More Kittens

 Friday I was at the lake all day again, although I thought it was Thursday all day.

This morning, very early, I headed to Sweet HOme, to try to catch the remaning kittens.  I had no idea how many there might be. Two were caught a couple weeks back, by a tenant.  My friend has Black Betty, the stumpy manx girl, and the tenant kept the other kitten she trapped.  This is the former 7-11 colony, whose survivors are now cared for by apartment tenants.

I arrived just after 5:00 a.m. and went to set a trap near the dumpster and kittens raced out of the fenced dumpster area across my shoes so fast I couldn't count them.

Turns out there were four.  I caught all of them in about two hours time.  Mom would not go into a trap and I spent two hours using her own kittens as bait to try to catch her. No luck.  She's only a few months older than they are.  I almost had her, at one point, when suddenly someone came out to throw something in the dumpster, then went straight to the drop trap, to see what was up with that.  I didn't even see her coming but mom did and ran back into the brush.

The kittens include another manx, like Black Betty, from same litter, now with my friends.  This one is a boy and a true rumpy manx---no tail at all.  The black and white one in the video is a boy too.

The other two are black, one boy, one girl, full tails.   But I have no good photos yet of that pair.

This is the big unfixed boy I still need to catch

And this is the mom of the six kittens, all now caught, but she needs caught and fixed.

I don't know if there are more kittens, from the other unfixed female,  who is all black.   A tenant has almost tamed her enough to get her into a carrier to go to be fixed.  We shall see.  My goal now is to catch the two black and whites, one a big male and the other the young female.  I had to give up trapping by 10:30 a.m. due to heat.  We are back in the mid to high 90's here.

I got home with the four kittens, and having had very little sleep the night before, set them up in the bathroom, checked sex on each (3 boys, 1 girl), gave each a couple drops of Advantage Multi, and went to bed for the afternoon.

Keithas Kitties stopped by late afternoon and took the little rumpy manx boy with them.  They are very familiar with manx syndrome and I felt good about handing him off, in case he has it.  

I was happy to get the kittens caught.  Breathing room I call it.  Any longer, before catching them, and they'd be tough sells to tame.   I'll get those black and white adults, soon too (I hope).

I'll be back on break tomorrow.  I just took a short vacation from my vacation.