Romeo's Tale

I don't talk much about what goes on at the clinic, or mention the resident cats very often. This week, I do have a story to share though.

I rescued Romeo as a kitten from my old boss, Dana's, house. He's the litter mate to Erin's little girl, Harley, who Herbie adored as a kitten. They were born in Dana's back yard, as part of an out-of-control feral cat colony that Dana and her family refused to do anything about. Their other sister got snatched by one of Dana's under exercised dogs and suffered a broken pelvis. Thankfully, the vet at work managed to save the kitten and piece her pelvis back together. When Romeo came in to be neutered,  none of us had the heart to send him back where he came from, even though he was half-feral himself and really didn't want to be handled, let alone tamed.

Long story short, Romeo ended up staying at the farm. He grew up to be best friends with Edison, the resident cat who raised Herbie. Still, he remained wary of people. For two and a half years, I saw him come and go, and never laid a hand on him, despite the fact that I worked at the clinic three days a week, fed him whenever the vet was away, and boarded my horses there.

Then, Romeo went missing. It turns out he had wandered down the street and gotten trapped in the course of a local TNR job. Thankfully, he's neutered and ended up at Animal Control. Since we're close with the dog warden, it wasn't long before we got a call. Romeo was at the local shelter, ready to be picked up.

From that moment on, Romeo's personality totally turned around. I guess the time in the cage gave him some perspective. Suddenly, he became affectionate and bold, even greeting the occasional stranger. In fact, I nearly had a heart attack the next time I farm sat for the vet because Romeo unexpectedly came up next to me and climbed in my lap. I was totally startled since there were no other animals in the room, and I never would have expected him to do such a thing.

This spring, the vet heard gunshots from the property behind us. It wasn't hunting season and she wondered what the fuss was about. As some of you may know, we've had a bit of a neighbor dispute with the farm manager and her husband for several years now. Things have settled down some in the recent past, but it's still tense and neither party cares for the other.

At the end of that day, Romeo didn't come home. The next day, there was no sign of him. The vet sent Patrick, the boy who works at the farm taking care of the animals and property, out to look for the missing cat. Romeo adored Patrick, and vice versa. Patrick searched and searched and called and called. He brought wet food, which the cats rarely get and really see as a special treat. He spent days trying to find Romeo, or a body. There was no sign of either.

Eventually, we all gave up. Of course, we assumed the worst, figuring the jerk of a neighbor had shot our cat. With no way to prove it, there was no legal action to be taken. I sincerely hoped this wasn't the case. The neighbor can be a real oaf, and very intimidating, but I wanted to believe that he wouldn't take it out on an innocent animal. Personally, I figured Romeo had probably been killed by a fox, coyote, or fisher cat, or had been hit by a car on some back road.

Then, one day several months later, while driving to work, I caught a flash of orange tabby out of the corner of my eye. Out of the corn field on my right sprinted a fluffy cat, and it only took half a second for me to realize it was Romeo. He darted in front of my car and I locked up my brakes trying not to hit him.

I rushed to work and blurted to the vet, "You'll never guess who I saw this morning!"

The vet didn't believe me, and after a while, I started wondering if the cat I had seen was just some other orange tabby.

Just last month, however, a volunteer from a local rescue came in. Lars, our other orange tabby, was on the porch with Iko. The volunteer asked, "Where's the other orange cat? He's a real sweetie."
"That was Romeo. He's been missing," I replied sadly.
"For how long?"
"Since spring."
"That's not possible," the volunteer replied. "I just saw him last week."
"What? Where?!?"

The volunteer went on to describe where she saw Romeo, and it happened to be the exact spot where I'd nearly run him over a few months back.

And so Romeo got this reputation as a sort of ghost cat. We puzzled over why he wouldn't come home. The farm cats have a great life, and Edison was obviously depressed over the loss of his best friend. None of it made sense, and we assumed that someone in the nearby neighborhood must be feeding him and letting him in their house. We contemplated putting up posters asking for his return, but it just never happened.

On Monday, the phone rang like it does a million times a day. I picked up with my usual, "Hello, McSNIP, this is Dom. How can I help you?"
It was the dog warden and what she said next got my heart rate going. "Hi Dom. We have a cat over here, and I'm pretty sure he's yours."
"O my gosh, is it the fluffy orange one??"
"That's the one!"

The dog warden went on to explain that there's a woman in the neighborhood on the road I saw Romeo on. She has two black cats of her own, and she called Animal Control to complain about a feral orange tabby who keeps coming to her house to harass them. She has tried chasing him away, but he just won't leave. She was contacting AC to see if they could come trap and relocate him, and the dog warden remembered us mentioning that Romeo was missing.

With shaking hands, I jotted down the address and hung up the phone.

I ran outside and shouted for Patrick, who was fixing a fence at the far end of the horse pasture.
"THEY FOUND ROMEO!!" I called, and I thought Patrick was going to sprint across thirty acres in response.

An hour later, Patrick returned with a cat carrier in hand. Inside was a large, fluffy, orange cat. He looked like hell. His coat was matted and dirty. He had lost some weight. He looked like a wild beast. In fact, I wasn't convinced it was Romeo at all. Of course, we have all the cats microchipped, and one quick scanned confirmed his identity.

But what's amazing about all of this is the story of Patrick going to retrieve him.

He showed up at the woman's house, knocked on the door, and explained who he was. The woman shrugged and told him, "Well, he's a feral cat. I don't know when he'll be here. Sometimes I see him. Sometimes I don't."
Patrick politely told her that we love Romeo and want him home safely. He went back to his car and called over his shoulder, "If you see him, please give us a call!"
And as Patrick's voice echoed across the yard, he was answered by a loud meow from the woods across the street. Patrick turned around to find a bedraggled Romeo emerging from tree line.
"Romeo! Come here, buddy!" he called.

And just like some scene out of a Disney movie, Romeo came running across the road and into Patrick's lap.

The woman was dumbfounded. "I can't believe it," she shook her head. "In all these months, I've never been able to lay a hand on that cat."

Of course, we're all a little perplexed about Romeo's lengthy disappearance. He was less than half a mile from home the whole time, but he never came back. He obviously wasn't thriving in his new environment and he seems to be relieved to be back. My best guess is that he was on the other side of the neighbor's property when the gun shots went off, and was too scared to come back across that farm to come home.

Regardless, I really hope he'll stay put now.

Monday Meows

Old photos of kittens we had available for adoption through the clinic. Dyandra and I named them after Pretty Little Liars characters, but I can't remember who was who.

This filler post brought to you by Dom.

Available Critters

Spring means adoption season is picking up at the clinic. I managed to get photos of some of the available animals in between rain showers. Unfortunately, I didn't have Dyandra's help with a few of them. She and I have puppy photos down to an art, and the image quality definitely suffered from her absence.

This is Arizona. Animal Control brought her in. She was too young to be spayed so we decided to hang onto her. She has already been placed. I have missed having a kitten around. I probably won't be saying that in a few weeks.

WW: Jax and Marbles

(Ok... MOSTLY wordless. These two boys came in together at about four weeks old. They were tiny and malnourished with bad eye infections. The woman who brought them in was convinced they would lose an eye each. The brown tabby was actually the worse of the two. The doc kept them, medicated them, and cleaned their eyes daily. There was a lot of pus and a lot of bleeding and it was not a job for the weak-willed. Thankfully, both kittens recovered and the eyes were saved. The scarring on the orange tabby will subside over time, but never go away completely. The brown tabby looks normal at first glance. Both kittens are currently available for adoption. They do not require any special care.)

West Virginia: There and Back

On Sunday Mike and I drove to West Virginia and back to drop off an order of jumps for Liz. We are planning to do a for real visit for a few days in the near future, but this was the best we could manage with our insane schedules. Besides, we can't bring the dogs in the truck so we didn't really have a choice.

Originally, Mike and I were supposed to leave by 6am at the latest. At 5am, I rolled over and sleepily mumbled, "Five more minutes." We woke up three hours later. Oops.

Thankfully, we made really good time on the drive down (six and a half hours, including stops).

I did get a terrible migraine about halfway through Pennsylvania. I've come to the conclusion that I'm pretty sure Chinese food triggers the migraines. It's probably the MSG. That sucks because I love, love, love Chinese food... but I'm definitely not in love with it enough to put up with migraines. Mike and I were able to stop for painkillers and caffeine almost immediately so the whole ordeal was over pretty quickly, but I was pretty miserable for a while there.

The views coming through western Maryland were gorgeous. Mike and I have been having this ongoing debate about whether or not there are any actual hills in Maryland. I'd say this photo is all the proof I need:

The line between Maryland and West Virginia is sort of a tangled blur so I'm not really sure what state we were in when, but it was all lovely. Mike and I need to start doing more day trips so we can get some real hiking and exploring in (you know, in all our vast free time).

We were both super fascinated by the wind turbines up on the mountains. I know a lot of people hate them, but I honestly wish NJ would get on board with all that. Apparently there was talk off putting them in the ocean, just off the coast, but people moaned that they would be an eyesore (as opposed to Snooki and all our other shore attractions). Mike and I were extra delighted when our route took us up the mountain and directly under the turbines. We probably added twenty minutes to our trip just by stopping and gawking and leaning out the windows to take pictures. (Yes, Liz, we are those people.)

It got so big!

Before I knew it, we were meeting Liz at the corner gas station/deli/whatever, and she was handing me a suddenly-three-month-old (K)Atticus. I cannot believe how big he got! Or how healthy he looks! Or how completely chill he is. He rode happily in my lap all the way to the barn while I made up for lost time by smooshing him a little extra. Good kitty.

At the barn, I met Liz's friend, Chris, said hi to Kenai, and finally, finally got introduced to Q and Griffin. I did my best 'critical face' and quickly came to the conclusion that Liz has a very lovely pair of horses. In fact, I don't think photos do Q justice (and I think she's lovely in photos!) She's pretty much what I would look for in an endurance horse if I ever got another go at it (you know, instead of taking a block headed tank of a standardbred and doing it the hard way).

Mike set to work putting the finishing touches on the jumps while Liz gave me a quick tour of the farm. I got to meet the other horses, including the little gypsy sporthorse filly who is o-my-god-so-cute.

I wasn't planning to ride on this visit (we were really strapped for time) but, before I knew it, Liz and I were strapping bareback pads to her horses to cross the creek and see the rest of the property. It wasn't until we were halfway across the back field that I realized that, probably for the first time in my life, I had been given my choice of horses and had gone with the mare.

Q was totally lovely. She was springy without being uncomfortable, forward without being rude, and obviously used to being ridden all over the universe. There need to be more mares like her. She also stood patiently while I discovered that I no longer have the upper body strength to vault onto a horse. *sigh* I even let her out for a brief, brief canter on the way home, which is when I decided that I need to come back to ride her for real, and soon!

Liz on Griffin, me on Q, and the faithful Kenai.

After playing some catch up and having some beers, we were ready to put the jumps to the test. Mike carried them over to the riding area and I made Liz ride over her new toys about a million times before I was satisfied. Q was a good sport about the whole thing and looked super cute in the process. She's an honest and bold horse and seems the type to be up for anything. A-dorable!

And just like, the day had gotten away from us. Mike and I still had a long drive home, and Liz and Chris had dinner plans. We said our goodbyes, promising to get back together soon. Then Mike and I hit the road.

Once again, we made good time on the way. We stopped for snacks and gas, but otherwise made a straight shot home. Neither one of use was particularly hungry, and by the time we got back on familiar turf everything was closed.

We did have a bit of a minor detour on the way home.

On the way down, we had taken the turnpike to route 11 to avoid Harrisburg traffic. 11 dropped us off on 81 south. That was during my migraine, so it was a bit fuzzy to me. We got off the turnpike, stopped at a Love's on the right for pain meds, and turned right onto route 11. I just assumed that Harrisburg was south of the turnpike and that we took 11 south to circumvent the area.

On the way home, following the same logic, we got off of 81 north onto 11 north. The GPS kept trying to convince me to get back on 81, but I ignored it. I did check the map to make sure 11 connected to the turnpike (it did).

Some time later, I was very confused. None of our surroundings looked familiar, and this was taking a lot longer than I remembered. Not to mention the highway was making a lot of lefts and rights that I didn't remember it making on the way down. We did get to see a lot of standardbreds in the form of Amish buggy horses, so I guess that was a new experience for Mike. After what seemed like forever and a half, we finally got to the turnpike. Ahead of us was the Love's we had stopped at earlier that day... only... it was on the right, not on the left where it should have been.

The whole thing sort of blew my mind, so I did some Google mapping when I got home. Turns out we took the turnpike to route 11 NORTH to 81 south on our way to WV, crossing back under the turnpike in the process. Meanwhile, Harrisburg is north of that whole area and was never in our way to begin with. Moral of the story, just take the turnpike directly to 81 and avoid the whole detour. Oops. Despite all that, we really didn't lose any time on the return trip.

 Mike and I got home some time after midnight. We were both pretty worn out and went to bed almost immediately. It's not exactly our standard road trip, but it was a nice break from the monotony of our lives. I'm excited for a return visit :)

Miracle Kitten Photos

Dyandra sent me these:

Miracle Kitten Follow Up

Remember that newborn kitten I resuscitated two months ago?? She came into the clinic today to get spayed, tested, microchipped, etc. She looks great... big, healthy, friendly. The next step is to find her a forever home. :) Hoping to get some photos sent over later. She's VERY cute.

Herbie and Rascal

Herbie and Rascal are the best of friends. The kitten is getting stronger, bigger, and more mobile. He pesters and pesters the dog until she plays with him. She sits there with her mouth open while he bats at her lips. Too funny. His favorite place to sleep is on her back paws. I just can't...

Sunday Stills: Herbie and Rascal

The Greenhouse: Home for Strays

I was at the barn giving lessons. Bryce was home removing AC units from the windows (hooray central air!) The neighbor came up and told Bryce, "You know there's a mother cat and a kitten on your back stairs, right?"

Sure enough, there they were. Mom scattered as soon as she saw Bryce. Bryce scooped up the kitten and texted me before setting him up in a box in the kitchen and naming him Rascal.

I came home a few hours later and checked the kitten out. He appears to be about two and a half weeks old (ears are still sorta floppy and teeth are just starting to come in). He seems healthy and sucks down KMR eagerly. He is getting friendlier and more active the longer he's here. Of course, Herbie is completely in love. She cleans the kitten and lets him sleep in her arm pit.

I did a really thorough search of our property and the one next to us in hopes of finding the rest of the litter. I'm sure mom was in the process of moving them when Bryce startled her.

I also set a have-a-hart trap in the back yard in hopes of catching mom. Ideally, I would like to get her spayed, vaccinated, and re-released, then find the kittens and get them placed in homes. No luck so far though.

Tomorrow, I'll take Rascal to the clinic with me to get a wellness exam, distemper vaccine, FIV/Felv test, and oral wormer. Then I'll be in touch with Trenton Cats and EASEL to see if they can place him for me (kittens go quickly this time of year).

It just wouldn't be a weekend at the Greenhouse without some stray showing up on our doorstep.

The Story of a Tiny Miracle Kitten

I'm going to share a happy story because it seems like the world could really use it right now.

Newborn

I have gone back to working at the clinic these past couple weeks. I still can't walk so I'm not doing much of the tech stuff. Mostly I've been doing the book keeping, the QuickBooks, the phone calls, and the dealing with clients at check-in.

I never really talked about our hunt for a second vet tech, but it was a real roller coaster even before I broke my leg. Thankfully, we seem to have finally found a keeper, Dyandra, and things are finally going smoothly (or, I should say, as smoothly as things can go in a low cost spay/neuter clinic for cats). Dyandra learns quickly, follows instructions, and has a good sense of humor (a must for this line of work). Thankfully, I've been able to teach her a lot of the medical stuff. She has sedation, blood drawing, and vaccinating down to an art already.

But anyway...

Tiny syringe full of KMR

Yesterday we had a feral cat brought in by one of the local rescue groups as part of a TNR effort.

It's kitten season and a lot of the cats that get brought in are either pregnant or lactating. The pregnant ones get abortive spays. The ones that are lactating get re-released as soon as they get home. They find their kittens and resume nursing like nothing happened. The surgery doesn't affect their ability to care for their young. In some instances, the person who brings in a lactating cat will go out and search for the kittens. If they are found, they can be socialized, 'fixed', vaccinated, and placed in forever homes instead of living on the streets.

But this feral cat yesterday had a surprise in store for us. When Carolyn opened her up, she found that she was pregnant... late term... one kitten. She could also see where two other kittens had been! That's right, this feral cat had given birth to two kittens then, mid-labor, wandered into a trap for food. Poor thing must have been really hungry. Usually, mother cats in late pregnancy go into hiding. After they give birth, they stay with their kittens for those crucial first hours of life. This cat was definitely the exception to the rule.

Of course, with a kitten that close to term, Carolyn wasn't about to just toss it in the garbage. I had no idea any of this was going on until she called to me from the surgery room, "So, Dom, want to try to revive this kitten?"

Rolling herself over. 

WHAT?!?!

I hobbled over there and was handed a towel with the tiniest kitten I have ever seen wrapped in it. Her umbilical chord was clamped off with a hemostat and she was very still and very wet. I set to work right away, rubbing the kitten a la 101 Dalmatians. A short while later, the tiny kitten took a tiny breath.

Now the problem became the amount of anesthesia in the little guy's system. After all, the mom had been sedated for surgery, and a lot of that sedation went straight to the kitten. She was alive, but would she wake up?

For the next two hours, I sat with a heating pad in my lap, gently rubbing the kitten, and occasionally rolling it over. Just as I posted a status about it on Facebook, the tiny kitten squeaked out a tiny little meow. I cheered out loud. From there on out, the kitten really came to life pretty quickly. Her meows grew stronger and she started kicking her feet and starting to suckle and crawl. She really could have used colostrum, but there was no way for me to provide it for her. Instead, I took a tiny syringe and fed the tiny kitten KMR, which she swallowed eagerly. She even wrapped her itty bitty paws around my thumb at one point. I totally melted.

Starting to kick and meow.

Dyandra and I named her Starburst, because that's what we were eating when she woke up, but told ourselves that we weren't attached. The tiny kitten could still die, but so far all signs point to good.

So what's next? Well, the rescue group took the mom and kitten home with them. They are searching the area where mom was trapped for the two other kittens. There's a chance that they survived without their mother for a few hours, but it's critical they be found. Starburst will be placed with her mother to see if she nurses. If not, they have another lactating female they can put her on. If that doesn't work, she'll be given to a volunteer to bottle feed. I thought about doing it, but I think Mike would probably cry if I brought home yet another animal to take care of, especially since he's back at work and can't afford to be up every hour at night. It's up to the rescue group to decide whether they're going to release the mom to try to find her own kittens if the organization doesn't find them. I suspect they'll just hold onto her, though. We know Starburst is alive. We have no way of knowing about the other kittens. Starburst stands the best chance of survival if she stays with her mother.

I really hope this little kitten makes it. It would be a cool success story to tell in years to come...

Saturday Snaps: Pocket Kitten

Most Wordless Wednesday

Have some assorted photos from the past couple weeks.

CP over oxer. 2'6" by 3'. He's now doing it as a 3'x3'.

Dallas, Clarence, Kittens

Wordy updates later :-P Two weeks ago I went to work with Dallas and Clarence and got a chance to take some pictures around the farm (mostly of the adorable kittens in the barn... all of whom are looking for homes, btw).

One of the adorable run-in sheds on the property. It's so quaint and I love it.

WW: Barn Kitten

Kittens Again

This was supposed to be my wordless Wednesday post, but the day got away from me.

I'd turn the sound down on the video so you don't have to hear me rambling or Gossip Girl in the background. I turned around the other day to find Herbie resting her chin on the floor while a kitten batted her ear around like a cat toy. Also, footage of kittens playing (I finally figured out how to put multiple clips together on youtube!!!)

And have two random snapshots of kittens as well.

They're going to the clinic with me today for shots and the second spay. I don't know if they're coming home with me afterwards or not. They're very cute, but I'm kittened out. If the shelter is willing to take them already, I'll gladly let them go.

Sunday Snaps

Point and shoot pics of kittens.

Snuggle

The kittens have been hanging out behind the couch. In the year and a half we've had Herbie, she has NEVER gone back there. Last night, we couldn't figure out where the dog disappeared to... you guessed it.

This is why I hate flash photography. LOL. Kittens love to sit on shoulders. 

Finally caught Herbie trying to nurse the kittens. Cute, no?

Kitten Spam

Waiting for the sun to come out so I can get better photos of the kittens, but I took some snaps in the backyard. Herbie continues to mother them. They climb all over her, attack her paws, tail, and face, and snuggle up to her to nap. She spends hours laying on the living room floor just watching them. Both kittens are eating wet cat food and drinking water. My only complaint is that I forgot how much kitten poop stinks. I cleaned the litter box COMPLETELY four times yesterday and it wasn't enough. Haha.

Kitten Videos

Foster Kittens

I was working at McSNIP earlier this week. We had a feral cat come in with her two four week old kittens. We spayed mom and she was set to be re-released. She was a nasty thing anyway. The kittens, however, are highly adoptable and the shelter is willing to place them once they're old enough to be spayed and vaccinated (and once they're eating solid food and using the litter box reliably).

I was sitting on the floor, spoon feeding baby food to the kittens, and I casually mentioned that I kind of miss fostering kittens. I haven't done it since I moved in with Bryce. He's highly allergic to cats. Mike is also not particularly a cat person (he likes them well enough, but doesn't want to own them, probably because his mom has four obese ones with terrible habits) As for myself, I love kittens and other people's cats so fostering is perfect for me. As fate would have it, these particular kittens were in need of a foster home for two weeks, at which point they'll be placed for adoption.

I called Bryce to make sure it would be ok. He said it wouldn't be a problem so long as they didn't stay forever and didn't run loose through the whole house at all hours of the day.

These two are probably the best foster kittens I've ever had. They're already using the litter box and eating food out of a dish. They've even started to eat cat food instead of baby food. They're very active during the day, but sleep through the night. They don't cry unless they actually need something. They're friendly and snuggly and come when I call them. They are going to make someone some very nice kitties when they grow up.

Herbie is totally enamored. She thinks they're HER kittens and is losing lots of sleep by laying flat on the floor and staring at them. She supervises their play and breaks them up when they get too rough. She also licks them and lets them clean her ears and tackle her tail. I actually caught her trying to convince them to nurse off of her the other day even though she's 1)not nursing 2)spayed 3)a dog. Adorable. Of course I can't get any of this on camera because they all stop whatever they're doing and stare at me as soon as I get up.

I'm waiting for the next sunny day to get better photos of them, but here's a sneak preview.