Back in late July, a cat arrived here at Hickory Head. I got a photo of a piece of the cat darting into the woods and assumed it was a feral that had drifted in and would be gone soon enough.
My neighbors had seen the cat, too, but no one had gotten a real good look at it. Hickory Head is a place that has owls, hawks, bobcats, venomous snakes, and alligators. Darwin isn’t delayed out here, very much at all.
Then one day the little gray and white cat walked right up Mom’s wheelchair ramp, like she wanted to come in. I opened the door and the cat fled. But ferals don’t do that. Someone had dumped this cat out, and now it was looking for a home, I thought.
So began an on again, off again, relationship with the cat I called Aqaba. Small, underfed, it seemed independent and standoffish. We were making good progress until the hurricane hit, and Aqaba disappeared. The sound of the generator frightened her away, and it was only last Monday before I saw her again, haunting the edge of the woods.
I had tried to trap her but she would have nothing to do with food in the trap, and I wondered how to go about catching this critter, or if I should even try. After all, what was I to do with a cat who was wild?
Aqaba also liked playing with fire. In the front yard, she was safe because the fenced-in backyard is separate from the back. She showed up a couple of times in the back, even on the deck, and I knew this would end poorly if Wrex Wyatt ever caught her in the open.
On Monday, September 18th, Aqaba strayed too near. Wrex was able to tag her. I heard about this by Wrex barking like hell in the back. I went out in the predawn darkness to discover Wrex had treed Aqaba but I wasn’t aware of the damage until she got up on the front porch for breakfast. I saw blood on both side of her neck and knew if the injury didn’t kill her, infection would. It was now, or never, for this cat.
I went and got a new trap, because the old one wasn’t working, clearly. Tuna was the bait of choice, and on Tuesday morning, I put a trail of fish leading into the trap, and one big lump in the back of the trap. I took a shower, got ready to go to work, and as I walked out, I saw the door of the trap was shut. But a raccoon or a possum might have come in. I crept forward and peeped in. Aqaba sat in the back of the trap, pissed off, but trapped.
I wrapped the trap up, put on some gloves, strapped the trap in, and away to the vet’s I took what I thought just might be a dead end project.
After all, there are a few diseases a cat in the wild might pick up, that are fatal. She might be pregnant. She might already have kittens. She might have a serious injury to the neck. I waited.
The vet called a couple of hours later, and this quickly it had to be dire news. However, I was in for a surprise or two. Aqaba wasn’t pregnant. Aqaba was male. The name still worked. No diseases, no broken bones, and it seemed Wrex just got enough of Aqaba to break the skin and not cause real damage.
So Aqaba came home with me. More surprises followed. Day One, he let me pet him, purred at me, and then let Mom pet him yesterday. He’s a pet, and always has been, it seems. Someone dumped him.
So, the adventure begins now. I have to find a home for him. I have him living in the bathroom right now, Wrex is still hostile, but Aqaba is alive, well, and looking for a place to stay.
Take care,
Mike
Mike writes regularly at his site: The Hickory Head Hermit.
Opinions expressed in this article are not necessarily those of the management of this site.
A cat? A feline critter?
This is it, Lions lay down with Lambs.
New horizons for Hickory Head.
Whoda thunk it!
I was about to inform him that he has a new cat – after all, he’s already named it
Chef Mike, eh, yeah, but Wrex. He’s getting older and he missed once, but I can be wrong about this only once. Ideas on how to get the two to love one another, or at least keep murder out of the equation?
Bruce, my dog injured Aqaba, I am therefore responsible. It is quite that simple.
I love what you did, Mike, from noticing to caring enough to do something. The storybook ending is you adopting him, but you understand your dogs, too. All my best.
There’s a little cat that hangs around my place once in a while. I believe it’s male, I’m only going on that assumption due to the color of the coat and probability. Most orange striped cats are male. Chaos does not like cats, however, she’s getting older, so she sometimes doesn’t realize there is a cat on the property. The little cat will look at me as if to ask if it’s safe for him to pass, I talk to him, usually telling him he’s playing with fire.( Although I doubt Chaos would be fast enough to catch him, she was never fast.) Might be why he comes back. I’ve never fed him, there’s a gentleman around the corner who does, I know he’s not starving, he just seems to like my yard.
I’m glad you were able to catch your cat, I’m more glad he wasn’t pregnant, baby kitties require lots of care.
Chick, trapping a cat and taking that animal to the vet’s is fraught. There’s eleventy-billion things that can go wrong, some are fatal, some are expensive. At the same time, life is defined by the risks you take, and also, by those you do not.
Dogs and cats living together! Mass hysteria!
I am glad, Mike, that you rescued the cat. I hope you find a home for him.
There was a cat wandering around our court that my wife was able to approach and pick up. Since we have two cats already, we put the stray in a cage in our basement and called it CIB–cat in basement or sometimes creature in basement.
We put a couple of signs up about a lost cat and I posted on a site called Nextdoor about him, too (that is a site that various neighborhoods and signup).
After a week or two (and yes, we took care of CIB and took turns staying with him), I posted on Nextdoor looking for a home for him. Someone said they were looking for a cat, so the three of us took the cat over, met the woman and her boyfriend/husband (I can’t remember which). They seemed nice and a good fit for CIB, so they got him.
A few years ago, we were visiting friends in Mexico. At lunch one day, we rescued a dog where we were having lunch at. We took her to a vet and found out she was pregnant, dehydrated, starved, but otherwise okay. We took her to our friend’s house. They named the dog Sin Nombre (Spanish for No Name/Without Name). We headed home a couple of days later–then found out she had 7 puppies. We ended up with one and Sin Nombre ended up in a home in MA and renamed Cindy. The other six puppies were adopted and ended up in Mexico, the US, and Canada.
Tim, Cindy’s journey is impressive as hell on your part. Most pregnant strays meet a much worse fate, as do their puppies. It is good to know people like you are out there, and fighting the good fight. Thank you!
Scokat, I’ve always wanted a cat, but Wrex wants a cat, too. So it’s adoption events for this little boy.