A Short...long...okay, Fine, Novel Of My Recent Cat Life

LittleShadow

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Hello all! My lovely cat, Molly, is a formerly feral calico, and though she has never met you, she loves you.

I used to live out in the country, and our indoor-outdoor fixed female cat, Tiger, kept most other cats away. She was loving towards humans, but did NOT tolerate any other animals...unless we rubbed them with a dirty sock, then personally introduced them to her. Then she would very graciously tolerate them, as an indulgence to us. But strays were a very rare thing, and we rarely saw the same stray twice.

Then a new neighbor moved in, with three unfixed queens and an unfixed tom. You all know where this went. Neighbors insisted it was fine, and refused to keep their cats indoors or fix them, so there was a very predictable population explosion. Tiger was not amused, but after a while a compromise was reached where she decided that our front and back fences were the markers for her territory, and gave up on defending the various fields and pastures around us like she had previously. Eventually, Tiger got older, and spent more time inside, and one day she passed on.

Now we had dozens of ferals EVERYWHERE. Neighbors occasionally sliced open a sack of the cheapest cat food on the market and dropped the entire sack out on their porch, but this was not a particularly regular thing, and wasn't enough for the constantly growing population. Instead of bothering to put out water, they installed a pond in their yard, which they only sort of maintained when they thought about it.

I tried a few more times to talk to the neighbors, then gave up, registered as a feral colony caretaker, and started TNRing the lot of them. A dozen trips to the low cost feral fix clinic later, and many of the unfixed cats had been driven away by the fixed ferals, though a few still hung around, and we would sometimes get new drive-by drop offs, because hey, it's the country, and look, a barn! Perfect place to abandon your pet, right?

One of the cutest groups of ferals was a trio. Fred was a ginger tom we tnr'd, who was very laid back. Midnight was a solid black female, though we'd thought she was a tom for ages, since she hadn't gotten pregnant in the nearly a year since we'd started seeing her, and we hadn't been able to trap her yet. Nope, dump off, as she had a neat white spay scar across her tummy. Molly was a lovely calico, and the three could often be found curled up in a multicolor ball of fur together.

The trio was the most social group of the ferals we had, as they would hang out in our backyard, and would often cuddle together, but like many ferals, wanted nothing to do with people. That would be fine....but Molly was producing litter after litter. She was a clever girl, and could get the food out of any variety of live trap without setting it off.

So we started putting food out in our three seasons room only. It was a glassed-in former screened porch, with a slider to the main house and a slider to outside. We put food in the room, and stayed away from the inside slider, but made sure that food was out for limited times after the cats started eating it regularly. Then we started only putting food out when someone was in sight of the inside slider, though nowhere near it. Then only with someone next to the slider. Then in the far corner of the room. Then in the far corner closest to the outside slider. Then next to the outside slider. Then one day, when Molly was VERY pregnant again, and alone in the room as she ate, we closed the outside slider.

Molly was initially unconcerned, then politely confused. Within a few days, she'd calmed down some, and was successfully using a litterbox and coping with being confined to the room. I scouted out no-kill shelters, and how to socialize kittens. A few weeks later...kittens! She had three, a smokey grey with a black face we called Pop, a tabby we called Crackle, and a high energy cream baby we called Snap. Yes, we named them Snap, Crackle, Pop. It fit, and was hilarious to us. We handled the kittens every single day, getting more thorough as they aged, and by the time they were weaned, they would let you pick them up, flip them on their backs, touch their bellies, examine their bottoms, clip their claws without complaint or struggle, check their ears, and would even open their mouths and let you run a cotton swab over their teeth without the slightest sign of displeasure. If you didn't know better, you'd swear they were some sort of ragdoll cross. They went to the no-kill shelter, were made much of by the staff who were shocked kittens this tame had come from a feral mother, and spent all of two nights there before being adopted out to become pampered, fixed, indoor-only pets.

Somewhere in the time between us closing Molly in the three seasons room, and the kittens being weaned, she decided that we were the BEST THING EVER. We're not sure if it was the food, the being gentle with her kittens, or what, but Molly went from feral to very tame very fast. We took her to a fix clinic, got her spayed and immunized, and after a bit of recovery time, let her out again.

Molly let Midnight and Fred know that actually, humans were great, and we ended up with a trio of cats that let us pet and play with them, and with Molly's fixing, our colony stabilized with something like 15-20 cats in the area. We're guessing the others were chased off by the stronger fixed cats, eaten by wildlife, or otherwise didn't survive, as we started with a much higher population.

Fred was the first of the trio to go, casualty of an injury that got infected. At that point, we actually considered letting Midnight and Molly come inside, but Midnight sprayed (another reason we'd mistaken her for a tom!), and the two were so close that we thought it would be cruel to separate them. Then a disgruntled renting neighbor was evicted, and as a last spite, left out poisoned meat.

Midnight came home one evening looking off, and we promptly shut Molly in the garage to quarantine her since she was always with Midnight, and took Midnight to the vet. Vet told us it was poison, and that there was nothing to be done but make it fast and painless instead of slow, and we did our best, but we lost almost the entire colony. The tamer cats ate the poison before we could catch any of them besides Molly, and the others were all the wildest who would never again touch any food touched by humans after being TNR'd. We were furious and heartbroken, but the person was long gone, and other than keep Molly locked up safely until after a couple good long rains to clear the area, there was nothing to be done.

At this point, we had no indoor cats, and I was in the process of moving out, and remaining family didn't want the hassle of caring for an indoor cat again, so Molly was allowed to remain outdoors after it was safe again, while I worked to move into my new place, which needed a lot of work. I'd always planned to bring Molly over eventually, but it didn't happen until Mom sold the old house. Mom's staying with me now, and Molly has a good sized catio out back. I'm planning to bring Molly inside once mom and all mom's boxes are moved to her new place once the fixer-upper is fixed up.

Ah...it seems I ended up with far more than a brief introduction, but hello anyways? I hope that I can learn more here about how to best care for Molly and keep her happy and healthy.
 
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LittleShadow

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Thanks for the sympathy. We were just...who even thinks to do that? Ugh. But Molly will now live out her life as a pet, so I'm going to do my best to give her a long and happy life!

She's what I've come to call "cuddle motivated." I've had her ignore fresh, warm turkey because the hand holding and offering the turkey COULD BE PETTING HER! I (mostly) jokingly tell friends that my biggest worry transitioning her from outdoor only to catio to indoor-with-catio-access is that she could starve as an indoor cat with cuddles being on offer at all times. She escaped from her catio one time, and mom went out and tried rattling food. I rolled my eyes, grabbed the towel I most often used to keep her from clawing me to ribbons when she kneads, and sat down with the towel in my lap and called her. BOOM! Cat in lap, purring. As she's gotten more used to regular multi-hour petting sessions, that's worked a little slower on future escapes, but it's still easier to get her to come to an empty hand with wiggling fingers than it is to get her to respond to even the tastiest food.
 

Tobermory

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We’d love to see a picture of Molly!

What a story! I couldn’t stop reading although I’m horrified—but, sadly, not surprised—about the people who mistreated, abused, and killed the cats you were watching out for. I volunteer for a farm sanctuary that takes in cats and dogs in addition to farm animals so I see it first hand as well.

I smiled when I read about Molly wanting love more than food. Mocha, the semi-feral I adopted from the sanctuary a year ago, is the same.

Welcome to The Cat Site! It’s a wonderful community.
 

tabbytom

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LittleShadow and Molly, on behalf of The Catsite community, a warm
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to both of you.

So glad that you’ve joined this site and you are in the right place for all things cat and this site is loaded with tons of rich resources and you’ll find friendly and helpful cats around and many of our cats are very knowledgeable in cat related stuffs.

Please post photos of Molly for us to see.

New Here? I Have A Few Suggestions For You!
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Feel free to ask questions if you have any and start a new thread of your own and post them under the appropriate forum headings and do check out the many informative articles we have here in Articles | The Cat Site

Enjoy your stay and see ya around :wink:
 
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LittleShadow

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Well, since it's been requested....have some pics of Molly!
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Here she is at the old place, napping near the car.

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Catio cuddle time, she's so happy!
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You know how some cats really DON'T want you to pet the tummy when they show you their belly? Yeah, not Molly. She LOVES belly rubs. (Not pictured is two seconds later, when she rolled to expose more tummy, and fell off my lap. I pretended nothing happened, to spare her dignity.)
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A few minutes later, back in the lap, for more pets.

You know how we're all advised to play with our cats using toys, not hands? Doesn't matter to Molly. You see, those toys are HELD by HANDS, and those hands could be PETTING HER. I've never had a successful play session with Molly, they all ended up cuddle sessions. :lol: I've tried leaving safe-for-solo-play toys out with her, but....well, as far as I can tell, she's not particularly interested.

Once, and only once, at the end of a three hour cuddle session, she actually did bat at the fluffy teaser on the end of a ribbon wand toy as I picked it up to take with me, but when I stopped and tried to play with her with the toy, she looked at my hands and started pawing the towel I use to protect my legs, then stared at the chair I sit in, then looked back at me in a pretty obvious "why aren't you sitting and petting me more?". That's actually the most interest I've ever seen her show a toy, but since string/ribbon toys aren't safe for solo play, I couldn't try leaving one out for her to play with without me.

I've also never gotten her to eat any treats or food offerings with a person present. She does like watching the yard, and birds and such, but so far as I can tell, if a person is anywhere in her general area, she wants CUDDLES, and all else is secondary. Oh well, at least I know she loves me!
 

Boris Diamond

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Welcome to The Cat Site! Molly is a beautiful calico, and it sounds like she is a great lover! :redheartpump:

So sorry to hear about the poisoned cats. So hard to understand why someone would do that.:(
 

rubysmama

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Hello and welcome to TCS. :wave2: Molly is gorgeous. :catlove:

So sorry about your feral colony. I don't normally cry when reading messages in this forum, but that story broke my heart. How can people be so cruel. :(
 
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LittleShadow

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mnj m, <---that is Molly saying hello everyone! I was cuddling her on my bed for a bit, and started checking the board after she decided that she wanted to cuddle next to me instead of on me, and she got curious and batted at the laptop a few times. So now you all get a message from her too!

And thank you all for the sympathy. I'm just so glad our first action was to quarantine Molly, as that was likely what saved her life. It was horrific to lose the rest, but we tried to focus on being grateful that she survived, and it helped.
 

Mamanyt1953

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There is no accounting for the cruelty of some people, nor for the great hearts and loving spirits of others. YOU are one of the "others." A very warm welcome to you and the lovely Molly!

I grieve with you for the horrible, cruel loss of the rest of your colony. May Karma catch up with those people quickly and definitively!

WELCOME!

 

neely

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A very warm and gracious welcome to TCS! :hellosmiley: I echo everyone else's compliments on your gorgeous girl, Molly. She's an absolutely lovely lady. Aren't belly rubs the best? :catlove:

My sincere and deepest regrets on the loss of your feral group of cats. :angel:
 
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