15 Albany area Cats Fixed Today

Last night and today, just another marathon.

I was back at the colony off Clover Ridge last night, with my drop trap. I'd already taken 7 to be fixed from that colony and helped them round up ten they took up to an FCCO clinic. These are neighbors of the people who caused the problem.

There was a big Siamese male, who, if not fixed, was going to be shot by a neighbor sick of his spray marking. But first, I went after adult females left unfixed. I caught the tabby on white in the afternoon, with the drop trap, unceremoniously. She never knew what hit her. She'd recently brought out her kittens, who look, from a distance, big enough to be fixed. I caught none of them, however. I had limited reservations and wanted to fill those with big cats. Who could reproduce and spray mark and fight.

I grabbed the kittens one by one, however, and weighed them. Many are on the verge of being weight grade for fixing. I chose to take one little white guy down. A keeper. I stuck him in a carrier. I also wormed the other kittens. There are several black ones, a couple of black tuxes, a torti, an all gray, a couple of tabbies, one of whom was fixed last time. The orange one disappeared. The man is trying to find some group to take them, before they're killed on the road. They cross it back and forth between the two houses. They're full of personality and most are very tame.

I left briefly. The old couple still was trapping south of Albany. However, he didn't realize or remember I have gotten, in years past 14 other cats fixed there. He thought they had all disappeared and all these new ones had showed up. In reality, they're the old ones, all ear tipped and happy and fat. He can't see the ear tips is all.

But there is still that black and white female with the two fat kittens out there, to be caught. We only caught the one cat there, in two days of trapping, that didn't have an ear tip, not counting the three others done last week, that is.

He wouldn't listen to me on the trapping either.

Then I picked up four tame cats, and that's when I got into it with that landlord.

After all this, I had a male kitten and an adult female, from the Clover ridge colony, the black and white male from the old couple, and the four tame cats, two of each sex. I then settled in for the long haul, out at the Clover Ridge colony, with my drop trap.

They got Devoted Mom caught themselves and put into a carrier. She's had a dozen litters probably and still is devoted to caring for each and even other mother's rejected kittens despite being worn out inside, from this endeavor, with a chronic cold, and worms and diarrhea from worms and malnutrition.

I drop trapped two torti's then, one at a time. The weather had turned. It was raining off and on and my car would fog up and it was hard to see with fogged up binoculars through a fogged up windshield in the dark if the cat under the drop trap was fixed or not fixed.

I knew there was a black male out there, and had to judge by his walk, it was him, not one of the many black females, some fixed, some not, and yank the cord, dropping the trap.

I lucked out at 11:30 p.m., when two of the final three females, waltzed under the trap together. I yanked the cord. Boom. Wasn't easy by this time, getting them into traps. I had no more transfer traps. I would have to lay one-door traps on their side, open end protruding beyond the corner of the transfer door on the drop trap. This makes me nervous, when I'm tired.

Once I raise the wooden transfer door on the drop trap, with it still entirely covered while also holding it down, I then must simultaneously pull the trap front away from the drop trap, with the cat in it now, and flip it up right so the door snaps down and the lever drops that keeps the cat from being able to hit the door and slam it open and get out.

Got those two contained. Figured maybe I should give it up, since I had to be on the road by 4:30 a.m. But then I saw the Siamese, out of the corner of my eye, like a ghost shadow against the black gravel. I waited it out.

It took awhile. He flirted around the perimeter. Then suddenly about 1:15 in the morning, this morning, he walked by my car and directly under the drop trap, where I had tuna in the plate. I shook myself semi alert and yanked the cord.

That was one angry Siamese. He hissed and struck at me through the netting of the drop trap as I got it covered and bolted against it. It was rock n roll. I got him into a trap.

I did the victory dance. I couldn't help it. I was dancing around in the dark in that driveway, with a flashlight in one hand, the cat at my feet in the trap. "Gotcha, buddy," I gloated. "Hey," I admonished, when he hissed, "Shit happens and tonight, shit happened to you. But it's good shit. Yes indeed."

I still had a trap set at a nearby barn. She had tom cats there, drift overs from this colony. Also, tragically, I'd seen a very very pregnant black cat waddle up the fence line from that direction, take one look at my car, turn around and waddle back down the fence line. I asked the colony caretaker about her. She said, "We see her in the field, behind the barn down there."

So, I told the barn owner, already concerned about the toms in her barn, about the preggie. She wasn't happy, but her daughter saw her that afternoon in the barn. We didn't catch her. I left a trap set.

I told the old couple to leave my traps set over night there too, that I'd check them on the way out of town.

I never got to bed last night.

I got a very upsetting call. The woman in Corvallis who adopted the two Siamese from the very old Lebanon woman colony, a few weeks back, never tamed them and now doesn't want them. I was horrified, because I can't keep them here, having too many, getting no adoptions, and now, they're probably too old to tame. I told her I could not take them back for two days and that the only option for them at this point is to return to the colony, which is a very very crappy option.

I couldn't sleep after that call.

Couldn't stop thinking about it.

So I went into the bathroom and held the old holocaust girl, who is so skinny it's hard to hold her. She seems like she'll break if I pick her up. She is eating and drinking on her own but is very very tired and I don't know if she has some underlying problem or if she is incredibly run down from starvation.

Because she recovered so quickly from dehydration and low body temp, I tend to think she went long term without food. Her left front leg may have been broken. It's thick and slightly crooked. This may have prevented her from getting to food and water for too long. I don't know.

Off I headed, at 4:00 a.m. But first, I had to check the trap I left set in the barn. In it, I found a mostly white male, dark tabby ears and tail. The woman came and said "That's one of them." So I loaded him in, although it was hard to fit another big trap in the car. The old couple had all my small traps and I knew I wasted them there, but I like them. He doesn't set traps well. I'd find them in a line, without bait, in fact.

Off then to check the traps in the old couple barn. I warned him, jokingly, now don't shoot me if when a car enters your driveway at 4:00 in the morning. "I can't shoot you?" he says, with a grin. "No," I said.

On the way, already, Devoted Mom has had an incident. She was meowing to beat the band, in the carrier, unfortunately, located just to the right and behind my head. Then I hear this farting sound, then a horrible terrible smell fills the air. AHHHHHHH!!! She's had a major diarrhea event four inches from the back of my head.

It's dark. I'm running late. The traps at the old couple barn are empty. I grab one and in the dark, wrestle with it and the diarrhea carrier and the fairly happy diarrhea cat, now purring. I get her into the trap. I plop the smelly awful carrier on the ground by the old couples' garden.

I'm leaving it there.

As a last thought, I scribble a note on a bait plate, that says, "Will be back for this later." I lay it atop the carrier and pick up a rock and put it on the note so it won't blow away. Then I head out.

The trip down always seems longer than the trip back. I got down there on time. I unloaded the cats, cleaned out the back of my car, spread out a blanket back there, wrapped myself in another and conked out for six hours.

More later. Bottom line: 15 more Albany area cats got fixed today and, despite the marathon, I loved every minute of it. I'll be a bitch from exhaustion the next few days. You better believe I will. Stay away. You've been warned!