back inside, the two deer that come by regularly were soon at the feeding station. Then I spotted one of them in the south yard!

There is a short path along the chimney block planters that has been shoveled, and that’s where she is standing.

Then she made her way around the white lilacs, to the shrine! From the tracks in the snow, they have been checking out the kibble tray fairly regularly. Which is interesting, since there is nothing there they can eat. There are birds that like to steal the kibble, though, and of course the cats are often there, just like at the feeding station, so maybe the deer is associating the presence of birds and cats with food!

Or she’s just curious. :-D

I like how the cat is so chill about the deer coming at it.

Doing my rounds this morning was a bit of a bother. Those high winds from yesterday drifted over many of our paths with hard packed snow. A couple of days from now, we’re supposed to get hit by a storm, with 10-15 cm of snow (4-6 inches).

*sigh* I suppose we should clear out the end of the driveway again, before the plows have to go through.

The Re-Farmer

More good news… and some not so good news

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Before I had a chance to head out to feed the outside critters, I got a series of texts from the woman who will be fixing our cats. She was able to book the surgery for January 31st – for both Butterscotch and Nosencrantz!

We will have to isolate them in the sun room the day before, and take out all food and water by 9pm. After surgery, we’ll have to keep them in there during recovery. If they end up needing cones, it’s an extra cost, but I think we still have cones from previous cat treatments that will fit. Though I doubt Butterscotch in particular could handle wearing one!

Meanwhile, she has passed on the information I was able to send her yesterday, and the process of getting cats adopted out has started.

While feeding the outside cats this morning, I only counted 16, but I saw Rosencrantz this time (right in front of the kibble house) and I even saw Ghost Baby, both of whom I haven’t seen in a while. They are doing very well out there.

Inside… well, it’s a different story. We have some weird stuff going on.

From the top down is Beep Beep, Turmeric, Tissue and “grandma”. This was a massive grooming and cuddle session, and both Tissue and Turmeric were acting like they were trying to nurse on “grandma”. Which is funny, because Beep Beep is Turmeric’s mom, and when she was ready to wean her kittens, she was quite abrupt about it.

This picture of feline domestic bliss ended abruptly that evening.

The cats sometimes get testy with each other. That’s to be expected. What happened this time was a full blown fight, with rolling balls of fighting cats, flinging across the dining room floor, into the entry way, and into the basement, before breaking off and cats flew in all directions. By the time we got there, we couldn’t tell who started what.

We got things calmed down, but every now and then, there would be another tussle. As soon as there’s any growling, all the other cats come running to see what’s going on, and the ones that were in fighting mode would just tackle whichever cat happened to be nearby.

Beep Beep is a bad one for that, but she’s been fighting for survival since longer than we’ve been here, so that’s to be expected.

No cats were injured, by the way. Just to reassure!

What wasn’t expected was Turmeric’s response.

She turned into a snarling, screaming, growling beast.

Even when there were no other cats around! One time I heard her start screaming and snarling, I came running, only to find her under the dining table – alone. I did eventually spot another cat in the room, but she was behind a shelf, out of sight, and not bothering Turmeric at all.

We ended up having to isolate her in my office until she calmed down, but when we let her out, she was soon in another fight, then hid under a basement step, needing much persuasion to get her out.

So for the past few days, we’ve had her in my office. Every now and then, we’d let her out, and she’d start snarling. Usually at the tuxedos, for some reason. We would bring other cats in, and mostly she would be fine. This morning, I even let Layendecker in, whom she had been growling at before, and there was no problem. But as soon as we let her out of the room, she’s snarling again.

Who knew such a big noise could come out of such a small cat!

I don’t know what’s going on with her.

But I’m less worried about her than I am about Cabbages.

Cabbages is one of the cats that Turmeric is getting along with just fine, so we brought her in for company. That and she was really missing my bed.

Something is wrong with her.

She’s completely quiet. She’s hardly eating or drinking. For a while, she was throwing up several times a day – a couple of days ago, I had to wash my bedding three times because of that, but she hasn’t thrown up since. She moves from soft spot to soft spot, and that’s it. We’ve kept the hard sided carrier in here, with a soft towel inside, and I’ll often find her in there. Other times, I’ll find her sitting at the water bowl, just… sitting. I’ve seen her using the litter, at least. She has shown no interest in even leaving the room, unlike the other cats, who have been wanting to come in and out. As I write this, she has just come over to the food and water bowls, but is just… sitting. Not eating or drinking.

I mentioned it this morning to the lady that will be fixing our cats, and the first thing she asked if if Cabbages was sneezing or had diarrhea. It was a no on both. She recommended giving her some cooked fish for the nutrition boost, but without getting blood work done, there’s no way to know what’s going on. And the earliest we can afford to bring her in to be checked is at the end of the month. I’m concerned about dehydration and, being a small cat to begin with, the weight loss is an issue, too.

We are quite concerned.

I am considering engaging the help of a daughter or two, and trying to give her water through a syringe.

The Re-Farmer

Amazing cat rant follow up!

/ Re-Farmer / 15 Comments

Okay, so after yesterday’s rant, I am very, very happy to share some good news that came out of that call with the shelter.

Depending on how things go, many of these cats will have forever homes! How many… we’ll see. I counted a total of 18 this morning.

I did have an unpleasant surprise this morning, though.

Chadicous has blood all over his chest and front legs!

It looks fresh, but I didn’t hear any fighting. I also could not find an injury, nor did he seem to be favouring any part of his body. It could be he has a small puncture wound somewhere that just happened to bleed a lot, but isn’t bleeding now. Or it’s from another cat, but none of the cats appeared to be injured.

There was nothing different in his behaviour, as he did his usual flinging himself bodily to the ground in front of my feet, asking for pets.

We will be monitoring.

I was just finishing off my rounds when I spotted Agnoos in the bird bath-turned feeder.

Many he’s hoping a bird will just fly into his mouth? :-D

Now, the good news.

I got a call from the woman I was told about during the shelter call. She is connected with the larger organization that the vet had told us about. They have a donor program that allows them to get females fixed for only $75. !!!!! That includes shots, too. Plus, through this larger organization and their foster volunteers, they can adopt cats out. She told me of the number of cats she did last year (I am remembering 150, but I’m not confident that it’s right), all have been adopted out.

Best of all, we don’t have to pay right away. As long as we make payments and pay them off by the end of 2022, they’re good.

At only $75 per female, that will not be a problem.

After talking for a while, we worked out that Butterscotch will be done first. Plus Nosencrantz, if she can get access to the surgery for both of them.

Oh, that’s the other thing. She does the surgeries at the vet clinic we are already using! She’s got a deal with them to use their operating theatre when they aren’t using it themselves. Tomorrow, she will call me back with, hopefully, a date for Butterscotch, possibly as early as next week!!!

Once those two are done, we will shift focus to getting the inside cats done. Then, the outside cats that we can easily catch, and finally, focus on trapping the cats we can’t touch.

If they are up for adoption (on learning more about Butterscotch, she immediately recognized that she was not an adoptable cat. I really appreciated that she caught that), they may not even need to wait for the local surgery. We might be able to take them to the organization’s facility in the city, where they will get the necessary treatments, and get adopted out from there, instead of having another trip back here.

Once I’m done with this post, I will start sending her the information she needs about me, including an emergency contact number if they can’t reach me for some reason, and information about the cats, starting with Butterscotch and Nosencrantz.

My plans for the day have just changed dramatically.

The Re-Farmer