Peek-chures

In the trapping and blogging last night, and recovery today, there wasn't much time for pictures.  Let's catch up.  (There aren't many from last night 'cause, y'know, it got dark.)

Tuxie watches as I set up the traps.

Nine traps, not yet set.

You read all the posts from yesterday, I'm sure.  Other than Pigpen, trapping went really well.  First we caught Barnaby (Miley), right outside Neighbor E.'s door (neighbor E. cried, feeling like she was betraying the poor fuzzy.)  Then the Mysterious Gray Cat was trapped behind a bush.  I moved another trap to behind the bush, which is where I caught Paint AND Tig(g)er.  But before then, we caught Tuxie between some bushes. 

The Volunteer picked up the cats at around midnight so that he could take them to the clinic first thing this morning.  Then he called around 1 and delivered that cats to me.

The cats on the balcony to recover.

Things haven't been as smooth as they could have been, alas, but everything is stable at the moment.

Tig(g)er

Tig(g)er is doing just fine now, and has eaten three helpings of food.  He's also looking for love.  But during surgery, while under anesthesia, he spiked a fever and the techs drenched him with water to cool him down.  It worked, and as I said he's fine, but it also meant that his paper was wet, he was wet, and such.  Also, he vomited earlier this evening (and wasn't that a joy to clean up, although thankfully, since he's tame, I was able to change his paper and everything) but that was before supper and he's keeping his supper down fine now.

The Beast.

The big gray cat, who is huge and male and who The Volunteer suggests we name The Beast because he's so big.  He was also very awake even at 1, which was reassuring.  He's also angry.  He's definitely the most feral of the five we caught.  ANGRY.  But really handsome.  He's not eating, presumably out of anger and//or fear. He'll be fine, though.

Miley

Miss Barnaby, aka Miley, is the one I'm worried about. Now that we've caught her we can see that she's really really skinny, like scary skinny, even though we know she's been eating (since she's been eating dry food at my house and canned at Neighbor E.'s.)  She had a really hard time waking up.  She looked sick, I guess, so she was also given a shot of penicillin.  When she came to me, she was groggy, couldn't stand up and seemed miserable.  A few hours later she was trying to stand up but kept flopping over, breaking my heart every time.

The Volunteer has contacted the clinic and I think we'll try to get a bloodtest next weekend (if we can catch Miley again) to see if she has something we can do something about (which... I dunno.  If it's teeth? Yeah, we can fix that.  If it's something that requires long term medicine?  Well, she doesn't come to humans... so... eek.)

But, lest you think all is lost, she is up and about now.  AND she ate three helpings of food, which is a great sign.  I think I'll offer her more before letting her go, too.

Paint disdains your offering.

 Mr (yes, Mr) Paint is doing quite well.  He woke up easily and has been very calm since He hasn't eaten, but I'm not concerned.  He has actually let F. (Bea's Mom) pet him a little (both today and yesterday when she thought she was petting Tuxie.)  [Yes, I told her to be careful, after that it's her choice if she wants to risk limbs!]  I'm not concerned about him.

If Tuxie ignores you, will you go away?

Which brings me finally to the suddenly camera-shy Tuxie.  Tuxie, it may surprise you to learn, is a boy.  A big boy, actually.  He came out of anesthesia just fine, but is cranky pants (although not as cranky pants as he was when he was yowling in the crate last night.  I got some video of what Tuxie sounds like when hungry, and will post it at some point, but he was even louder and sadder in the crate.)  He hasn't eaten, and won't investigate much, but he's alert and coming out of it just fine.

Tomorrow morning, if they seem alert and well, I'll release them.  Alas, I won't write about it 'til much later because I'll have to dash off to get ready for work/class/rehearsal/etc.

Keep your fingers crossed that they continue to do do well. :)

Oh, and no sign of Pigpen today-- she seems to be keeping a low profile for now.

The Cats are Home!

All five kitties are in their crates, being groggy, on my balcony.  More details later.

Waiting, waiting, waiting

Generally, cats are ready for pick-up from clinics around between 12 and 2, and it is now 12.  So I'm officially all set to greet The Volunteer whenever the cats (and he!) are ready for me.  We'll bring all five up to my balcony and I'll tend their after care, poor things. 

This part makes me nervous because there's always a risk any time any animal (including humans, of course) goes under anesthesia.  So fingers crossed that all my feral friends come back safe and sound to me.

But hey, when they return we'll know exactly if they're male or female.  We know Tig(g)er is male, but everyone else is up for grabs.  Anyone want to place bets* on Tuxie, Barnaby/Miley, Mysterious Gray Tabby, or Paint?

Once the kitties are back here, I'll take some pictures of the groggy moggies, and post the pictures I took last night, too.

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*Please note that I am not actually suggesting betting as that would be gambling and then Project-Cat would be in trouble and that would be bad. >^.^<

Throwing in the towel

Alas, no Pigpen tonight.  I have to feel pretty good about the 5 we did catch, of course, but it's still disappointing.  She sat around all evening, never near the traps, but never far away either.  Then around 10:30 some teens were hanging out nearby and being kinda loud, and we haven't seen her since. 

Now it's midnight and The Volunteer is coming by to take away the 5 we were successful with.  Poor Tuxie is curled up in the smallest ball I've ever seen her make-- turns out she really is mostly fur!  Paint is actually the calmest.  Barnaby/Miley came right up to neighbor E. when E. wanted to see her to say goodbye 'til Monday.  And Tig(g)er is rubbing his back on the top of the cage asking for pets.  All in all, fairly calm kitties. 

I'll update more tomorrow, of course-- they'll be out of surgery and back here for after-care by afternoon.

Pigpen, staying true to her epithet

Caught a fifth cat-- Paint! This is good.  But we're still missing Miss Pigpen (aka Hannah.)  So five cats in crates are on my balcony, awaiting pickup, and four more sit, loaded and ready, outside. 

Three of the five cats were caught in the same place-- I just keep replacing that crate with an empty one.  Fingers crossed, maybe Pigpen will visit there next. 

Funnily enough, I've caught 6 cats tonight and 5 were ones I wanted.  The sixth was Raven, a domestic  (and already spayed) black cat wearing a collar who is sibling to Whiskey (aka Sam).  Obviously I let her go right away!

If I'm interpreting DNL's comments correctly, though, Miss Pigpen had a litter of kittens this past Spring (which were domesticated and taken to Petco, apparently), so she's definitely not speutered. 

Everyone, please send "Pigpen go in the trap," vibes.

Fourth!

Neighbor E. had a great plan involving letting Ti(g)ger eat at her house like he normally does and letting us catch him that way.  Tig(g)er had other plans, though, and when Beatrice's Mom came over to hang out, she pointed out "Hey, there's a cat in that trap."  And there was indeed-- a rather angry Tig(g)er who started throwing himself against the edge of his crate, poor kitty.  He settled down quickly once the cover was atop, and he's now awaiting pick-up with the other three.

That leaves Paint and Pigpen.  It figures that my nemesis would, once again, refuse to cooperate.  But it's only 8:30, so we shall see.

Another one caught!

Tuxie is VERY angry about it, but she's been caught.  She is now in a trap and yowling.

This leaves Tig(g)er  (and we have a plan for him), Pigpen (MY NEMESIS) and Paint, who I've seen around, sniffing at the traps, but has not deigned to yet go in.

We wait...

Amidst the Trapping

While hanging out with neighbor E., who is unfortunately not well enough to help trap tonight, we caught Barnaby/Miley! Huzzah!

And then another neighbor came to my door to tell me that there was a cat in one of my traps-- and we've caught the sooper mysterious grey tabby! Huzzah!

But Tuxie is just taunting us.

T-minus-1.5hours...

This part?  Sucks.  The cats are hungry-- I haven't fed them, E. hasn't fed them.  Even DNL doesn't seem to have fed them today.  This is good-- hungry cats go in traps.  But it's bad-- they're crying.  Tuxie is sitting on my door step yowling. 

So far today (in going between house and car) I've seen Tuxie, Tig(g)er, Barnaby(Miley) and Paint (!!) -- so that's 4 of the 6.  (I've also seen Mistoffolees and Daisy, and I feel awful for them since they don't need to be caught, but are hungry, poor things.)  Just a few more hours and there will be yummy tuna in oil (eww.) 

Meeple.

Good news! and GREAT NEWS! and mediocre news...

All the pictures in this post are from this morning. :) And you click them to make them bigger.  (Also, I've recently updated the Flickr Set with about 60 photos.)


Mediocre News:
Let's start with the mediocre news because that way we can end with the great news.  The mediocre news is that when I came home this evening I saw that DNL had fed the cats.  This despite the note I put on her door.  DNL, as you may recall, doesn't approve of TNR because it's against Jesus's wishes.  I... am not happy.  But I don't want to say nasty things behind her back (although I will admit that a good 50% of why I asked a friend to help me tomorrow night was so that I'd have backup in dealing with DNL.  Not because she's dangerous, but because she's batty.)  I'm assuming she didn't get my note, or she got it and didn't read it, or she got it and didn't understand it.  (She didn't seem to understand, quite, two years ago the first time around...) I just have to hope that the other people who have been feeding the cats did not today and won't tomorrow, in and that DNL's actions don't ruin the trapping.

Hullo, Barnaby.  Um, I mean, Miley.

Good News:

Speaking of other people who feed the cats, I got a knock on my door last night and found a man and a woman, the latter of which was clutching the note I'd put on (I assume) her door.  She was very nice (the man didn't speak much), and just wanted to meet me, and to be sure she understood what was going on, and even offered to help tomorrow evening.  She told me all about her cat (and I gave her a cat toy to take to him).  Just like whenever I find a note on my door, she got scared upon seeing the one I put on hers.  Even though I was really careful to state many times in said note that we are bringing the cats back, that this is TNR, etc., she wanted to make sure, and that's cool.  (That's why I put contact information on the note!)

It turns out that this is the woman who has been putting collars on Tig(g)er.  (She calls him Tiger, I've been calling him Tigger, and a little girl in the complex calls him Garfield.)  She knew the previous owner.  She'd even tried to take Tig(g)er inside to live with her and her cat (and husband and possibly other family members), but Tig(g)er just refuses to stay only indoors.  He does, however, come inside every evening to eat dinner-- and now we know how he got handsome and filled out again!! She says that if she'd known Tig(g)er wasn't neutered she'd have taken him to get it done, so she's glad that I'm going to.

I love how sprawled Tuxie looks-- that back paw hanging out just makes the picture.

ALSO, she's apparently exceptionally fond of Barnaby and Pigpen-- although she calls them Miley and Hannah.  (Yes, you got the reference right.  Evidently it's her favorite show.)  So she is the one I have to thank for getting them so much less skittish-- she's been feeding them canned food every day!! She says that she's gotten Barnaby/Miley close enough to touch her nose  (and that Barnaby/Miley has put her head in the doorway and touched noses with her cat) but not close enough to really pet, yet.  She's been working on it for 6 months.  We both have high hopes of being able to catch them tomorrow evening.

It was great to be in touch with one of the other cat lovers in the neighborhood, and to have her support.  (She kept telling me how 'beautiful' it is what I'm doing and such.)  And like I said, she'll be out tomorrow night because she wants to see how it all works.

And now the Great News:
We did it! Actually, you did it.  Between donations and purchases in my Etsy shop we have raised (are you sitting down?) $504.50.  And that's not including the matching donations!!!

You guys make me cry with happiness.  Your generosity reminds me that there are good people out there.  (It's an easy thing to forget when you're dealing with abandoned cats, and hearing about ferals being poisoned and shot.)  You guys, from all over the world (well, okay, I think you're relatively confined to North America, but that's okay) know that these little feral cats just want to be allowed to live and do their thing, and you've made it possible.  I am so genuinely grateful and humbled by your generosity.  With this money not only have we enough to pay for the TNR via the Spay and Neuter Hotline (who, let me just say again, have been incredible and patient with me as I've tried to schedule all this), but also for me to feed the ferals for a year!  (And having TNRed the rest of the colony there shouldn't be any more kittens for me to care for, and therefore no more vet bills... knock on wood!)  I ... yeah... just... wow.

Thank you.  Thank you so very much.  No matter how much you contributed-- a few dollars, a link from your blog or your FB or Twitter-- I appreciate it more than I can properly express.

So now we just have to hope the cats go in the traps...

They're more excited about making the goal than they look.  Promise.