Odd Looking Cat Toy

 

I made a new cat toy with remnants from cutting a fleece up to become two cage covers.   I had this strip of remnant and this is what I made:

I don't know what it is, but I stuffed it with cardboard, paper towel bits and cloth.  Oh, and catnip.

The cats don't care that its ugly.

They love it.

Roadie, aka Surprise, was neutered and vaccinated today.   He was so happy to get back to the holding cage and to scarf down two more cans of wet food.  He's been eating like he has hollow legs that need filled.   

I went out to the bird feeder this morning.  Saw something under it.   It was a rat.  Just sitting there, half stunned.  I wondered if he'd been dropped by a bird of prey.  But then I saw the neighbors cat behind their fence, frantically searching.  Ah, I thought, he got chased under the fence by their cat and probably is injured from the cat.   I went back to get my phone to take a photo and when I turned back around, the rat had run right back under the fence to the neighbors.  Ok.   It's seriously suicidal to be a rat or mouse around here.  Several neighbors on the street behind me have free roamer cats who visit this block too.  And if a rat or mouse ventured into the cat yard---certain quick death would follow.   Then we have the swooping in Cooper's Hawk, after small birds but would never pass up on a mouse or rat.

The huge stump piece left on its side, after the maple was cut down, has rotted and is falling to pieces inside the cat yard.  I've begun the task of putting the chunks in a bucket and taking them to the yard debris.   It's tedius.  That was a massive piece of wood, almost four feet long and nearly 2 1/2 feet high, on its side as it was.

I filled in a few holes too, created when the former maple roots rotted and disintegrated.  They left behind perfect looking holes that run both horizontally and those can collapse under foot, and vertically.  Eventually they'll all just collapse on themselves.

There's always a lot of work to do here.  It's never ending.  One of the runs had developed a large hole, from age rot.  It wouldn't be long before the hole would be big enough for cats to exit through it.   I went to Home Depot and got a single osb 2'x4' board.  It was $5.  Once home, I covered the board in the vinyl stick on tiles I have in the garage, to replace the floor ones that have broken over the years.   It took 8 of them.  I then shoved the board into the cat run from a ladder and attached it in three places over the area with the two ragged holes.   At least that area of the run looks brand new now.

It's nice to get these long on the list projects off the list.  I have a lot of trapping coming up.   25 appointments in all.   3 different clinics.   10 of them are next week, from the trailer park.   The next week, five from south Albany, 2 from wherever the next day, then 8 more trailer park cat spots at FCCO.  I'm hoping with 18 more for the trailer park, maybe that will be close to getting them all.   It gets harder and harder with most of them fixed now.

I need to catch that lone Siamese way out there where I caught Roadie.  But the feeder lady would have fed Sunday, Monday and Tuesday so its jumping the gun to try today.   I'm chomping at the bit to try today, but I would likely not catch the cat, feel sorry for it and leave food, disrupting efforts tomorrow.   I need to wait one more day.

Costs of Living

 Cat food prices have increased drastically in the last month.

Walmart raised the price of a single Friskies can from $.78 to $.84.   

Walmart jumps its cat food prices

I found a coupon price sale at Bimart for 48 case can and jumped on it.  With the sale and the coupon, reduces the price to $.68 a can.

Human food prices are still high too.  I checked the internet for reasons cat food is so high.  Said the costs of production rose 25% between 2019 and 2022.  And now, I don't know, maybe tariffs play a part in increasing it more so fast.  Or just plain old greed.

All I know is the struggle to survive is real.   The neighbor gave up on buying a trailer here since her ID got stolen and now is hoping to move back to CA to be closer to family.   She said there are some trailer parks down there with space rent cheaper than here in town.  I believe it.  Housing costs here are out of control.

Getting chicken that's marked down for quick sale due to age on shelf, cooking and dicing it, that helps extend my cat food.   I used to get road kill calls from friends who then would bring me a wild turkey or other bird they had seen hit by a car.   For me to use it, I have to have credible witness on when hit.   I don't want to make my cats sick.  Lots of people eat roadkill around here.  It's perfectly safe if fresh enough and free.  Why not.

Surprise, (I'll figure out a better name) the gray tux kitty in the holding cage, is eating well.  Not aggressive at all, but also not tame, been on his own too long I suppose.  Maybe born there I wouldn't know.  I texted feeder lady his photo to ask if she knew him but all she said was "hope he looks better in person cause he looks like a rat".   Ok, I thought, that doesn't deserve a reply.  Then I went further and blocked her number. There is no reason to communicate with her.

I got a neurosurgeon consult appointment late February.  I was shocked really it didn't take months.  In the meantime I found exercises to strengthen back muscles on youtube and am starting slow to do them.   If I have to have surgery having some back muscle strength might make recovery faster.  Yesterday started out bad with back and leg pain, but I reminded myself "You are lucky to be alive at this age, so buck up and enjoy this day".   I have to lecture myself a lot on various issues.   It helps.

Today its back to raining here in Oregon.  February 1, finally its raining again.  Rather than cold and overcast.  Everyone I know is sick of winter.   If we don't get enough rain, with snow in the mountains, the summer could be bad, with low reservoir levels, and wildfires.  You never know, could be one of those summers where it rains through end of June and we barely get any sun.  That could be hard to take too.

Poof!

 I returned Poof and gave the lady two bags cat food.  We jawed about prices going up and getting old.  Then I drove off and decided to try for that Siamese, since I had an empty trap in the back.

And time.

Feeder lady isn't feeding today, nor did she yesterday.   She only feeds the cat three times a week.

I set the trap and dorked in my car on my phone, searched it for snacks, never found even one.

An hour was all I was giving it.   But then I heard it spring.  My ears aren't that old.  The trap was about 50 feet from my car, hidden from my view.  But I heard it spring all right.

I was so ready to see that Siamese in the trap.  And so unready for what I did see in the trap.

Excuse me, who is this?   

It's a boy.   And he's got a claw hole in his head which is not uncommon this time of year.

The hole in his forehead

The Siamese had joined the party.  I'd put out some food since I had just the one trap now occupied.

So I begin to wonder how many more that lady was feeding out in this very rural place.   She'd never tell.   

See ya Poof!

Freshly Neutered and Gorgeous and He Knows It

Poof Isn't Pregnant

 Poof is not pregnant.   Ha!  I knew Poof would be a boy.

I went and trapped him quickly anyhow, just in case when the residential lady, one of the folks who feeds him, told me "she" is pregnant.  These are folks who cannot describe a cat's color even, for the life of them.   Her adult son walks their dog routinely in the park, sometimes followed by a couple of cats.

They love animals.  But they don't actually ever help getting cats who show up at their place fixed.   We're talking three or four adults there, none of whom will lift a finger when one needs caught to be fixed.

So I prefer trapping them by myself in the park.  But now there's the parking fee, so unless I pay out, I can't.  People pull into the parking lot just across the dike trail from them and dump their cats.  Sometimes dogs too.  By the score.

Many people who move to this county are shocked by the number of stray cats and dogs.   

Poof was covered in fleas, poor fellow.  But they're dead and dying now.

The tech at Rad offered to take him over to the clinic yesterday with her.   I'd put out a plea.   I had to be in Salem with Flopsy, Mopsy and Cottontail at 8:30 a.m.  I couldn't do the Corvallis 7:15 check in too, for Poof.  They were the three trailer park cats I was holding for barn cat placement.   I ended up taking Poof up to the tech in Lebanon and putting him in her chicken/hay shed for the night.  She wasn't home yet.  She took him in to the clinic with her yesterday morning.

So he's had an experience!

The hand off went fine except Flopsy and Mospy, who are very bonded, (the two blacks) were in the same small carrier and one of them pooped on the drive up to Salem.   The SCR lady is always prepared for such incidents though.  She had extra carriers along.

The rest of the day I spent catching up.  I had to vacuum out the back of the dryer and its vent, to increase efficiency, which had decreased.   I need to switch from towel cage covers, that take forever to dry and increase the already expensive electric bill, to fleece.  Right now cheap fleece blankees are on sale at Walmart for under $4 each.  I need to make this switch now.  I struggled to pay the electric bill.  It was high from running a space heater in the garage during the freezing weather to keep group after group of trailer park cats warm as they awaited barn homes.  And from trying to dry the darn cage covers.  Towels take too long to dry.  The door switch on the washer is also going haywire.  I watched youtube videos on how to bypass it, so if it gets much worse, I'll do that.  The door switch lets the washer start when I close  the door and stops it if I open the door.   

I finally had time to repair my old cheap aluminum fold up cart.  I use it to bring heavy items in from the car or even from the store to the car.   It's super light weight.  I've had it a very long time.   One wheel, held by two plastic brackets, broke a few years ago and I was able to glue it together, since it broke only on one side and then reinforce that with a metal hardware piece, glued and screwed across the broken area.  That has held well.   But this time, the other wheel broke off completely.

I had a 360 castor and decided to use that even though it is smaller than the other wheel.   I used pipe brackets and screws to hold it in place.  And since its a 360 wheel, used long enough screws to run them down the outside and inside of the wheel hardware to keep so it wouldn't spin sideways.

Eventually I'll get a new hand truck, but when I do, I'll get one with bigger wheels and that can also be used as a pull cart sturdy enough to pull traps with cats in them.     I'm really broke right now.  The electric bill was a killer.  I hope cleaning out the dryer and vents of lint, no more space heater in the garage since the cold weather broke and no trailer park cats to hold right now, plus switching to fleece cage covers, will help in months to come.

Long screws down the sides of the wheel hardware keep it from spinning.  I use what I have.  Might not look great but it works and will keep the hand truck usable until I can get another.

Broken off wheel out front.  The bottom of the hand truck is all corroded but its been around a long time and has a right to show some age.

I loaned a couple of traps out to a farmer who will catch his own two barn cats and has an appointment for them himself.  One of my drop traps is now in Sweet Home with a lady trying to catch the last cat in her colony.  

I probably now loan out traps to people catching their own more than use them myself.  Well maybe not more.  But it does almost double the cats that can be helped.

Today I will clean my car and that's about it.   I'm not taking Poof back til tomorrow.  I want to be sure he's not tame.   He's set up in the holding cage.  I cleaned it yesterday after the three that had been in it left.  He's not acting tame so far at all.

Five More, Plus

 I went over to the trailer park late morning yesterday.  It had been down in the low 20's the night before and finally unfroze.  

I set up the drop trap in one lady's front area and sat across the street in a chair provided by another resident.    She gave up after awhile and went back to her place--too cold, she said.  The other lady left too.  I then moved the drop across the street to my side out in the grass.

The only one left unfixed where the drop trap had been was a teen black.   The other six hanging out there are now all fixed.

It wasn't long before I began picking them off, one by one, with the drop trap, the unfixed ones.  I caught a massive male I named Megatron.  Black tux.  I caught a little black tux too, who turned out to be a girl, named her Cottontail, for the records.  And then two more blacks, both young adults.  Flopsy and Mopsy.  Silverton Cat Rescue barn team will try to place the three young adults.

I picked up a kitten at another trailer.  There are four in all there.  She also has a bunch of unfixed dogs.   I told her to look up PAL, a Salem nonprofit that helps get dogs fixed.   

She told me the kitten was a girl.  I knew it wasn't but I said nothing.

I went home with the kitten and the four wild things for the five Salem appointments today.  There are no more appointments for the trailer park.  I"ve tried and tried to get folks to request appointments at the FCCO and or OHSS, since that's what needs to happen to get more.  I can't make more myself.   Rules, you know, at the clinics.

One resident has made all the FCCO and OHSS appointments for the cats fixed thus far.   But she's tired of it.  Rightly so.   

For now I can't do anything more there.   I returned the kitten and she'll keep him inside.  The big boy goes back tomorrow and the other three remain here for SCR placement.

After I took the cats to the clinic, I went to try to catch that lone Siamese way out the rural road.  This time I saw the cat but it never went for a trap.   I waited three hours.   Then I went to the park.  The residential lady said Poof, the buff bobtail long hair, is pregnant.  I had my doubts.  Looks male to me.  And these folks are known for not being able to even describe a cat by color, so I wasn't particularly believing them.  But I don't want anymore kittens born in the briars at the park.  Poof got dumped there months ago.  

 You got to have a parking pass to not be in violation at the park now.   Those cost $9 a day.   I don't have one.  So I circled through fast and saw the cat.  I looked around for park employees, didn't see any, set a trap, waited ten minutes, caught the cat, grabbed the trap and took off.  Whew!!!!   Doesn't matter I'm volunteering.  Not to the county.  

Poof's tail is really distinctive.  Looks like a hairy water fountain.   

Here are the five who were fixed today from the trailer park.

Cottontail, a girl, black tux

Mopsy, a girl

Flopsy, a boy

Megatron, a black tux huge boy

Atlas, a boy kitten

Here's Poof.  Since I was told its a pregnant she, the clinic agreed to work in Wednesday.  

Super beautiful Poof

I get home tonight and get a text, the first one in some time, from the Lebanon feeder lady.  Shes reprimending me for not telling her I would feed that Siamese out there, that it could have spared her a trip out.  WTF!!!  She never told me she was still feeding, in fact she said the opposite.   And she hasn't answered a call or text.  Not even about finding Moxie dead, a cat she fed.   She only texts me when  she wants something of me.   I responded it was up to her now, that I would not be back out there, and that I'd spent hours on three occasions trying to catch a cat that was being fed, because she'd told me she was "letting that spot go".   At least I'm done with it and at least she told me she's still feeding.   And I know why I couldn't catch that cat.   

Freezing Rain? Snow? Ice? Not Here.

 We are having sunny days.

But they are cold.  And at night, temps dip to nearly 20 degrees or mid 20's.  

This has been going on awhile.   Cuts my trapping hours, that's for sure.   When bait freezes over.

Last night it was down to 21 degrees.  Tonight, tomorrow, won't be warm enough for bait to stay unfrozen til about 11:00, then frozen again by 4:00, so those are my trapping hours, that five hour window, for the five spots Monday.  That's usually the time of day no respectable wild cat is out and about too.  

By the time I tried to get going late this afternoon to trap at the trailer park, it was already too cold.

A friend came down, thinking maybe she could help with feeding that poor Siamese left out there on her own.   I don't even know if she's still alive or not.   Haven't seen her in two weeks.  But to be fair I've only been up there 3 times in that time.  

I've tried to find someone closeby with a heart who could maybe even trap her.

Anyhow, she was going to get here at 11:00 a.m. then it didn't happen til after noon.  So I knew we would not see the cat at the time of day.  We went anyhow.  She wanted to see where it was.  No sign of life anywhere.

To come back, we drove through Waterloo and turned to head back to Lebanon and I thought I saw a dead cat along the road.  I had her turn around and go back.  I got out and went and looked.  This is a couple hundred feet from another place that Lebanon woman fed.  

Sure enough, it was Moxie, the black teen she fed, although he's pretty close to adult by now.   I had to turn him over to check for the right ear tip but there it was.   He'd been hit by a car.  I don't even know if she's still feeding the cats there.  She was, even after she quit the other place, because she was taking a bus there.   But I haven't heard from her again, since I drove her to feed last Sunday.  And she doesn't respond.  I sent her a text anyway, to tell her he's dead.   No response.  

He was born down along the river in the berry vines to Fluffy, a brown tabby girl.  I'd caught and fixed Fluffy's mom Growler.  I caught four of Fluffy's siblings when young and got them to rescue, but she and I had a falling out over her refusal to help trap, and I had nothing to do with her for months after, except to encourage her to catch the other two and get them fixed.  She didn't.   I finally caught one of the two, a girl.   

I didn't know she'd moved her feeding place for the cats, but she did and that Fluffy had kittens of her own.    Finally I went and caught Fluffy and her by now teen black boy, Moxie's brother, got them fixed and sent that pair off with SCR to a barn home.   Again, I encouraged her to catch the rest.  

She got Moxie and Julius, a big orange boy, into carriers a few months back, and I got them fixed.  SCR had a barn home for them and the two sisters.  I held the boys in the garage and encouraged her to get the girls but she didn't, then she came and wanted the boys back, said the sisters needed them there.   That was the last I knew of those four.  Until today.

So long Moxie

Moxie wasn't quite yet a year old.  He was hit by a car.  Sorry buddy.  

Portland Trip

 Yesterday I drove 20 cats to Portland to be fixed.

It was from the barns again, just outside Albany.   I took both my drop traps to them a few days before and they began feeding under them.  I also left them traps to set up and feed in, which they did.   I thought we'd catch a few Tuesday evening then the rest on Wednesday just to break it up a bit and give a better chance of getting 20.

Well they caught 17 Tuesday night.  This is an elderly couple, both over 80.  He was pulling the string on the drop trap in one barn and she in another.   He caught three under the goat barn drop trap.   She thought she had four in the hay barn, two of them already fixed, but she actually had about seven cats under it.

So I did the transferring out to traps.  My headlamp went dead out there as I tried to get them out but eventually got them into live traps.  The rest we caught by setting traps.

Wednesday I took my neighbor to a procedure she had to have, under anesthesia, then picked her up again when she was done.  After that I headed out to once again try to find that lone cat on that rural road, but didn't see her.  There was a homeless entourage there in the pullout.  It consisted of a very old small camp trailer, a blue passenger van, with some logo painted over but not enough you couldn't see someone tried to paint it over, and a utility rig loaded in junk metal with a generator running off it to the camp trailer.  It has been very cold out.   The cold often lasts til late morning.

I parked and went around the group of vehicles, to try to spot the cat.  I never spotted her but left some food in case she's still alive and somewhere in the brush around there.

I decided to stop by the colony when driving home, since it was on the way.  I'd told them I'd be out later.  I saw a cat in a trap by one barn and collected her.   By 4:30 the other two traps had cats in them and we were done since they had only 20 spay spots at the FCCO.

In the meantime I got the back mri results by mychart.  I was really kind of shocked at the results showing a lot of damage especially at one vertebral level and stricture of spinal cord there (stenosis) to 4 mm, which really was scary to see.  I felt very vulnerable then, like I shouldn't lift anything heavy at all, or my spine would pinch off there.  

The doctor referred me to neurology.  I think that might take a long time, but I don't know.   The main damage is caused by calcification of the disk, nerve endings etc and even a ligament or tendon head that attaches.  Something like that.   I don't want to read it again.  

I got up at 4:30 a.m. yesterday morning and by just after 5:30 was headed to the clinic with the 20 cats.  I had to load them all first but took it easy.

It was too cold to have them in the car night before.   I went to my friends house and spent the day there.  she wasn't there, was at work, but I watched TV when I should have been napping.  Oh well.

Got home after 7:00 last night I think.  I could have been home sooner but I had to stop for gas and then returned a bunch of cat phone calls there, just to take a break from driving.

Now I just need to return those 20 cats.  They have more there need caught.  Hopefully they can get some more appointments.  

These 9 are from the goat barn.

And then the next 11 are from the hay barn.

Long hair buff teen

Two short hair buff teens

There were two kittens, one gray long hair and one muted torti long hair

Dlh gray teen

Dlh muted torti teen

There were three gray tux short hairs, one a kitten and the other two teens.

And a flamepoint teen.

That's a lot of photos but will need them for reference next time around.   

The problem is we didn't catch the adults at the hay barn, only teens and kittens.

Return of the cats:   It went very smoothly.   I first went into the goat barn and put out a lot of dry food, then also plates of wet food.  Then I released the 9 cats from the goat barn.  The woman of the couple watched, but it was easy as I'd driven up near the barn.  I left the empty traps there and asked her what she thought my chances were driving through the field to the hay barn.  Sure would be easier than hiking each trap out.   My car is very lightweight.  In other words, low chance of sinking in to soft ground.   If I'd gone earlier, with the ground still frozen, I would have not thought twice about it.   

So I went for it and drove out through the field around their house and yard out to the hay barn.  There I repeated what I did in the goat barn--put out a lot of dry and wet too.   I put all the dirty papers in a bag I'd brought along, folding up the cage cover towels, then drove through the field back to the goat barn to get those empty traps.  I arrived home with the traps cleaned of dirty papers and cage covers ready to start laundering.  This made things very easy.  Catching up on laundry will take a few days but otherwise, this was as easy as it gets, and would have been easier if I'd taken a nap at my friends place during the day yesterday since I had to get up at an ungodly hour.