Friday, October 15, 2010

Davy and Goliath: Mr. Mom

Davy was just a tiny kitten when he and his big brother, Goliath, moved in with us. He was the only survivor in his litter of kittens. And with their mother gone, too, Goliath moved right in and became Mr. Mom to his tiny baby brother. A woman in Baltimore found them together in her backyard and watched as Goliath nurtured and cared for Davy. But she was ill and couldn't keep them. Over the months, we watched Davy grow from kitten to teenager to energetic young cat. We rarely have kittens in our group home, and all of us loved watching him grow up under Goliath's watchful eye. Because Goliath was too shy to live comfortably in a home, they went to live in a barn with an older cat, miniature horses, a couple of cat-friendly dogs and people who adore them.

You can help us save more cats like Davy and Goliath. Please help us find a new location in the Columbia area for our group home.

Monday, October 11, 2010

Leonardo and Friends

Our group home began with Leonardo, Spencer and their 20 friends from the same household, who were all in urgent need of a place to go. A friend had just moved to a huge house in the country, and she invited the cats to stay in her basement until they got adopted, making it possible for us to save them from Baltimore County Animal Control. We quickly mobilized a team of volunteers to care for our new family of "basement cats." I loved just sitting on the floor in the basement watching the cats swatting around toys and climbing on the ladders and platforms we'd set up for them. It took almost two years, but they all got adopted in groups of two or more. I loved them all, but Leonardo and Spencer, were my favorites. They were brothers and were the oldest and wisest of the cats and my good friends.

Peaches

We were packing up after an adoption show at PetCo when we noticed a shopping cart with a cat carrier in it. When we opened the carrier, we found a tiny orange cat curled up in a back corner. She was literally frozen with fear. A store employee said the shopping cart and carrier had been there since the night before. Peaches was too traumatized to go to our shelter, so she went to a foster home instead. The foster home soon became her forever home. Years later, she's still very shy but happy.

Taz and Mia

Taz and Mia were abandoned outside when their family moved. Mia was old, although we have no idea how old. Taz wasn't young, either. Mia wasn't well when she joined out cat family, and her health continued to decline, no matter what we did. The only thing that seemed to help at all was acupuncture, and a house call vet came weekly for a little while to do her treatments. Fortunately, the vet loves cats and didn't mind sitting on the floor treating Mia with one hand while waving off curious friends with the other. Finally, Mia had to be hospitalized one last time. She began her journey to Rainbow Bridge all alone in a cage at the vet clinic. We were devastated when we found out, because we wouldn't have wanted her to be alone. And we were worried about how Taz would do without his friend. But just a few days later, a woman spotted him on Adoptapet.com and wanted to meet him. A week later, we took him home to a family of four cats and a human who adores him and loves having his companionship while she's working in what she says is now his garden.

Cosmo

Cosmo already had an appointment for a lethal injection when his human decided to try one last rescue. It wasn't that Cosmo was a "bad" cat. In fact, he was his mom's best friend. But she'd been assigned to travel in Europe for a year, and no family members, friends or rescue groups were willing to keep him while she was overseas. We'd been "stuck" with cats whose families never returned for them before, and we were a bit hesitant about Cosmo. But he didn't deserve to die... His mom signed a contract specifying the date she'd return for him, promised to keep in touch and delivered her buddy to our group home. While she was traveling, he had a great year hanging out with his cat friends and snuggling with the volunteers. As the date for his reunion with his mom approached, we began making plans. She and Cosmo would be moving to Italy, and all of us wanted to make sure his arrangements to fly in the cabin with her were in order. As a farewell gift, we gave him a soft fleece harness and leash to wear on the trip. She was nervous about their reunion and worried for weeks that he wouldn't remember her. He did, of course. It was a long trip for our boy but worth it to be with his mom again and living with her in a lovely country home with a fenced garden in Italy.   

Jasmine And Company

Jasmine and her 15 housemates were already in the Baltimore County shelter, when their "ex" realized she'd made a terrible mistake, and her elderly cats would probably be killed. A victim of domestic violence, she'd been told by the police to stay away from home and had asked Animal Control to pick up her cats. The shelter gave us three business days to find places for the cats, and the two of us networked frantically. Friends of Animals offered to help and ended up taking two kittens. Fancy Cats Rescue Team found foster homes for many of the senior cats. I'll always remember the day I went to the shelter in a borrowed van to collect the cats. They were in a room in a little house at the entrance to the shelter grounds, and there were cats everywhere... perched on shelves in the closets, sitting on windowsills, lounging on the furniture... As we loaded the last of the cats into the van, the officers who picked them up stopped by to say goodbye and wish them luck. They were big, burly men with tears in their eyes. All but three of the senior cats went to foster homes.  I figured Harry, Jasmine and Leo would be fine in our group home since they were used to living with a lot of cats. Besides, it was only a matter of time until a softhearted person came along and offered them a home where they could spend their golden years together. That softhearted person turned out to be me. Leo, who was 14 when he moved in with me, was cute and fun. But living with Harry, who was 15, was like living with a crotchety old man with chronic digestive problems. And then there was Jasmine, also 15. She looked like a powder puff but beneath the long, silky fur was a tough Baltimore street cat. She was smart and shrewd and wise, and the most nurturing cat I have ever known. She was a once-in-a-lifetime cat, and it was an honor and joy to share my life with her for five years.

The Pfister's Cats

When the Pfister's Mobile Home Park in Laurel closed to make way for a huge ice cream factory, 40 feral cats and a couple of tame house cats were left behind. Every evening for two months, I went to the abandoned mobile home park to feed the cats -- a colony of 17, including a calico with attitude named Grandma; a tame cat who never left the porch of the trailer where she'd spent her entire life; two orange brothers who lived across the street from her; two mother cats with kittens near the front of the park; and a black and white tuxedo cat and his friend who moved from trailer to trailer, always together. I named them Buddy and Ben. Being in what felt like a small town inhabited only by cats and squirrels was both scary and fun at the same time, and I looked forward to my daily visits. The friend who rescued Puck trapped all the cats. Then we carefully labeled all the traps so friends and family members wouldn't be separated and would go to barns together. I'll always be grateful to the wonderful family in Lynchburg that took the entire colony of 17. Grandma, who was never fond of her offspring, chose to live separately with her newest litter of kittens in the mobile home park. Being the kind of cat she is, she chose the trailer with the nicest front porch. At her new home, she soon discovered that the house has a beautiful porch, and that's where she spends her time while her kids catch mice in the barn.

Puck

Puck was just a kitten when a friend broke the window of an abandoned inner city apartment and snatched him off a windowsill. He grew up in our group home but never quite learned how to play nicely with people. He's one of those cats who loves you one second and sinks every tooth and claw into your arm the next. After a couple of disastrous adoption shows, we decided he'd be happiest and safest in a barn. Puck was the first cat I'd relocated to a barn, and I wanted to make sure he had everything he needed in his new home. So he arrived with two shopping bags full of "stuff" -- a bed, snugly baby blankets, catnip toys and the dog toy he loved to cuddle. The adopters were a bit surprised that a barn cat would have so many possessions, but Puck wasted no time showing his new family he was ready for full-time work as a Mouse Manager. When his "dad" reached into his crate to pet him, Puck bit his finger. Puck's name is Honcho now, and he's living large on his horse farm. He invites the neighborhood cats over for sleepovers in his barn, rides around on the farm machinery and helps his people garden. He's a great mouser, too, but most important, he's a wonderful friend to the people who adopted him.