Emergency Trip to Snipped

 Sunday everything seemed to be going just fine, on track.  I had seven spots at the Salem clinic Monday.

Early morning Sunday, I got up and drove over to the house where a man feeds five cats.  I'd taken him a drop trap the week before, set it up and he'd been feeding in it.  I was there by 6:00 a.m.

These cats are a mom cat and her four older kittens, teens now.

I couldn't believe such great timing.  All  five went under the drop trap at one time and I yanked the string he had attached himself to the drop trap stand.  Caught all five!  I ran then back through his house, to get the traps, while he covered the drop trap, to calm them down, and held it down.   Three of the traps I'd brought were large ones, because I was taking my ten small ones up to Sweet Home a little later in the morning.

All five cats in the colony caught!   And early in the day too!   

I was in Sweet Home by 11:00 to deliver ten more traps, already lined in paper with a folded cage cover inside each.   My stomach took a nose dive to see about 12 teenage cats in three cobbled together cages on the sidewalk.   One litter box.   These are the ones they've tamed from feral moms.

I tried to keep my horror at their situation bottled inside.  They were going to put most if not all the teenage cats into my traps today, Tuesday, to be fixed at the FCCO tomorrow, then allegedly try to find them homes.  And also catch the free roaming cats.   I am not optimistic.  I don't know why, with 12 tame teens right there, that they can handle.  I guess I will find out today if they have filled the 14 precious reservations they got from the FCCO as I will pick them up later today and transport them to Portland tomorrow to be fixed.  They wanted no help trapping.   They have five of their own traps.  And now borrowing ten of mine, they have the traps to get it done.  So there would be no real excuse not to catch 14 cats with 12 sitting right there in those three cages.

Anyhow, I'd only been back home a short while when my phone rang.   The caller ID came up the Salem clinic but no one is there on Sundays, so I hesitated, thinking someone cloned their number to scam.  I answered it. 

 It was the clinic calling to cancel all seven of my spots for yesterday.  WTF!   No vet, they said.  My mind went blank completely after their first phrase, that they were cancelling all spots.  If they told me why there was no vet for yesterday's clinic, I didn't hear it.  After my mind went blank, it began whizzing away.  I can't release the five cats I have in traps.  Hell no.  Where could I get them fixed.   I contacted the lady who was to bring two boy cats up from Holly.  Those would be the other two to fill my 7 spots.  More cats had appeared on their property and they try to immediately catch them, contain them, then find somewhere to get them fixed.  Unfortunately, the two boys couldn't be fixed either.

My afternoon was spent calling and emailing and messaging and texting, trying to find anywhere the five cats in traps could be fixed.   Once cats are trapped once, they can be very very hard to trap again.   Cancelling spots for ferals who have already been trapped is not the same as cancelling appointments for tame cats or dogs.   Not even close.  

I got a response from a friend down in Coos Bay who once worked at the Snipped clinic.   I used to take lots of cats there, when I had a lower mileage car and when I worked under a nonprofit that paid the bill.  I would even trap colonies there, for them, while they fixed the cats I brought.   But after Poppa Inc. closed, I didn't have the money to take cats down to Snipped and lost touch with the clinic for the most part.  However, I knew I might still have dollars on account there, from a grant given by a friend of this friend.

Darci contacted the clinic manager and got a thumbs up to bring all five cats yesterday.  I was ecstatic!  Not only for the cats ,who now could be fixed, but for their people, who had done everything right in prepping for the actual trapping and were so enthusiastic that they would be fixed and not produce more cats.

Off I went, yesterday morning.  I got up at 3:30 a.m., so I could leave at 4:30.  It's a three hour drive.  I managed to go to bed by 8:00 Sunday night too.  The forecast called for downpours Monday through Wednesday.  I took my raincoat.  Here's the route I drove--down I5, to south of Cottage Grove, then the exit off the freeway for Drain and Reedsport.  Then, its the drive west along the beautiful Umpqua River to Reedsport.  Then south again on highway 101 to North Bend.

The drive down was uneventful except when the rain began and I realized my wipers need replaced.  The wiper was just smearing water across the windshield.  I got one later in the day at an auto parts store in North Bend.  The rain stopped by 9:00 a.m. there and the weather turned beautiful.  I heard the valley had rain all day, however and today its pouring again.

I was at the clinic by just before 8:00  and checked in the cats.  I got to meet the clinic manager who got the last minute spots arranged and see the vet whom I hadn't seen in years.

I drove then on down to Sunset Bay State Park, passing through Charleston on the way and the turn off to the county park I worked summers as a teen, pulling weeds or manning the info/camper check in booth up front.

You can see the red pin where the Snipped clinic is, literally minutes off the bay, then the road south down to Charleston and on to Sunset Bay.

Beyond Sunset Bay, are two other nice parks--Cape Arago and Shore Acres, the latter the site of beautiful Christmas light displays.  Here are few photos from Charleston.

This gull, in the video below, is raiding the fish cleaning station garbage can!   I don't blame him.

Part of the harbor.

A lone seal was searchiing the surf for food at Sunset Bay.

Here are the five cats fixed yesterday clear down in Coos Bay. Thank you Snipped clinic!  When I found out, upon pickup, that four of the five were girls, I was very happy they had been fixed.  But also I felt guilt, knowing that many girls would have slowed down the Snipped clinic day, made it even longer.  They voiced no complaints but I knew.  I was home by 8:30 after dropping off the cats at their people's house.  They would house them overnight in their garage in traps there.

Cali, the mom of the other four

Aries, also a girl, but just a teen

Jupiter, a girl teen

Leo, the only boy

Pisces, another girl teen

I got to have lunch with my brother, another wonderful plus to the day.  Then my friend loaded me up on extra food, which was just another good thing to the day.  I spent the remainder of the day in the little park on the bay, just down from the clinic.  The weather by now was clear and warm--beautiful.

On the way home, as is my way, I stopped at the Elk place outside Reedsport to use the bathroom and give the five cats each some wet food.   The bathrooms were trashed with toilets overflowing so I chose not to use them.  There were lots of Elk by the viewing road. 

What seemed initially like a disaster, with my spots being cancelled in Salem for yesterday, resulted in a great day down in my home turf, on the south coast.  Not only were the cats fixed, but I got three hugs!--One from my brother, one from my friend, and one from the clinic manager, a new friend I hope.