We had an outstanding yard sale on April 30th. $2,600 raised for the kitties. Which is great, because we've taken in so many high risk kittens that were not in good shape when we got them that we've spent almost $600 in just two weeks on non-planned medical (sick kitty, etc.). And one of our long-term residents is currently in the hospital for a blocked urinary tract and the medical bills for him may be close to $1,000. But we raised the money at the yard sale, so all is well right now. A huge thank you to everyone that donated to the yard sale, volunteered with the yard sale, and bought.
Bo Duke was adopted over the weekend. YAY!
In other news, I just started a new job and am learning new people, processes, and technologies so blog posting might be sparse for a while. Wish me luck everyone! Thanks.
A blog about our cat rescue efforts - the adoptables, the ferals, the barn cats.
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Wednesday, May 4, 2011
Tuesday, April 26, 2011
Adoption update, barn cat update, and Spring Hope TNR project update
Adoption Update
Parmesan and Pickles were adopted this weekend. No surprise there - small kittens at 3.5 months old and super sweet and super cute!
And Sweet Tea was adopted last night!!!! The reason for all the exclamation points after Sweet Tea? Well, Sweet Tea was one of the Bojangles kittens (found behind a Bojangles on a TNR project last year). Her sibings, Boberry Biscuit and Chicken Biscut, never tamed up for adoption and Sweet Tea was really shy but her foster mom said definitely not a barn cat. Sweet Tea would flinch some as you reached towards her, but once you started petting her, she loved it. But the flinching would make lots of people shy away. But someone met her Sunday and fell in love with her. We are jumping for joy about this adoption.
Barn/Garden Cat Update
Boberry Biscuit and Chicken Biscut (yes, I do get flack on their names!) were relocated to a great barn home on Saturday. They went to a horse rescue barn and if this relocation is successful, we will get more requests for barn cats at other rescue barns (this is a test case). Boberry and Chicken Biscuit were the perfect match for the barn and and we have a very high success rate with relocations - as we work to match the cats to the barn and barn to the cats the same way we do to match adoptables and families. We're sure this will be a success. And since we have about 30 cats on the wait list for barn homes, having more available barns for relocation would be terrific.
Spring Hope Update
We've trapped 49 cats (plus a bunch of others but they were "repeat offenders" - meaning already TNR'd but wanted the smelly food in the traps!!) in 16 days. The cats are starting to get a bit wise so after tomorrow's release, we will take a short break (1.5-2 weeks) and then start up again. Two little fat kittens last night were not quite old enough to take in (we have no more available bottle feeder foster homes), so we will wait another two weeks and then pull them in. They appear to be about 3.5-4 weeks old but not eating on their own.
April 10, 2011
Parmesan and Pickles were adopted this weekend. No surprise there - small kittens at 3.5 months old and super sweet and super cute!
And Sweet Tea was adopted last night!!!! The reason for all the exclamation points after Sweet Tea? Well, Sweet Tea was one of the Bojangles kittens (found behind a Bojangles on a TNR project last year). Her sibings, Boberry Biscuit and Chicken Biscut, never tamed up for adoption and Sweet Tea was really shy but her foster mom said definitely not a barn cat. Sweet Tea would flinch some as you reached towards her, but once you started petting her, she loved it. But the flinching would make lots of people shy away. But someone met her Sunday and fell in love with her. We are jumping for joy about this adoption.
Barn/Garden Cat Update
Boberry Biscuit and Chicken Biscut (yes, I do get flack on their names!) were relocated to a great barn home on Saturday. They went to a horse rescue barn and if this relocation is successful, we will get more requests for barn cats at other rescue barns (this is a test case). Boberry and Chicken Biscuit were the perfect match for the barn and and we have a very high success rate with relocations - as we work to match the cats to the barn and barn to the cats the same way we do to match adoptables and families. We're sure this will be a success. And since we have about 30 cats on the wait list for barn homes, having more available barns for relocation would be terrific.
Spring Hope Update
We've trapped 49 cats (plus a bunch of others but they were "repeat offenders" - meaning already TNR'd but wanted the smelly food in the traps!!) in 16 days. The cats are starting to get a bit wise so after tomorrow's release, we will take a short break (1.5-2 weeks) and then start up again. Two little fat kittens last night were not quite old enough to take in (we have no more available bottle feeder foster homes), so we will wait another two weeks and then pull them in. They appear to be about 3.5-4 weeks old but not eating on their own.
April 10, 2011
- 15 cats trapped for TNR: 11 females and 4 males
- Plus, 2 kittens taken in to adoption program
April 13, 2011
- 11 cats trapped for TNR: 9 females and 2 males
April 19, 2011
- 12 cats trapped for TNR: 6 females and 6 males
- Plus 1 mama cat trapped for TNR at a later date and her 5 week old babies taken into adoption program. Mama will be TNR’d once her babies can eat on their own. While not idea
April 25, 2011
- 10 cats trapped for TNR: sex yet unknown (not back from spay/neuter yet). But report that one or two may be adoptable so will be evaluated for adoption program
Tuesday, April 19, 2011
More trapping at Spring Hope
Last night we trapped another 13 cats from the Spring Hope colony. That makes 38 spayed and neutered since April 11th (not counting one of the cats from last night - see below).
One of the cats trapped last night was a new mama and the caregiver was able to show us where her babies were. So crawled in the back of my SUV with a carrier, towel, and the trap, locked myself in, and transferred mama to the carrier and then put her babies in it with her. She'll stay in my hall bathroom until her babies can eat on their own and then she'll be sterilized, vaccinated, ear cropped and returned to her colony. While it's not ideal to keep them out of their colony for that long before returning them, this is a front yard colony and we can let her go in one of the sheds where she can reacclimate for a little while before running loose again. She has the five cutest babies who seem to be about a week old. Mama gets scared and hides behind the toliet when I go in that room, but she's taking good care of her babies.
We are making great strides with this project in a short amount of time. Next time we trap, though, we are taking several extra traps (even if we have to take two cars) because we had quite a few "repeat offenders" last night and we'll need to just put them in time out next time we trap.
The almost 100-mile round trip (it's 94.7 miles) makes it a bit hard to do on a weeknight but last night, both of us were able to get out of work a little early and since my SUV was already loaded with clean traps, drop trap, towels, tarps, and trapping kit, we were able to get to the location while it was still light out and had at least an hour of trapping with light. Makes it so much easier to do when it's light and there are so many black cats that keep going in the traps. Can see a cropped ear very nicely in the light! Of course, by the time we were done, it was dark and although we tried to take pictures, we were more concerned with trapping kitties and then it was too dark. But we'll get more pictures soon.
Last night, we trapped 6 males and 7 females (1 of them being the mama above). Quite a few females were pregnant. We have prevented 60-80 kittens from being born in just a short time, since over two-thirds of the cats trapped so far have been female and pregnant.
One of the cats trapped last night was a new mama and the caregiver was able to show us where her babies were. So crawled in the back of my SUV with a carrier, towel, and the trap, locked myself in, and transferred mama to the carrier and then put her babies in it with her. She'll stay in my hall bathroom until her babies can eat on their own and then she'll be sterilized, vaccinated, ear cropped and returned to her colony. While it's not ideal to keep them out of their colony for that long before returning them, this is a front yard colony and we can let her go in one of the sheds where she can reacclimate for a little while before running loose again. She has the five cutest babies who seem to be about a week old. Mama gets scared and hides behind the toliet when I go in that room, but she's taking good care of her babies.
We are making great strides with this project in a short amount of time. Next time we trap, though, we are taking several extra traps (even if we have to take two cars) because we had quite a few "repeat offenders" last night and we'll need to just put them in time out next time we trap.
The almost 100-mile round trip (it's 94.7 miles) makes it a bit hard to do on a weeknight but last night, both of us were able to get out of work a little early and since my SUV was already loaded with clean traps, drop trap, towels, tarps, and trapping kit, we were able to get to the location while it was still light out and had at least an hour of trapping with light. Makes it so much easier to do when it's light and there are so many black cats that keep going in the traps. Can see a cropped ear very nicely in the light! Of course, by the time we were done, it was dark and although we tried to take pictures, we were more concerned with trapping kitties and then it was too dark. But we'll get more pictures soon.
Last night, we trapped 6 males and 7 females (1 of them being the mama above). Quite a few females were pregnant. We have prevented 60-80 kittens from being born in just a short time, since over two-thirds of the cats trapped so far have been female and pregnant.
Monday, April 18, 2011
Bad storms, but good adoption weekend
With the predicted bad weather, I really didn't think we would have many adoptions this weekend, but I was finishing up the third adoption of the day at Petsmart, when the the power went out and stayed out until late that night due to storms. Wilma, Kismet, Charlie Girl, and Luke Duke were adopted this weekend.
Poor Charlie Girl, everyone called her fat - or asked if she was pregnant (no, absolutely not! We have a 100% spay/neuter before adoption policy no exceptions). Honestly, I was about to make her a little tag for her cage that said "I'm NOT pregnant, I'm just fat!!!" because everytime someone stopped by, they would ask if she was pregnant. Charlie Girl's foster mom told me she's muscular and I'd scold her and ask her to cut back on the amount of food she gets because Charlie Girl was overweight, not muscular. Well, Charlie Girl was adopted by a couple that are both personal fitness trainers and one is also a nutritionalist. Charlie Girl will be on a meal and fitness plan in no time! They are already switching over her food to kitty weight loss food.
The storms were frightening, and all I could think about while at Petsmart where my personal cats and the fosters at my house - I was so worried. But all of our volunteers and cats are safe. However, the damage in this area is devastating, many lives were lost, so much damage to property everywhere, and my heart goes out to everyone affected by this weekend's tornadoes.
Poor Charlie Girl, everyone called her fat - or asked if she was pregnant (no, absolutely not! We have a 100% spay/neuter before adoption policy no exceptions). Honestly, I was about to make her a little tag for her cage that said "I'm NOT pregnant, I'm just fat!!!" because everytime someone stopped by, they would ask if she was pregnant. Charlie Girl's foster mom told me she's muscular and I'd scold her and ask her to cut back on the amount of food she gets because Charlie Girl was overweight, not muscular. Well, Charlie Girl was adopted by a couple that are both personal fitness trainers and one is also a nutritionalist. Charlie Girl will be on a meal and fitness plan in no time! They are already switching over her food to kitty weight loss food.
The storms were frightening, and all I could think about while at Petsmart where my personal cats and the fosters at my house - I was so worried. But all of our volunteers and cats are safe. However, the damage in this area is devastating, many lives were lost, so much damage to property everywhere, and my heart goes out to everyone affected by this weekend's tornadoes.
Wednesday, April 13, 2011
Adventures in Spring Hope Trapping Project - Part 2
We received a call yesterday around noon that a local low-cost clinic has 12 spay/neuter spots available for today, can we fill the slots with ferals, and oh by the way, no cost - they were already paid for. Um, heck yeah - free spay/neuter when we are working on such a large colony with very limited funds. I don't care how late we're there trapping after work, we'll fill those slots.
Immediately called the caregiver and asked him to pick up food and not feed until we come by tonight. That we'll be bringing back the 15 that were spayed/neutered and vaccinated and will be trapping again for spay/neuter.
After work, we rush home, changes clothes, meet up at my house, drive to pick up the kitties, and then drive to Spring Hope to return the cats. Open up traps to release cats and then start baiting and setting traps again. Now, I've not had lots of luck retrapping cats, but this poor kitty that was just released keep going back into the trap. Not so smart male kitty - you were given canned food while you recovered from surgery, you're not starving! NINE times we let him out of traps - nine (we counted)!!! We had success trapping 12 in about an hour.
It's amazing how the caregiver went from not wanting us to trap/spay pregnant cats when we were there on Sunday to cheering us on and hoping we'd get the pregnant cats last night. I guess he knows how much worse the situation will get if they all were allowed to have babies. 10 of the 11 females trapped Sunday were pregnant or in-heat.
Our next trapping is Easter Sunday, we are unable to get slots until then. Well, we might be able to get appointments for one or two cats but it's about an hour drive each way to/from the location, so we really have to do the mass trapping because with full-time jobs and the other rescue responsibilities, we can't drive 2 hours to just trap 1 or 2 for spay/neuter and then after recovery, drive 2 hours back to return the cats.
I think we'll be taking in many kittens from this colony.
Immediately called the caregiver and asked him to pick up food and not feed until we come by tonight. That we'll be bringing back the 15 that were spayed/neutered and vaccinated and will be trapping again for spay/neuter.
After work, we rush home, changes clothes, meet up at my house, drive to pick up the kitties, and then drive to Spring Hope to return the cats. Open up traps to release cats and then start baiting and setting traps again. Now, I've not had lots of luck retrapping cats, but this poor kitty that was just released keep going back into the trap. Not so smart male kitty - you were given canned food while you recovered from surgery, you're not starving! NINE times we let him out of traps - nine (we counted)!!! We had success trapping 12 in about an hour.
It's amazing how the caregiver went from not wanting us to trap/spay pregnant cats when we were there on Sunday to cheering us on and hoping we'd get the pregnant cats last night. I guess he knows how much worse the situation will get if they all were allowed to have babies. 10 of the 11 females trapped Sunday were pregnant or in-heat.
Our next trapping is Easter Sunday, we are unable to get slots until then. Well, we might be able to get appointments for one or two cats but it's about an hour drive each way to/from the location, so we really have to do the mass trapping because with full-time jobs and the other rescue responsibilities, we can't drive 2 hours to just trap 1 or 2 for spay/neuter and then after recovery, drive 2 hours back to return the cats.
I think we'll be taking in many kittens from this colony.
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