Cat Fixing Update

Update: Friday, I took in two cats. One was a stray who showed up at the 34th street Baptist colony, a black male, whom I picked up that morning and took straight to the vet. He was already neutered. He's been hanging out with the strays for several months and the woman feeding the strays has been feeding him. She was fearful for him, since the apparent demise of an abandoned formerly tame and owned orange tabby male. She didn't want that to happen this little guy too. But, fortunately, he was already neutered.

The second cat fixed Friday was a torti teen, owned by an extremely poor woman now living in a beleagured Albany trailer park in an ancient 5th wheeler.

Today, a Lebanon woman took in her own five, four of them females and picked them up herself. She is connected to the Marian trailer cats I got fixed last summer.

I took 3 adults, three teens and two kittens from there to be fixed and returned only two adults. One of those cats I got fixed, but then relocated, or tried to, was Marian, who disappeared when she escaped from me when putting her into a containment cage at her new barn home down on Witt Drive, when the sudden extreme roar of a jet boat, from a nearby event, although it was not to start until the next day, on their little short road, caused her and me, instant jolts of adrenalin. It was so loud it was like a bomb had gone off right beside the barn.

I tried to hang onto her, in her panic, and got seriously scratched, wrist to shoulder, and bitten in my attempts. She was never seen again. I searched for her for weeks. I hope she is still alive out there somewhere, and that some kind person is feeding her. I still search for her.

Three of the teens went to a barn home outside Brownsville and are doing fine. I adopted out the two small kittens. One is doing great in Jefferson while the other, a very healthy kitten, died in the hands of a Lebanon family, who noticed, after a few weeks, that she suddenly couldn't use her back legs, but did nothing about it, apparently, and did not take her to a vet. She died.

Since the young daughter carried her around constantly and slept with her, I am guessing she suffered a traumatic injury, perhaps rolled over on, in sleep or something else. It was horrible to hear of that little kittens death. I no longer adopt small kittens to families with young children unless I know the family.

But a good thing in hearing from the Marian trailer woman this weekend, was that the allegedly feral female I trapped and returned, is now a house cat, she told me, loved and tame.

As for the gray male I returned, they don't see him, but he's probably still there and probably still eating the scraps they leave out on the porch. For one cat, scraps would probably keep him alive and this woman with the five cats fixed today, who is the sister of the man of the Marian trailer couple, takes cat food to them when she can. So it's his sister, who lives in Lebanon and loves animals, who took in her five today, paying a small copay on each, and vowing to make sure that gray male at the trailer, gets fed outside.

I had not intended to take any of those Marian trailer cats in to adopt out, just to get them fixed, but their neighbors' dog had come over and already killed three of the kittens and one adult between the time they called and when I got out there, three days later. I knew that many faced no future there, with a vicious dog next door, and them unable to afford cat food for any of them. They have no vehicle either, and if they go anywhere, although they are in a remote location, they ride their bikes or hitch rides with friends or family.

So two cats went in Friday and five more today. Also, I am told, there may be three more strays who may not be fixed, at Heatherdale trailer park. The woman who is feeding them is going to try to get photos of them and send them to me so I can check the photos to see if the cats have eartips or if I recognize them as house cats I got fixed for residents who then may have abandoned them.

An Adair woman called, wanting to get three cats fixed, but then refused to get the pregnant female fixed, stating her kids all knew the cat was pregnant and she wouldn't know what to tell them. They have four dogs, seven kids between the husband and wife, and nobody works.

I told her this might be a good time to discuss responsible behavior and kindness with the kids, but she said she couldn't. I explained Poppa's policy, which is they all get fixed or they will need to pay for it themselves and suggested she try the FCCO for the two males. The other thing is that they have their own vet, in Albany, whom she says she is going to work with, to get the two unfixed dogs done. I suggested she work with her own vet then, to get the cats fixed, being sensitive now to the concerns of my own vet, of people using them for spay neuter only because they are affordable but continue routine care with another vet. So I told her I could be of no help with Poppa funds and my vet. I think it was the right thing to do.