Monday, April 30, 2012

Flier Scam?

  I get this e-mail today:  "Hi, My name is Megan and i saw your flyer on the stop sign. So you can email me at *******@live.com thank you very much!!! and i will give you all the infomation."

That e-mail sounds like a scam person, maybe even a porm spam person.  I didn't post any fliers at all in Eugene.  I handed them all out.  However, I did e-mail the flier to some nearby schools, businesses and churches.  I wasn't thinking.  Other people could have innocently forwarded it on, to be helpful, and it had both my e-mail and phone number on it.  That was not bright, wasn't thinking.  This is a new age.

I e-mailed the person back, which probably was not wise either.  I told the person, I hope you're not a scammer.  I said, I didn't put any fliers up on stop signs, but if you do have information on where the lost cat is, I would love to hear from you.  I was trying to be careful.

Who would put a flier on a stop sign anyhow and how really could a person do that?

Anyhow, I hope I don't get my I.D. stolen over looking for a lost cat.  I'm still in the age of trusting people for the most part.




Sunday, April 29, 2012

The Search

I went down to search for the lost cat in Eugene today.  I had made lots of fliers.  Once there, I even climbed up into the attic from a rickety ladder and searched, although no cats have access to the attic, only one smaller area and she still could be there, way down in the rafters.  There were two cats up there then. I searched the larger area.  It was darn hot up there.  I am still itching from it. I had to slide along a 2x4 so I wouldn't break through the ceiling.  I can still shimmy!

The two cats stared at me from the other smaller section, over the hen house, through netting they had put up to keep cats out of the larger attic area.  Nonetheless, I was sure I heard kittens.  If I heard them, then she's in the rafters in the other section.   I laid there quiet in the dark but did not hear them again.  I know what I heard though.

We put food and water up there anyhow, just in case, in the larger section. Then I let myself down, until my feet hit the top of that old wood ladder.  After that, I searched the yard.

After that, I went around talking to everybody.  The woman across the road loves cats but says her son's dog might kill an unknown cat if she came into their backyard or tried to go under their house, that has an opening their dog can also get through.

I talked to a nice older couple.  They looked at the photo and said they thought that was the cat hit by a car.  They found the white and black cat screaming and flopping, back broken and didn't know what to do, she was hurt so bad.  So they called animal services who came and took the cat away.  But then, it turns out, they called animal services to come get that injured cat three days before I even took the cat down to Eugene.  They're real sure it was not last week that happened, but the week before that.  I will contact LCAS to see if they have records though. I sure hope it wasn't her with the broken back hit by a car.

I walked to a park then on into a trailer park talking to everyone and handing out fliers.  There were two women about to leave for WA state, but they said they had 15 minutes time and love cats and I handed them fliers.  I found one they put up at the store a block away.

I talked to lots of people on the street behind where she was lost.  I saw lots of cats.  Two houses in particular were real cat people. One was home and one wasn't.  I left a flier tucked into the door of the one who wasn't home and gave the guy at the other house a flier.  They live only two houses down and behind where she was lost. I had already e-mailed several nearby churches and schools with her photo and the flier.  I already got a response from one principal who vowed to have his students watch for her.

There are lots of cats in the area who look almost like her, however.  It's hard to tell the white and blacks apart.  I hope she can be found.   I spent hours down there and met a lot of friendly people who want to find her.  But if that old couple mixed up the day they called on the badly injured cat, if it was her hurt so badly, boy that will be hard.  I will try to find out.

I had to go, you see, to search.  I can't just sit here in mourning.  I am an action person.  When a cat goes missing, I find it much more therapeutic to try to find the cat, rather than sitting around crying about it.




Saturday, April 28, 2012

Whatever That Was in the Middle

Last week, B called.  She'd been trying to get Mama Cat in a carrier or trap so she could move her to her new place, down in the Eugene area, for days, without any luck.  I went over, netted her and had her in a carrier in three minutes.

She wanted to take me out to dinner as a thank you. Tonight was the night.

She was back in town to hand the keys of her old place back to the landlord and load up the last car full of stuff.

So we went to a Mexican place.  I don't like to eat out much.  That's a huge stretch on my trust levels, to eat food someone else I don't know has prepared out of sight of me.  The thing that changed me on this, and it really never used to bother me at all, was meeting people who cook that food.  Or meeting their relatives and hearing stories of their relatives and how awful they behave and what they've done to food when they get mad.

Former and recovering meth addicts often become cooks.  I won't go into details.  But after realizing I had run into a lot of the people now working as cooks and seen how they live, their unclean abodes and habits, I couldn't eat out like I used to.

But tonight I went out with B.  She ordered for me since I'd forgotten my glasses.  There was your generic seasoned rice on one side.  Black beans on the other.  And something in the middle.  It was covered in cheese with green bits showing through here and there.  Spinach I think.  A vegetarian plate.

We were talking.  I was eating, not paying much attention.  There was not much flavor to the food.  Whatever that was in the middle tasted like cheese smothering something.  But I could only taste the cheese.

I had a margarita also.  So did B.  There was a lot of salt on the edge of the glass.  Too much.  I wiped most of it off, then sipped it.  By the time we were ready to leave, my stomach was already killing me, like knives slicing my gut top to bottom.  By the time I got to the car, I was doubled over.  I thought "Ok, I just ate too much."

By the time I got home, I could not straighten up my stomach hurt so bad.  It's been like that ever since.  I tried to sleep but woke up and whatever that was in the middle came up.  Looked a whole lot like spinach pieces.

Later, I upchucked more of whatever that was in the middle.  I hope to upchuck it all.  If I only knew how to make myself upchuck, I feel my world would suddenly feel like a dark shroud was torn off.

Whatever that was in the middle, between the generic rice on the left and the black beans on the right, has not been welcomed by my intestinal tract.  This experience won't do much for my acquired disaffection for eating out.


Front Room Redo

I rid the front room of the Stinky Couch.  I called it the Stinky Couch because it's always had an odor of mold to it.  I should never have agreed to take it from a neighbor when they moved.

 It was vinyl, not clothe, so I thought I could clean it up to smell ok.  The neighbors' garage was one of "those", crammed top to bottom, back to front with junk.  That was tough on them when they moved.  The black couch had been inside that crammed full garage for I don't know how long.  Where it came from before it ended up inside there, buried in other forgotten possessions, I don't know.

So it came here, and I should not have brought it in.  So now it's out in my driveway and I will need to take it apart to use what I can of the wood, recycle the metal and get rid of the rest, mostly foam.  Dismantling a couch is very hard and painful on my hands.

With the Stinky Couch gone, I rearranged the front room.  The cats have not approved so far.  I am Queen cat here.  I have the say at least on furniture.



I rewrapped the climbing pole in new used carpet pieces.  I'd been given some Mercedes Benz car floor mats.  No kidding!  My cats are now climbing and sharpening claws on some high end rug rags!


 I got an adoption inquiry on Posey this morning.  I hope they call.  




Thursday, April 26, 2012

Computer Problems

I've been having a lot of computer problems lately.  Slow as sin it is.  Can't even watch a short video anymore.

So, if I go dark on here, no more posts, it's because the thing has died.  I don't know what is wrong, if it's about ready to quit or what.  It is old by computer standards and I"ve used it a lot.  We'll see.  Too bad the darn things are so expensive and don't last that many years for the expense.

Four Local Cats Fixed Today








Today, four more local cats were fixed--two girls and two boys. Three from Albany, one from Lebanon.  One of the girls was pregnant even though just a teenager, about six months of age.
Lebanon male Pepper still under the influence of anesthesia.

All four parties who own the cats were unbelievably happy to find a way to get them fixed.  Two had taken the cats in as strays.  The other two households were bereft of funds after losing jobs or having nothing to begin with.  So it was good Poppa still could help them out.
 Young Albany black tux female, Boo, spayed today.
 
Albany female Claus, spayed today.  Six months old and pregnant!
 Albany male Max, neutered today.

I also made a loaf of oat bread.  I am now addicted to making my own bread from scratch.  It tastes so much better than store bought!  I have made whole wheat.  I have made flax bread.  This time it was oat flour bread, with a bit of flax meal and a dash of molasses.

Came out too good.  Can't leave it alone.

I have a pot on cooking leek and potato soup tonight.

It's a good night for soup--blustery outside.  Thunder showers passing through temporarily whip up the wind, swaying the tops of trees, sending cherry blossoms cascading down in a soft shower of spring pink tinted snow.  The skies darken and look ominous, black with shades of gray, roiling off in the distant, then rolling in.  Then the dark masses will  break on the edges into heavy whites with complicated shapes in vivid 3D.  And suddenly the storm will be beyond me, just barely beyond, with blue sky showing overhead but rain, warm and heavy drops, splattering around me.

Spring is here.  I have bush beans three inches tall now in one of my tractor parts box raised beds out front.

I go out and lift off jagged pieces of old chicken wire from the 3 foot square area where I planted peas a week ago.  The plot is beside the house, under the overhang, like I read would be an ok place for them.  I bend over from the edge of the cracked cement of the driveway, and peer at the dirt, until my eyes focus there at dirt level, searching, scanning for pea sprouts. Yesterday, I found five.  Today I see 12!

The chicken wire pieces are to keep out the old man's cats, who like to poop there and sometimes to sleep curled in the dirt.  No more free loading in my garden space, kitties.  It's growing season.

All four cats I had left on my list needing fixed were done today.  So I feel free for now.

I've had little to do the last days which is not good for me.  Now, I plan my day ahead the night before, so I don't sink into the oblivion of boredom or loneliness.  I have projects lined up for myself, in lists, chores too, that are not daily, that can be done.  I have to keep myself very busy to keep away the weight of the alone.

I keep off the news now.  There's nothing good to hear.  It's simplified blather anyhow.  It helps me to keep off the news.

I hate election years.  I hate the idiotic waving, smiling, posturing, blaming and promising.  And yet nothing ever changes.  So I tune that out now too.  Next time I get sent a ballot, I'll do my duty.  But I'm writing in my own name for every spot open.  It's easier that way.  I don't have to consider the blather. 

I did my duty by the cats of this area today and wrangled out four more to be fixed.  So there you have it.

Tuesday, April 24, 2012

URI, Unfixed, with Tapeworms


I am sad today.  A pregnant Albany stray, who went to a Eugene rescue, escaped in less than 12 hours from that rescue and is now missing.  This is not my fault, and there's nothing in the world I can do for the cat now but hope.  But the incident has created a deep pit of sadness, the returning sadness.  I am so lonely.

The Pregnant Albany stray, now on the loose and lost in Eugene.

There's another big orange tux unfixed male roaming into my yard, eyes draining from a URI, tapeworm hanging from his butt.  I tried to wrestle him last night, seeing him for the first time, wanting instinctively to get him contained for fixing.  But he'd have none of it.  I'd set a trap and almost had him inside it, when the old man comes out, and off the cat spooks, me barefoot and in pursuit. You know how I am about unfixed cats.

He comes up to me and I try to scruff him, but he hops up on his back legs and jumps at me, forearms extended, like a boxer or wrestler, claws also out and shiny sharp.  I was quicker though than he and jumped clear of his claws.  He stalked off them, righteously outraged that a mere human would take him on like that.

This morning I spotted him again, before I was dressed and was unwisely out after him barefoot again, pajama bottoms held up with one hand.  Picture that if you must.  Not pretty.  But you know how I am about unfixed cats.

Again he slithered off into the old man's collapsing arboritums, the future fire hazard of the neighborhood, along with his two foot high backyard grass.  I'll get him, I promised my troop of cats watching from the cat yard. They all hate him.  He spray marks everything and has fought with the blue house cats from three houses down, who hang out in the other neighbors yard, my yard and the old man's yard, lonely and forgotten at their own home.  He has fought with the old man's black tux, creating fear in the black tux boys eyes, to see him.  This orange tux is vile, sick and needs to lose his balls to save his life and turn him into a nice kitty.
The Sprayer, new unfixed stray in my yard.  Tapeworm hanging from butt not shown.


Ah, if only we could spay and neuter all these armies in the world.  Peace on earth might happen.  N. Korea is spray marking right now.  Iran does so constantly.  Hormones are deadly.  We are pleasantly purposely blind to it.  The spray marking, fighting, breeding, and territorial behavior of male cats has its human behavioral counterpart, you can be sure.  War, anyone?

I have cheered myself up.  I can't stop laughing, in fact, after writing this.  I think it is thinking of this latest typical Albany stray:  URI, unfixed, with tapeworms.

I also gave Hairy half a haircut.  He got away from me before I could finish.  He has very long fine hair, that mats in the undercoat. He gets dandruff too beneath the fine undercoat.  So half of the spring Hairy cut is done!  


Monday, April 23, 2012

Mom Cat is Here and Quite Preggie

I picked up the Male Man's latest stray--allegedly not a male this time, but a pregnant stray girl.  She's very worried looking, huddled on the top shelf in a cage in my garage right now.

I am worried too, worried she will have kittens and I don't need kittens here.  Not to worry too much, a Eugene rescue has offered to foster her if they come.  I have never had a pregnant cat here before.  Yup, first for me.  I've taken thousands of cats to be spayed, but I've never housed a preggie for a few days hoping she doesn't pop kittens and that it is just an overload of roundworms.  And maybe it is.  I did get every male I could find in that area fixed two to three months ago.  Cat gestation is two months.  Ok.

I did have that feral Siamese, who had kittens in the trap, middle of the night.  That doesn't count.  I never even knew she was pregnant.  She had kittens within three hours after I trapped her.  Stress I guess.  Or maybe she was ready, but I don't think she'd be sniffing around a trap if she'd been just ready to pop kittens.  The stress did it.

The people who used to own this cat in my garage now said she ran away almost two years ago. So she showed up at the Male Man's place.  I call him the Male Man because I got four of those males in the area fixed right there.  He feeds strays.  He's got a real soft heart. 

He's a very kind man, he sure seems to be.  This possibly allegedly preggie kitty thinks so.  She had no place to find food or shelter, until she found his place.  So I don't know what to do with her, not knowing if she's about to have kittens or not or maybe just full of worms (wishful thinking!!!)

Shall I take her to the Eugene rescue, let them take care of her?  Except they think they could adopt out kittens, if she has them, but not her, so then what for her.

Everybody wants kittens and nobody wants a mom cat.

I worked all day in my yard.  I planted seeds although it's early to do that in Oregon.  I get burned when I plant early.  Every year I get excited and plant my vegees then it like snows or something.  The old man isn't caring for his yard at all.  I thought he was gone today, then he comes out of his garage and kind of stares around then goes back inside.  I wonder if he just came home or if something's up.  He's had DUI's before he told me once.  If he gets one now, he's going to have a hard time of it.   I'm sure he probably was sleeping or something.  I just didn't see him leave today but I bet he did.  There was some van parked out front of his lawn.  Maybe he had visitors.

It was suddenly very hot today.  Close to 80 degrees.  First time since last fall to even go over like 70 and we hit 80?  Well, that probably means it's going to snow next week.  I bet it will and freeze my seeds. The garage was hot to house a cat.  All summer the garage is too hot for anything alive.  This is just the tail end of the time I can get away with it.  I put a fan on her for today,  but then, I bet by Tuesday, it will likely turn freezing again.  This is Oregon where I live, not Arizona.  I don't have any spay appointments til Thursday.

I drank too much coffee late, so I can't sleep.  Darn it.   Been debating on what cats to take to that barn home.  A Heartland worker has a sister wants two barn cats.  They live long out there.  She's had two sister cats for over 13 years.  One just died.  The other one is lonely.

Was going to take Tweetie and Button, then I saw in my records they've been here over three years, and never been country cats.  Be a terribly difficult adjustment for them to go to living in a chicken coop, albeit a large one no longer housing chickens, and dodging windrowers come July and grass seed harvest.  Not fair to them. 

So I'm switching my thinking to taking two from that doomed colony where the property got sold. Be easy adjustment for them. A far better life.  I hate splitting them up, but they're doomed unless they get someplace else.  The bulldozers will be moving in.  I'll take two of them out of there.  Be good to save even two.  That's what I'll do.  But that's only if I can trap them.  I know other endangered cats, but take too long to get them ready.  If I cut down my list by two out there, in my mind, in trouble, that would be awesome.




Sunday, April 22, 2012

Goodbye Brenda, Echo and Mama Cat



 I received an e-mail this morning, from Brenda. She had tried everything to get Mama Cat, a former feral, into a trap or carrier. Brenda is moving. She bought a house in the Eugene area.

Brenda and her long time partner contacted me two years ago, for help getting strays fixed, including Mama Cat and her kitten. I not only got Mama Cat and her kitten fixed, but also four big stray males. Two of these males were kicked out of the rental next to her, when they spray marked. They were brothers.

All four of those males disappeared. Later, a man was arrested for trapping and dumping neighborhood cats. I believe the two brothers, the big white male and the other male I got fixed all became victims of this asshole. Brenda and her man split after almost two decades together. That was hard on her. But she is doing well, and I got yet another unwanted tame stray male, Echo, fixed when he arrived hungry at her door. Brenda and her guy had found a home for Mama Cat's kitten.

So Brenda, now without Bombard, their orange female, taken by her partner, took in Echo and Mama Cat, whom she would let in, then out, trying to get her used to indoor living. I knew Brenda was trying to move, but had not heard from her in awhile, until the frantic e-mail this morning. She had tried everything to contain Mama Cat. She was inside, but would not go into a carrier or trap. I went over this morning, and in about three minutes, netted her and put her in a carrier.

 I will miss Brenda. She is educated and very very funny. Hysterical even, a joy to be around. She once invited me to a vegan group with her, for comic relief, she said, because believe it or not, I'm fun too! She had whiskey in the trunk, and before going into the meeting, she told me I would need a shot. The meeting was in Corvallis. I had never tasted Whiskey in my life, but I threw back a shot in the car, giggling and sputtering as it hit my throat. It was tough then to keep a straight face through the vegan potluck. Everything was funny. Finally I confessed to the very small group of people there, that I was "under the influence". There was hair in the salad. Try finding that and pretending all is well, so as to not be rude, when burning on your first ever shot of whiskey!

She's almost moved out. It's like an exodus on her block. Her place will be empty. The people next to her moved out. The people behind her also left and the people across from her also moved out. I don't know how much of the exodus has to do with the man killing people's cats by dumping them out to die elsewhere. Who would want to live next to someone like that? Not I.

Just as I was leaving to go over to net Mama Cat, Rocky calls. I got the four big males fixed for Rocky, including Mac, the cat whose leg was amputated when he was hit by a car on Pacific. I had also gotten three females fixed from a half block away. Well, turns out, they had another cat. They had told me she ran away.  She showed up at Rocky's very pregnant.  Tonight, he got her inside and I picked her up.  But she is so pregnant, I don't know if she will make it to Thursday, the next day I have spay appointments.  But if she doesn't, she won't have kittens under a house.  I am right now attempting to find someone who could foster her and her babies, because I think she is on the verge of giving birth.

I told her I want to move also.  She said she understood.  There is little to do around here and so many drug addicts.  Not that other small towns do not share the same problems.  I need an area where I can find friends with similar values, human contact, recreation.

Goodbye Brenda, Echo and Mama Cat. Good luck to you. Will miss you.





Echo, former stray, dressed up for Halloween!.





Echo, when I took him to be fixed.





Mama Cat, when I took her to be fixed.

Thursday, April 19, 2012

Confrontation

I got into it last night on a trailer porch with a cat hating asshole.

In the end, I used the only defense I could muster, in my exhaustion, the screaming lunatic preacher defense it could be termed, I think, if I was an outsider watching.

There were plenty of trailer parkies watching. It turned into one of those "person in trouble, mob watches, does nothing" scenes.

Which is why I felt particularly vulnerable.

Under attack, no back up.

I'd gone over to check on Deb's cats and try to find out if she was coming back or not. Four days before, I'd stopped by her trailer to see if she might be home. I'd gotten most of her cats fixed last fall, but there was one mother and one kitten I didn't get fixed. And when I tried, last fall, Deb had been hauled off by the cops to the mental ward after purportedly even laying in the road. I figured she was under duress. She had really no friends or family and the old woman next door was really mean to her. Since she was hauled off last fall, I've stopped by now and then, to see if I can catch her at home, to arrange to get those last two fixed.

Deb, despite living a terribly hard life, had a soft spot for animals and would drag home strays of all kinds, dogs, cats....She was a stray herself.

But last fall, she had collapsed under the weight of her life and her loneliness. I was later told she'd actually had a small stroke. But I don't really know what went on. She'd gotten another loser boyfriend. She was the one who told me he was a loser. I asked why she was going with him if he was a loser and mean to her. She said she was lonely.

She finally came home, I was told, had a cane and a walker. But was in the hospital again, I was told four days ago, and now they thought she really had Parkinsons and that she was not coming back. That first day there, four days ago, a neighbor said no one was caring for her cats. So I went up on the porch and put out some food. Her tame little black tux male came running out and gulped food, going from dish to dish, so eager was he to eat.

I could not believe her neighbors would not just take care of her cats at least but that's a zombie trailer court where many people have already lost their hearts. I decided the only thing I could do at that point was to try to find out if she was coming back or not.

It was last night I ran into a neighbor, when I stopped by again, to feed the cats and try to find out if she was or wasn't coming back. A Wilsonville woman had offered to hold the tame black tux until she could get him into OR Humane, but first I had to find out if Deb was coming back or not.

The neighbor across the street told me she wasn't coming back he didn't think, that her family would come by only occasionally. Someone had mowed the lawn and there were cars parked in her driveway though. I wondered what was up with that.

So I go up on the porch and all her cat food dishes are gone. The neighbor looks in the trash and there they are, thrown out. At that point, a neighbor who lives beyond the cat hating old woman next to her strides up. He immediately attacks me, telling me I caused this whole problem in the trailer park with the cats by feeding them.

I think he's kidding. I've fed Deb's cats only twice before. I tell him that. He says "I saw you here last fall." I say "Yeah, picking up and catching more cats to be fixed." But on he rants against me, that I've caused this cat problem here somehow, as he's kicking the food I just put out off Deb's porch. Not his porch. Deb's porch. He's taken it upon himself to throw out her things, and park his excess cars in her driveway and now is spilling out his hatred for cats in general on me.

I am already tired out from the long trip yesterday with another Albany unwanted throwaway life. I've worked getting cats fixed at that trailer park for 13 fricking years, beginning way back when I didn't even have a car, and a Corvallis woman who trapped cats wanted my help getting a bunch trapped there, since my reputation was already spreading, though I lived then in a low income hotel dive in Corvallis.

That was old Lou, a huge woman who fed cats there, the strays, thrown out by others, mostly drug addicts and alcoholics. The park was full of them. I got over two dozen fixed that she fed. She told me I was nicer to her than anyone she'd met in years. She died shortly after I got them all fixed at FCCO clinics. She died after getting a flu shot. I then rehomed all those cats, out of respect for her. Even then, I could not understand why her church members or friends or family or neighbors didn't help. I went to her funeral. She was a Mormon. She was also the first Mormon I ever met, that I knew of at least.

Trying to place all those cats was how I encountered Poppa Inc. Keni, Poppa's president, offered to take several as barn cats at Recycled Gardens, the nursery Poppa used to run to raise funds for spay neuter. That's how I connected with Poppa Inc. in the first place. I took up four and was astonished to see the beautiful Recycled Gardens and to find people working like that to help solve the problem. I'd never been anywhere at that point in my life or met anyone normal, having lived my entire life in the horrific controlled isolated and abusive poverty stricken world that is Oregon's mental health system. I had not left it yet at that point.

To encounter such a world as Recycled Gardens and people like Keni who applauded me helping Lou's cats after she died, that was something new to me. All I got even then at that trailer park, where I was helping complete strangers, were dirty looks and demands.

At Recycled Gardens, I found a niche. I didn't get up there much, since I was poor, and it was way up in Beaverton, about once every couple of months. I had a really clunky car then, that was always dropping parts. I bought it used off a woman for $200. There were misfits like me who volunteered there too. The values admired there were hard work and dedication to making the world a better place. This was a far cry from the world I knew. I'd lived in the Benton Plaza in Corvallis, under "mental health care" for 11 horrid years of complete meaninglessness and hopelessness. There people, mostly labeled mentals like me, or poor old people, basically waited to die. They turned to complaining there, and I joined in, about life, endlessly, about our lot, about problems, like the cat problem. Many turned to drugs and alcohol to ease the relentless wait for death.

At Recycled Gardens people were actually actively addressing problems, with hard work, instead of just complaining. I got inspired!

I went on to help dozens upon dozens of cats there over the years, including Deb's cats.

The people who move in and out of there cause the cat problems there. As do the people who live there who sit by and complain but do not help their neighbors.

So when that man attacked me as the cause of the problem there, all these memories come flooding back, of the sacrifices I've made to help the people there. I turned on him like a deranged preacher. The old woman who hates cats, next door, who was so mean to Deb while her own little dog free roams pooping, got in on the fray, too. By watching. And laughing. And agreeing with the asshole.

I wasn't surprised.

I was screaming for him to leave me alone, to get away from me, that I didn't cause any of the cat problems here, but I'd solved a lot of them by getting over a hundred and fifty fixed, and to back off. I screamed "Where is kindness, where is love, why don't neighbors help neighbors?" I screamed they were all a bunch of zombies without beating hearts. I ranted on. The man had also demanded I take out all Deb's cats. I had retorted why doesn't her family do that or you, her neighbors, why is it you want me, a stranger, an unpaid volunteer, to do this for you?" He wanted them to die of starvation then.

I couldn't look at the little black tux, watching this exchange but still trying to grab mouth fulls of food. He was doomed and so were all the cats. This horrible weight of knowledge and the despair, for me, in the knowing, was what drove my loud retortions. In frustration I hit the railing with the side of my hand. Later, my hand swelled and turned purple.

I was leaving then changed my mind and stormed back onto the porch saying "I will take this little boy, to save him from you, you hateful awful unkind people." I backed him into a carrier and left. I was sobbing hysterically then, sobbing so hard I couldn't see to drive, so I pulled over and down another road and sobbed like the world had ended. All the frustrations and sorrows associated with Kiwi and the horrors of living in an area so cold and heartless, overwhelmed me. My own loneliness overwhelmed me. And my aloneness in caring about the unwanteds here is a terrible weight. People who care about strays around here are considered abnormal.

I then took black tux boy to Safehaven, still heaving with sobs, and asked if they could take him in, after telling them about what had just happened. They agreed to take him in, tested him on the spot (negative) and were sympathetic to my sorrow.

Last night again I determined I need to move out of this area and to an area where I have contacts or friends. To save me. I am so lonely here. To help animals is extremely hard. To do so alone, with no support system at all, is very very hard. Let's face it, I don't have any real friends close by. Not even one. It's really tough to be alone, harder than most can imagine.

I am worried about the rest of her cats. But I also cannot put myself through more at that damn trailer park. I hope Lou's ghost will haunt them.

Wednesday, April 18, 2012

Kiwi is Gone

Gig Harbor, WA scenes...



Kiwi is now in Washington state. How she got to where she is now, and not to where she was initially going, is a story of stress--both cat and human.

My friend in Brownsville is online more than I am, and has developed rescue contacts. A couple months back two of these contacts agreed to take in two of her rescues, both wobbles cats, one a Siamese. One went to one rescue, who primarily transports rescued Siamese and collies. The other went to a long term rescue/sanctuary, that houses few cats but houses them well and long term if necessary, even for life. I was happy for her to find them a placement.

Then, she took in an Albany stray female, a black long hair, with an injured leg, found by a friend of hers over off Knox Butte. There's a problem house nearby with a woman who takes in animals for whatever reason but doesn't care for them well. The cat likely came over from there.

But she hadn't the space or money to care for Erika, the problem leg cat so she appealed to her online resources again. The one rescue agreed to take her and the other agreed to place a Siamese she had. That Siamese had five female black kittens. I helped her get the last three of them fixed through Poppa funds at the S/nipped clinic. She got the other two done a month earlier, using Safehaven vouchers and a private clinic. However both later came down with distemper and died. Fortunately, the other three had been vaccinated when fixed at S/nipped.

The Siamese and her five girl kittens originally came from someone who otherwise was going to shoot them.

My friend knew about Kiwi, my recent arrival here--the unwanted stray Siamese who had been through so much already. I knew she hated car and carrier travel, but when my friend said the Siamese transport rescue said the people taking Jenny, the Brownsville Siamese, would also take Kiwi, I agreed and offered to ride along.

We left around 8:00 a.m. yesterday morning. I had Kiwi in a soft shell play pen. They're large and very flimsy nylon with a zipper front. However, it would hold a bed and litter box and she couldn't damage her face and nose if she tried to get out.

Kiwi immediately went into car/carrier stress mode. It didn't cease. The trip would be long. I thought she'd calm down after an hour. Or two hours. Or three! You would think. But not Kiwi. She broke out of the soft shell by unzipping it. She isn't dumb! She was then free roaming the car. We thought, "Ok, maybe she'll be fine doing so." But she began climbing onto the dash. I finally made a collar out of my key lanyard and a leash out of my camera bag strap. But her distress increased. At times she would sit quietly on my lap. But not for long.

We finally stopped and I put her back into the soft shell, this time securing the zipper with the key lanyard clip. Then came diarrhea, explosive, probably because she was trying to hold a need to go and due to stress. The stench was horrific. She broke out again, covered in diarrhea.

We stopped again and this time she had to go into the hard shell carrier. I covered the door on the inside with a towel. By this time, my friend and I were seriously stressed. My friend was chewing her fingernails. I wanted to crawl under the tiny space under the front passenger seat and just cry.

Kiwi continued banging the carrier and rocking it, crying, clawing out the front, her distress was huge. I was afraid she might die of stress. Or that we would. I was kicking myself to the curb for putting her through this. I knew the likelihood of the transport woman taking her now was zilch. My friend told me the home taking the two girls was another two hours further north of Tacoma where we were to meet the woman for the transfer. We tried to think of some solution. We didn't think Kiwi would survive a five hour drive back to Albany either.

We finally made it to the Tacoma mall where the Siamese woman met us. And no, she did not want to deal with transporting stressed out Kiwi. She took Jenny and my friend and I exchanged stressed out looks. What to do now?

Nothing to do, but to take Erika, the bad leg Albany stray, on to the Gig Harbor rescue. When we arrived, that woman was rushed also, because she had a cat needing to see a vet. But when she saw Kiwi and heard what she'd been through on the ride up and in the time before, with her being lost for a month or more, and unwanted, she offered to take her. Kiwi had instantly reverted back into the fun loving easy going kitty she is, when not in a car or carrier.

I was so relieved I could have collapsed on the spot. So was my friend.

The drive back was far easier, far more peaceful. No more stress. Good luck Kiwi in your life journey. You are in great hands. And thank you Viv and Laura, for helping with Kiwi.

Despite the stress, it was fun to see things I rarely see. Made me feel exotic to see the great Columbia river and its bridges, islands and boats, with V shaped white capped wakes spreading out behind their progress and made tiny by distance. And to see the white glistening jet liners flattened by approach or take off, to or from Portland International, laid out over the tops of buildings or tacked low atop the horizon as if suspended in air.

The bridge of the gods, as it is called, across the inlet between Tacoma and Gig Harbor is like a dance of dolphins to behold--sinewy and graceful and beautiful! Like music!

Kiwi and Erika, both former Albany strays in trouble, are now living in Washington state and face far brighter futures than they could have ever encountered here in Oregon.

But that sales tax up there, OMG! What a shock to get a coffee and expect to pay one price but then have it cost almost 10% more. Be glad you live in Oregon, if you do! It's terribly expensive up there, to even buy coffee.

Saturday, April 14, 2012

Day of Walking

After the usual two hours of chores this morning, I knew I was going to Corvallis. There was a free yard debris pickup at the disposal site. I still have a bunch of limbs and branches that fell during the snow and windstorms. I gathered those up and crammed them into the back of my car.

I fed Kiwi. She's still in the garage cage. I suppose I'll move her to the bathroom this evening now that River is gone. I don't want to. If she's loud, she'll keep me awake.

I fed the garage room crew of cats. These are the cats who rarely come into the house even though they can if they want to via the overhead cat run through the garage.

The run is too narrow. Guarding of the run by cats with dominance and anger issues goes on. One cat with issues can keep other cats from going out and still others from coming into the house from the garage cat room and cat yard. I need a solution to that.

Miss Daisy, deaf to the low threatening growls of the cats with issues who want to engage her, blind to their acidity too, (she was born an optimist), weaves her way through them, like a soldier running a field unaware those little dips hide land minds. But many others who want to go out, are too afraid to challenge the anger Moguls who station themselves bristling at the top of the little stairs leading up from the kitchen cat door to the skyline garage run.

Those who rarely come in, include Button and Tweetie, sisters from Columbus Greens trailer park. Occasionally I find Button inside. They include Hairy, the big fat very hairy old former feral who was to meet his end at Heartland, until they saw his ear tip and called to ask if I would take him. He likes his vittles a lot. He doesn't move around much and has never, to my knowledge, run the gauntlet to come inside the house. It'd be an idiot cat to challenge Hairy. He's twice the size easily of any cat here.

The last three garage and cat yard dwellers are Angel, Smolder and Nemo. Smolder, Sage's son, is very friendly, but he likes hanging out with Sam, if Sam is out in the cat yard, and he loves Nemo too. Angel, an extremely long hair black tux girl, was dumped at the Scravel Hill cemetery with her mom and sister. Angel does come in every night, but waits until things quiet down in here. Nemo used to be so friendly and tame, but after his two month long adoption to the Salem family, culminating in them demanding I come get him, his outgoing friendly nature had vanished. He has since refused to come inside and runs from every human. I don't know what went on up there. He was such a love before and now......at least he's safe again here.

So I took care of Kiwi in the garage and cleaned the garage cat room and yard. But after that was done, I knew where I was going after I dropped off the yard debris at the recycle center in Corvallis. I was going out to Bald Hill.

I used to hike that park three or four times a week. I lived in a shack over in Corvallis that wasn't far from Bald Hill park. I love that park. I miss it.

I really don't get over to Corvallis very often anymore. If I do get over there and it's not pouring down rain, I try to go walking at Bald Hill park. Today I did just that, with sun out for a change and Bald Hill's notorious poison oak in remission from spraying I think, I walked up that hill to the very top. I had to stop about three times. I'm out of shape. I plopped down on the grass at the top. A young couple had the bench. They were bantering back and forth like a girl and guy might do, barely skirting their flirtatiousness, apparent to anyone within earshot.

Another young man sprawled on a blanket, feet out, legs bare, strumming a guitar. A brownish tan bible lay next to the edge of his blanket, forgotten to the day and his lazy guitar.

A single woman appeared then left the trail and vanished in the trees. She was soon back. Bathroom break over. She sat with her back to the rest of us, facing west and Marys Peak, visible off in the distance through an opaque haze hanging low, snow bedazzling its crown.

Down I went then, faster than I came up. I took the horse trail down, the wide and muddy horse trail. I got in my car then and I came home, feeling powerful for having done something like climb Bald Hill, something I used to do like habit, like taking a shower, when I lived over there.

I'm alone constantly. Sometimes the loneliness is heavy on my being like walking through knee deep mud. Sometimes I can kick it off or bear the weight and go on my way despite. Today I went my way.

Friday, April 13, 2012

Vespa, a.k.a. River, Goes Home

Kiwi, the unwanted Albany Siamese, spayed yesterday, now in a cage in my garage.

River, the mom of the three bottle babes, found in a barn near Harrisburg, and one of 17 cats I trapped to be fixed. I wanted to give her a better life, a real home, but I have too many here waiting already. So I took her home today, back to her cat family.

River again, also known as Vespa.

Kiwi again.


I fumed and fussed over taking River back to the Harrisburg colony. But I don't get adoption inquiries. It is extremely rare. Now with Posey here and Kiwi too, the Albany stray Siamese, I knew it was hopeless. I have too many and no way to find them homes.

So I sadly returned her this afternoon. She looked confused when I first opened the carrier, then strolled out, rather nonchalant, and went under the man's big truck. She then crawled up onto the spare tire, in the rear, obviously a favorite spot.

I gave the man a bag of Purina Cat Chow. I told him how guilty I feel returning her. He vowed to take good care of her. I saw four of the other cats. I have to find somewhere for Kiwi the Siamese to go, too.

A Wilsonville woman let me take her in to Oregon Humane on her reservations, but they refused her, saying she had a mouth granuloma and bad teeth. I was disappointed. I wasted all that gas to go up there and then a reservation was wasted that the Wilsonville woman could have used to get another rescue into Oregon Humane.

Kiwi then was spayed at Heartland Humane yesterday. They said the granuloma seen is just a trauma ulcer. They also did not see any signs of bad teeth, they said. She tested negative for FIV/Felk and found no ringworm, something OR Humane claimed they found on one ear edge. Kiwi hates carriers and beats herself up around the face the minute she's put in one.

Right now, Kiwi is in a cage in my garage and River went home to her cat family.

On the way down I5 to return her, a car begins tailgating me, real close to my bumper at times. It was black maybe a civic, older, cross dangling from rear view mirror. At first I thought maybe it was someone I might know, trying to get my attention, they were driving so close. Then I thought I could see the man was on his cell phone and thought "Please don't hit me." But then I got kind of scared.

I drove slower and slower, trying to get him to just pass me, but he wouldn't. I went form 65 clear down to 55 then even 50 at one point, but he wouldn't pass and just rode my bumper. So I got real scared. I waited til the Brownsville exit came up and sped up half mile before it came along. I waited and just a split second before I took the exit, I signaled and swerved off onto the ramp. He had no time, if he was intent on harming me or following me, to make that off ramp he was so close. I was relieved.

I sat at the stop sign at the top of the ramp and watched him disappear in the south bound lanes. I waited quite a time before proceeding back onto I5 S. He rattled me behaving like that. I think it was all due to cell phone use or maybe impairment from drugs or booze or something, but I'm not real sure what was going on.

I rode with someone once who was a trance driver. Trance drivers are people who zone out when behind the wheel, although unimpaired by alcohol or drugs. They get so tranced out they like to get behind a car or truck and latch on mentally to the back of that vehicle. This releases their mind from driving. Then they blindly follow. If that vehicle ahead of them slows, they slow. If it speeds up, they do the same. Trance drivers don't like to change lanes. They're not engaged in driving that heavily. If the vehicle they've latched onto mentally, exits the road, even though they are not going that way, the trance driver follows. A trance driver often does not realize he or she has left their route for awhile. Riding with her was frightening!

Tuesday, April 10, 2012

Just Stop It!

Stop making changes. Pleaaaazzzzeeee!! Youtube changed and keeps changing. Each change makes youtube harder to use. Each time youtube makes changes I don't create a video for a couple months. I don't have time to figure it out, ok!

The last youtube "upgrade" denies me the opportunity to click a button on audio swap that shows only songs near the same length as my video. That button was really helpful. At least, I can't find it on the new improved youtube video editor. And, when you edit your video, you then lose all description and title now. It fricking sucks. I hadn't posted a video for ages since "the change" and finally tackled it with Posey's adoption video. Do you know how long it took me to find just the right song on audio swap, without that helpful little button? A long long time.

A friend e-mailed a few weeks ago all panicked. She'd read youtube was going to ban kitty videos and she wanted to know if that was true. I said "I don't think so." It's the only thing she searches out on youtube. She claimed she read that on a really legit site.

Now blogger is changing AGAIN!!!! too.

I think techies cannot help themselves. They fiddle and fiddle and are blinded to the faults of their "new versions". They are blinded also into thinking everyone on earth is a techie who loves to read lengthy technical instructions on new software or gadgets or upgrades to favorite sites.

I think techies will improve the hell out of their websites until they are no longer even functional because they cannot stop themselves.

I don't like these stupid new blogger changes. Sorry techie creator guys. Your old version was really nice and easy. The version before that, even better. Maybe get a new hobby, techie guys? Once something works, leave it alone and go get a beer or go for a hike or get a girlfriend, not a virtual one. Just suggestions.

And where are my paragraphs, techies? In the editor, they show and once on the page, they don't. During your last changes, I lost my ability to find old posts, because many have disappeared from the archive and you removed all dates from them, too, thinking for some reason, dates on posts are not important. Now, apparently, no paragraphs. You suck blogger techies who keep making it worse. I will dream about you badly.

(I found a way back to the old blogger, a button to revert back, so I can add some paragraphs back. Their new version would make you think, when writing the post, you had paragraphs, but once you publish, they're gone. Soon, I bet, switching to "the new look" won't be optional)

Of course blogger is free to me. So is youtube. So I can't gripe too much. The creators make money on youtube and on blogger. They make money on me using their sites. They don't create these sites out of some humanitarian urge. Since the sites are free, I'll struggle on until the struggle outweighs the fun of it, then I can drop them like they never existed and move on to some other site, that so far hasn't been messed up by "upgrades" and "new looks".

Saturday, April 07, 2012

She Needs a Name. And a Home.



Mom cat is doing better. Her bloody diarrhea is history on a plain chicken diet, sub cu fluids and then the worming.

She's turned tame on me, rolling in ecstasy when I pet her. I don't know if this is still from mommy cat hormones within her or if maybe she once was tame, just dumped out there or gotten as a free unfixed kitten or cat off craigslist.

Either way, she needs to remain here a few more days to recuperate while I decide if I take her back or if there might be somewhere for her to go. She needs a name.

Thursday, April 05, 2012

Post Surgical Mother Cat in Trouble

The mother of the three bottle babes developed diarrhea the Sunday after surgery. This is the reason I had to find an option for her three kittens. I figured it might be stress. But this morning, she stood up and dribbled out a large glob of bloody something. I was not sure where that came from--rectum or vagina.

She stopped eating yesterday and drinking. I became extremely concerned, worried she had distemper but fairly sure it was not.

But what?

The FCCO tech thought colitis and advised I take her to a vet. I couldn't get in anywhere though and did not have the money to take her to the emergency clinic. A Brownsville woman asked if I had tape wormed her. She remembered getting some cats from a horrific Albany house saturated in urine and feces from cats and dogs and no cleaning. One dog pooped out pure blood. It was tapeworm caused.

So I tape wormed her this morning. Nothing. I was half frantic all day, trying to figure out what to do and finally resigned myself to the fact if it was something internal, a spay complication, there was nothing I could do and she would die. But if it was parasite caused or stress caused, well that I could help her with.

But this evening, I went in, to check on her, got her out of the carrier by lifting the top off and she went under the sink, where I had rigged a bed for her and immediately began to poop. But it was white poop. I thought "Oh no, her liver is not longer functioning." But then I looked closer. It was all worms she was pooping out, round and tape. She moved and pooped out more, than ran quickly to the litter box and pooped out still more.

Even though she is technically feral, I've been handling her and she wants to be clean and use the litter box.

I was relieved to see her problem is worms. That I can deal with. I took photos. Stop and quickly move to another website if your stomach be weak.

You can see both round and tapeworms in the photos if you know what you are looking for. Roundworms can kill cats and kittens. Only the mature worms in the gut die when you worm the cat. The larvae who migrate throughout the body, then "sense a vacancy" and move into the gut and mature. This takes about two weeks. In heavily infested cats, one must worm three times, two weeks apart. Tapeworms are gotten by ingesting an infected flea, most generally. They grow flat and long and are segmented. You usually only see segments stuck to a cats butt or the outside of the feces. They look like grains of rice.

Roundwormer is cheap. YOu can buy it in grocery store pet food sections or at feed stores. It is usually is sold under the generic names of either pyrantal pamoate or piperazine.

Back of neck treatment Revolution also kills roundworms.

Tapewormer is usually marketed as a pill containing the generic ingredient prazaquantal. Prazaquantal tastes horrible and can make the cat salivate terribly. It is sold by vet clinics and at feed stores. Vet clinics usually carry it under the brand name Droncit, a pill. You can get a pill called Drontal that besides containing tapewormer, also contains Strongid, a pyrantal pamoate roundwormer. You can also get a different tapewormer ingredient in a pill called Cestex. Or, you can pay out and get a back of neck treatment called Profender, that allegedly kills both tape and roundworms and is far easier than pilling a cat. Profender is available at most vet clinics.

I use dog chewable wormer tablets, but you need to know dosages to use those. I use the ones that contain equal amounts (114 mg) of prazaquantal and pyrantal. An adult cat dose (average cat size of 8 lbs) of prazaquantal (tapewormer) is 23 mg.

I often advise colony caretakers to worm their ferals. I tell them to tapeworm them once yearly and roundworm them twice, two weeks apart, twice yearly. You can mix these tapeworm pills, in tiny pieces, into cheese whiz, freeze it, and hide the bits in wet food (freezing it obscures its lousy taste if given while still frozen). This is effective especially if you deprive the cats of food for a day or at least of wet food. You separate the doses out for all the cats on small paper plates. Round wormer, often in liquid form, is easy to mix into wet food. This is very doable and really very cheap to do, also, and can make their lives so much better.

Wednesday, April 04, 2012

Problem Babies Now--Gretal and Feather

I've been playing around with Open Office program "Gimp", which is free to upload, and layer masking, after seeing a FB post by a cat friend in Canada about bored architectural students on spring break creating LOLCATS and architecture. On that tumblr page, that was indeed funny, there was also a tutorial on using Photoshop layer masks. I don't have photo shop, but I have the free program "Gimp" and it too allows playing with layer masks. Below is my first play creation:
I have several cats who have had serious health issues. Feather, Gretal and Brambles are the ones with the worst troubles. Brambles is a chronic herpes boy. He has outbreaks now and then, but not so much anymore. Gretal is doing just great after getting rid of all her teeth and then getting over the slurpy back of throat cold, or "feline mumps" virus, as I've dubbed it. Feather is still skinny but got over feline mumps and is slowly gaining some weight. I don't know what her underlying issue is. She has never thrived since she came here, trapped at the Santiam rest area, abandoned there and nearly starved to death, in late 2008.

I call the new virus feline mumps because of how it presents: Swollen under jaw lymph glands, at the very back, sometimes becoming very large. Copius production of mucous in the back of the throat or sinus cavities that drains down their throat or drools out and causes gagging and hacking and difficulty swallowing. This virus is widespread but comes on slowly and doesn't affect most cats. I had four come down with it here: Valentino, Posey, Feather and Gretal. Posey's brother and mother, over at the colony, are suffering with it. My Brownsville friend with cats has had four or five of hers get it, but others have remained unaffected. Valentino is old. Posey is young. Feather and Gretal are both health compromised. Or were, I should say with Gretal. So I call it mumps, because it is not a normally presenting feline "cold".
Gretal looking almost chubby now and 100% better than she has been for a long time.

Feather, looking much better, but still not 100%. Sure is improved though.

Kittens Go to Paws in West Linn



The three Rural Linn Colony bottle babes went to PAWS in West Linn. They are extremely adept with bottle babes and mom was not caring for them well and possibly has coccidia. PAWS gave me some Marquis Paste to give to the mother cat when I took them up and bought back the big canister of KMR I bought to feed them. I had not opened it. I'd also bought a can of liquid KMR which is what I used to feed them initially. I made both purchases when on the way home with them last Saturday after they were found in the barn behind the colony caretakers house. KMR is outlandishly expensive. When PAWS bought that can from me, I was thrilled. I used the money to put gas in my tank for the drive home. It was another long trip just to take them up there and then get home. But it was worth it to me.

There are two girls and one boy amongst the three. Again they were coated in their mother's dried poop. It's good they are gone from her. She has had stomach issues and while she would let them eat, she did nothing else for them, gave them no outward signs of love, like cleaning them and looked desperate to be away from them.

Heartland also had offered to take them, and I am very grateful for their offer, but in the end, because mom has parasites and the kittens likely do also, I chose PAWS because they specialize in bottle babe care. Thank you so much, Sharon, for taking them.

I gave the mom the Marquis Paste and she seems to be a little happier with the kittens gone. When her poop is normal she will go home to her cat family. She is very lonely for them.

When tiny kittens are found, it's hard to know what to do. In an already large colony, where it would be difficult to selectively trap them later on, if they survived, it is usually best to take them out and also take the mother, to care for them, if possible. But they'd been without their mom for three days already, so were in trouble. In such a case, you have to take them, or understand they'll likely die.

Now whether to keep them with a feral mom or not, that's a call one has to make. It can be a challenge to keep a feral mom happy for the time until they are weaned. Some do better than others. In this case, she wouldn't clean them and had diarrhea herself which got all over the kittens. I bathed them twice daily but could not keep up. Mom didn't feel good and although she'd let them eat, that was it. In the end, to up their survival chances, and considering the mom's loneliness, I made the decision to take them from her. It's not a easy thing to decide.

I got some updated photos of Bart, the former Millersburg stray now with his beloved saviors. He is an incredible mouser and can even smell them through the floor of the house. It still chokes me up to think how much he wanted them to take him home, from the fed feral colony he'd attached to, and how much he loves them for taking him home with them. Makes me want to cry every time!
Bart had been running with his nose to the floor of their house, so they knew there was a mouse under the house and set a trap. When they caught the mouse, Bart tried to run off with the mouse in the trap.

Tuesday, April 03, 2012

8 More Fixed, Bottle Babes Found

I finally got it together to return the 15 rural Linn Colony cats fixed Friday, on Saturday. I'd already returned the other four cats--the Lebanon black manx male, the Side by Side colony Albany male and the Albany male and female.

I'd done two loads of dirty towel laundry too and given food and water to the 16 cats who overnighted after surgery in my garage (that included the Albany Side by Side colony male).

Time to get off my duff and return the 15. Off I went with them loaded, haphazardly, not organized and neat due to my exhaustion, in my car.

When I get there, I already know they've caught another big black male in one of the two traps I've left there. I already know they have not caught the uncaught teen. I ask the woman if she thinks I can net the teen. She said "Let's try. He's on the woodpile behind the tarp." She goes to one end and I the other. He's looking at both of us, worried now, not sure which way to go. Then, he suddenly decides to bolt off the side, but my net is already over him, in a flash. The caretaker is ecstatic. I get him into the end of the net, and clamp the netting tightly closed beyond the hoop with my hand, not entirely sure there are no holes in my old rotting trusty homemade net.

I carry him in the net into the garage and we easily transfer him into my crooked trap, the trap I backed into in my garage. I was going to make art work of it, then decided to fix it so it works. So I did. It's unique and cool and I still catch cats in it.

So I have the two remaining colony cats contained and am about to release the fixed 15, when up comes the neighbor, who leases the barn behind the caretakers house. He's got kittens from the barn. Three tiny bottle babes, eyes barely open--two white boys and a torti girl. They are cold and screaming.

Who is lactating, I wonder, of the females in my car. I take a good guess, the gray tabby female first to trap and who ate everything I'd give her, before surgery and after. I take her into the garage and with a mirror, check her belly for any sign of lactation. I see small milk bags, not much milk but there's lactation. I release everybody else, load the teen and the big black male up, and the tabby mom and the kittens and the empty dirty cages and carriers, and come home.

I don't like having bottle babes here. A feral mom needs a quiet place to want to nurse and care for them. I rigged the rabbit hutch finally after feeding the kittens myself--KMR I'd just bought for outlandish cost at Petco. Their little bellies were distended. They were at the age, despite being two weeks old or so, they still need stimulation to poop and pee and they hadn't had that. They must have peed out a cup between the three, once stimulated!

I got them warm also.

Then I put them in with the mom. At first, she would have nothing to do with them. I was panicked so tired out already and now these kittens! OMG, I thought. I can't do this. But the mom finally became the mom, and took to feeding them. She's not a great mom, won't clean them, doesn't feel well herself. She ate too much in the time she was in the trap before surgery. She was one of the first to trap Wednesday night and this was Saturday. She acted like she was not that happy to be back to being mom. She has diarrhea from her over eating, too. I have to remove the kittens and bathe them at least twice a day.
The rural Linn mom with kittens, found in the barn by a neighbor.


I'd also been contacted by a Junction City couple who claimed to have 15 cats a neighbor left behind needing fixed including some pregnant ones. To solve my issues with the two cats in traps, I asked S/nipped if they by chance had any Sunday appointments. When they said I could bring cats Sunday, I asked how many max and was told six. I called the Junction City people and told them to meet me at 5:15 a.m. Sunday at the Mcdonalds with four cats, preferably females.

So off I went to S/nipped the next morning, with the two rural Linn boys, and three girls from Junction City. They only showed up with three.
Sinbad, big black male from the rural Linn colony fixed at S/nipped this last Sunday.
Nippy, the silver tabby tux male teen I netted Saturday at the rural Linn colony and who was fixed Sunday at S/nipped.


On the way back, I met them again, only this time, at the house of a JC cat trapper, who works at the WAG clinic in Eugene. I figured they could hook up and find a way to get the rest fixed somehow. I didn't get photos of their three girls. They were two muted tortis and a tabby on white female. For records, I named them Melissa, Janey and Ruthy.

Then it was home again. I also had to meet the Lebanon man, who had two more boys caught for a pre arranged Monday appointment at Heartland for them.
Furbee and Tom E. Cat, from the Lebanon big boys colony, fixed Monday at Heartland. Frubee was a crypt orchid.


I picked up an Albany girl Monday morning also and all three of those cats were fixed at Heartland.
Priscilla, fixed Monday at Heartland. These folks found her as a bottle babe and requested help from me then on caring for her. I can't believe she is so beautiful now. But she is!


Heartland said they have a worker who will foster the bottle babes, if they're old enough (I believe the person works full time). I agreed to it, but now have misgivings since I don't think the kittens are quite old enough to be left alone all day without feeding. I think they're still too young for that.

19 cats fixed Friday. Five fixed Sunday. Three fixed Monday. Very good four days for local cats. The rural Linn Colony is completed. The Lebanon Big Boys colony still has the female, with kittens out in the woods, and one big boy left needing fixed. Ten boys fixed from there so far. The Albany Side by Side colony is now fixed.

I am still recuperating from a wild exhausting but meaningful weekend.

Dashing

 Got a message this morning.  Was I even really awake yet?   The weather has been really winterish, with winds, pouring rain, cold, even thu...