Animal refuse, I mean rescue
Tuesday October 5, 2004 – 1:47 amMe and Sarah "rescued" two wild kittens tonight (=last night) and took them to the shelter. John came over and helped us round them up and got himself totally fuckin’ scratched up in the process. There’s one more kitten that got away, and we could never get the mama cat either, but we got two of the three kittens. But it’s breaking my heart anyway; two kittens got torn away from their mama. Who is outside as we speak, crying. She’s a half-domesticated cat who was abandoned by the former tenant of the building next door. A lady who lives in my building across from my back door, through some completely misguided sense of doing the right thing, has been putting out food for these cats, so they’ve been basically living at my back door for the past few weeks. I talked to her and no, she had no plans to adopt them or anything. We had a freeze warning tonight, I called Sarah and told her about this, and… what can I say. UGH, I feel awful. Even though I know we did the right thing, it’s an awful thing to do. And there’s one kitten and an unneutered mama-cat still out there. Ugh. Why me? Why? Why? Why can’t I just look past these things, move along and mind my own business? Let wild cats be wild cats?
Sarah sure is a good friend though, jeez. And John too. Who else would have helped me with a crazy-ass situation like that? Hello, will y’all come over right now and help me herd some cats that aren’t even mine? Sure, why not.
UGH. I can’t sleep…
October 5th, 2004 at 6:08 am
hey — no problem, happy to help. i got home and poured rubbing alcohol all over my hands and used some of that liquid band-aid stuff… his bites gave me 14 fuckin’ punctures through the skin! that was a genuine hell kitty! but… the poor little critter, he was probably frightened beyond recognition — and besides, it wasn’t too smart of me to just grab him like i was on the tonight show or something! you did the right thing, edith. now those two kitties have a chance of landing in a happy home, instead of freezing on some porch on the north side.
October 5th, 2004 at 5:19 pm
Poor John, poor kitties, and poor poor mama-cat! I had a really interesting discussion about the whole thing with a friend - made me question whether we did indeed do the right thing, but I feel ok about it. I just loved the spunk and silly hiding tricks of that little fighter kitty, even though I do NOT love the fact that he bit John’s hand to bits.
It was sad.
PEOPLE: please spay and neuter your cats!! And don’t feed the feral ones or they are even more vulnerable! Wild cats are really really hard to catch, and harder to keep safe if left to live outside. That is my speech.
October 5th, 2004 at 5:41 pm
Well Sarah, there’s a lotta good news to report! (a) John is probably NOT going to have to get rabies shots. (b) The biter kitty is merely under observation, it is not being killed to see if it has rabies like the lady told us. (c) As you know I caught the third kitten and took it to the shelter as well. (d) The guy I talked to on the day-shift was SO SO SO much more positive-sounding than the lady last night. And (e) they loaned me a trap to catch mamacita so I can bring her in for neutering / adoption. I think all four of them stand a pretty darn good chance of getting adopted — the kittens because they’re still kittens and the mama because she’s already domesticated. And at the very least, in the very harshest scenario, at least they are not going to die from freezing this winter, they have a chance to be adopted. And if & when they’re adopted, they’ll be NEUTERED, we won’t have a repeat of this same scenario next summer.
I can’t thank you enough for helping me Sarah. I really didn’t know how to proceed, it’s been 10 years since I’ve attempted anything like this!!