Sink or Swim

After the terrible day yesterday, I had to either sink or swim, I figured.

So it was good for me to head to the Cascadia homeless camp this morning.

First I dropped off the three cats from the Bellinger colony fixed Wednesday--the last torbi girl, the long hair orange girl, and the brown tabby boy.  Minus from the returnee's was Titus, the missing black and white boy, who somehow escaped a live trap in my garage.

When I told them one had escaped a trap, the adult son, said "It was Titus".
"How did you know?" I asked.   "He is an escape artist and extremely smart," he replied.  I guess Titus knows how to open windows, how to climb walls and has an extensive skill set.

They said if I run across him, they'll take him back.  If not, they figure he'll survive anywhere.  They said he's a kind cat, young and loves kittens.

This only made me cry.

Once in Sweet Home, I dropped off two tires I got out of my rafters when searching for Titus, at Lisa's workplace.  She is going to use them in a goat playground. 

Then I picked up Theresa and we headed for Cascadia.  She knows all the folks in all the homeless encampments up there, and also where the unfixed cats are.

We returned to the camp where we had trapped five adults prior to the Covid shutdowns.  They were fixed and then a woman out in Scappoose adopted all five as barn cats.  She posts videos of them periodically.

After the shutdown ended, in early June, I was informed there was one adult that had been missed, who now had two kittens in the old house. So I went and caught her and the two kittens.  They wanted Cascadia, as I named her, back, but the two kittens went into foster.  I thought that was the end of it, that all the cats at least there were fixed.

Nature claiims this old house, but Cascadia and two of her kittens had made it home.

But Cascadia had six kittens not two, and now they want the four teenagers gone but also they want Cascadia gone too.  I feel so helpless at times and want to protect these poor cats.  I was only able to trap one of those five cats who need a new place to call home--an orange tabby boy kitten.

I'll get Cascadia and the other three.

Three trailers farther up the rocky dirt road was where we were really headed.  A woman had a tame Siamese with four kittens, living in the woods above her trailer.  She has three or four yappy little dogs who chase the kittens.  At first she wanted all five back once fixed, but she changed her tune after Theresa and another camper and myself talked to her.  Then she relinquished mom and all the kittens.

As we arrived Theresa, who is afraid of dogs, eyed the massive pitbull under another trailer.  He did look menacing.  Around his neck was some sort of sharp chain collar, likes spikes outward.  I saw his tail flap a couple times.  And his eyes sparkled, it seemed to me.  "Come here you big baby boy," I said, slapping my knees and smiling.  Oh did he come, rollupping over, all wags and wiggles, that big huge "scary" boy.  We gave him cat food and Theresa went and got a can of dog food from the lady we were trapping for.  We have to replace that can of dog food, though.

Was able to first trap two kittens, one at a time.  Then I had to use the tame mom in a trap to catch the other two.  I also walked down the steep rocky road to the other trailer to see if they had trapped anyone else.  That's where Cascadia is fed, with her four remaining kittens, although it was down to three after I caught the orange boy.  They had no luck however.  Walking up and down that hill four times wore me out and made my knee sore.

It was already hot by 11:00 a.m.  So I left with the six cats/kittens I had caught.

At 6:00, after a nap, I picked up a Lacomb stray boy.  When I got home with him, I set him up in the living room in the cage, since it was still quite hot in the garage.  I knew this would not go over very well with my cats.  Big huge unfixed stinky boy in my living room.  Boy does the house smell now.

By 7:00, ARCF in Portland had agreed to take the Siamese mom and her four kittens.  But they didn't want them fixed with ear tips.   Yikes.  Now I had only the orange tabby boy and Grayling, the big boy, for my five spots.  I called a Sweet Home woman with an unfixed boy she can catch and drove off to meet her in Waterloo.   I tried the residential colony caretaker, to see if she had new ones.  She didn't.  I tried her neighbor, who had taken in a kitten months ago, but he couldn't find her.

I got home and there in the driveway was Titus, the lost boy from the garage.  I set traps but have had no luck and its now 5:00 a.m. Friday.  Ah well.  Sure its embarassing to go short handed to the clinic but I did end up with 8 cats.  Five of them just can't be fixed right now.  ARCF will get them fixed.

Here are the three boys getting fixed.

Flash, one of Cascadia's four kittens, from the homeless camp up there

Grayling, a big sweetheart stray boy from Lacomb

Charming beautiful Oreo from Sweet Home