how did your kitty come to live with you?

Ive been asked why and how i got my siamese and peanut.

sirus: ad on CL for a 5 week old kitten hes now a year old and loveable beast

apollo: no longer wanted hissing and didnt like other pets..lol...yea right never gave him a chance to settle in..he loves other animals.

gemma: found as a stray taken in by a rescue who then tried to use her for breeding. but she couldnt get pregnant.

simba: throws up alot..eats too fast and is old...just switched him to canned food hes doing better

sapphire: ad on CL owner didnt have time for her anymore...shes an easy cat sleeps almost all day long..just gotta change litter and feed..not very time consuming...

peanut: found in a trash can and after months i think she finally will have a home..im picky what can i say.

india: through a cat rescue who knew of the owner trying to place her..reason attitude problem. shes fine as long as you leave her alone and she feels like being petted. shes been terrorized by boxers of course shes going to have an attitude. sd long as no body forces themselves on her shes a sweety..shes in my window finally grooming herself.

Tonka: fiances sister in law and brother...getting rid of all their pets. (hes a flame point) who has a neuter appointment next week...ha poor guy he gets here and then goes to get snipped..

Aristotle was fostered by a TCS member and Topaz came as a stray.

Originally Posted by gemlady

Aristotle was fostered by a TCS member and Topaz came as a stray.

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is your topaz a tortie point? she reminds me of my sapphire.

Halsey and Molly - found at a construction site at 3 weeks old. They are our friendliest cats.

Teresa and Chester - mommy was a feral who deposited them in our yard. We finally caught them at 6 months, still together. They are almost feral - your hardly ever see them (until dinner time!)

Gracie and Josephine - not related but both were adopted about a year apart by our (former) neighbors. We got Gracie first at five weeks old. Her third eye was showing when the kids brought her to me saying mom didn't want her anymore. Josephine was left behind when they moved.

Abigail Adams was a foster last year. Her owner got sick and I was the only home they could find for her. I had her from two weeks to four months, so when she came back her tail was just trembling with excitement. She was a little lonely for her owner (who later died) but she's settling in OK.

Finally, Dolly Madison - showed up a week after Abby came back. She is eight months old and weighs 5 pounds but is a fiesty little girl. She and Halsey (18 pounds) play tag and she usually has him on the run!

My husband started naming our fosters cats after president's or their wives - hence Abby and Dolly. I told him if we ever got up to Barack and Michelle, he'd be on the curb! He said if we ever got there, we'd have won the lottery and could afford them!

i like all the names. i enjoy naming my pets and when i had my kids..woohoo that was even more fun!

I went to the local shelter when my Brownie stopped showing up at my door for food and I knew he was gone (he was an outdoor cat that adopted me and lived a good 13 years). So, I wanted another big black tomcat and came home instead with Butzie my cutie tortoise shell tabby. She had my name and number for sure. It was the first day that she was available for adoption. I didn't have to pay to have her spayed because she already had been. She made herself right at home and became the princess she deserves to be.

Callie - adpoted from a local shelter 8 years ago

Sven - given to us by a friend of a friend whose boyfriend suddently decided he was allergic to cats. This was 3 days after we adopted Callie

Stinkpot and Darko - ended up on our frontporch July 3, 2009 from who knows where. They were 4 1/2 months old, neutered, microchipped, the whole shebang, but we got to keep them! We legally adopted them about one week later.

I hate to say it but I bought Trout from a pets store

If we ever got another cat, we would adopt now that I know what I do.

But it does make me feel good that Trout got a good owner rather than some abusive shlub buying her.

I adopted Holland from a local shelter. I went in because I'd fallen in love with another cat on the shelter's website, but he was gone. Second choice - I wanted a black cat and I wanted a young one. Holland was (is) such a scaredy-cat that she hid from me and the counselor in the adoption meeting room. I didn't even get to touch her until I brought her home. She gave me a lot of fits early on, she hid and hid and hid. But with time and patience she blossomed (with ME at least ) and she is my little love bug. She is still afraid of other people, but to me - she greets me when I get home, she sits on my chest and kneads my shoulders in the middle of the night, she even tolerates me holding and cuddling her every now and then...

Larry was my first ever foster. FAIL!!! I decided within a week to rename him and keep him. He came with his sister, who I named Lena. She, unfortunately, died from FIP 5 months later, but Larry lives on, contented and happy and making me laugh constantly.

Originally Posted by colorpointcat

is your topaz a tortie point? she reminds me of my sapphire.

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No, she's a mink/cream tortie and white. No points.

I won't list everyone I owned, but I have owned both shelter cats, strays and purebred breeding and/or show cats (Russian Blue, Cornish Rex, Ocicats)

I'll just tell about my 2 now and future one.

Ling - black & white bicolor - last of our barn cat litter before we moved. We rehomed her siblings at 3 months old and kept her and spayed her. The rest of the barn cats were rehomed after neuter/spay. She's about 4 or 4 1/2 yrs old.

Jack (Cpt Jack Sparrow) - purebred cinnamon spotted Ocicat. Our first Oci was a chocolate spotted and he died at 3 yrs old from complications of a UTI. Jack is our current show cat and is a Quad Grand Champion in ACFA and a Premier in CFA.

Our future kitten which may be born next week or in October will be a chocolate-silver Ocicat - his name will be Zorro (hubby named him).

Callie, my 14 yo, showed up on the patio of my apartment 12 years ago, starving and wet. She was a bit standoffish at first, but now she's a total love bug.

Hannah Grace, my 5 yo, was adopted from Animal Control (aka "The Pound"). She was 7 mos old, weighed 4 lbs, almost died the first week we had her from a severe URI and complications related to what we now know is herpes. She's the dominant one and definitely rules the roost. Total love bug and has a big purr.

Tumbleweed, whose about 14 wks old, was rescued by a fellow TCSer, CatMom2Wires, during a downpour while she & her family were stopped at a red light. We adopted him into our family July 13th. He's such a joy and brings us lots of laughter. He's got a motor boat on him and he turns it on frequently!

to all the wonderful stories - including Trout!

Our involvement with kitties started with Booger, a kitty that turned out to be a Maine Coon already spayed. She acted feral and was ravaging the garbage cans. I convinced Gary that having her around would be better than running her offf. A year later, kitties turned up in the yard, I found TCS, we began TNR, and Boog did NOT get along with the colony cats, so we found her a home where she could be an indoor/outdoor kitty.

Gary - who used to hate cats - with Booger, the kitty that started it all!



The original litter was Lazlo, Sheldon, Spooky, Tuxedo, and Julius. We adopted Lazlo at about 10 weeks, then Shelly 10 days later. We adopted out Spook and Julius together, but Tuxie was "unadoptable." He sent several cats that turned up at the feral feeder to the hospital. Spook and Julius were abused (we didn't have any forms or screening process in place back then). We got them back, kept Spooky, and one of the vet techs fell in love with Jules (he's doing GREAT. ).

We fostered along the way, and actually adopted out quite a few, but we kept the ones with special needs: Flowerbelle and Ming Loy.

Tuxie came inside full time because in that first winter he was out, he'd finally bonded wtih Gary - but we were afraid he was too aggressive and would not adjust to being indoors. But when it went below zero (not wind chill) for over two weeks, and he would come running every time we opened the door.... and he would NOT stay in any of the shelters we constructed for the ferals, but always showed up with some insulation fluff on him (couldn't figure out where he was staying), Gary couldn't take it any more and we put him in a boarding facility that would accept him. "Just through the really cold patch."

But he became ill after a month or so, so went to the vet... and stopped eating. He got over the UTI - but wouldn't eat. The vet told Gary, if you want this cat to live, you have to take him home. He moved in full time with no problem. He's still like Ricochet Rabbit, and he'll bop anyone that gets in his face or space, but doesn't go out of his way to be aggressive. Turns out he developed an autoimmune disease, so he would have died at two if he hadn't come in. We almost lost him several times, but thanks to our wonderful vet, he turned 8 this year.

I have no idea how many cats we've TNRd. Multiple hundreds. We started a no-kill shelter, in fact, that still operates, though we never had anything to do with the day-to-day after it was licensed and up and running, because the vet hooked us up with the woman that wanted to do it.

Billy we kept only because we couldn't find him a home, and we couldn't leave him outside alone going into winter after having found his brother a home. He moved inside permanently with us November 2008.

Charlie, you all probably know the story. He's the first TNR cat we ever had test positive for FIV (none have ever tested positive for FeLV), so here he is.

Originally Posted by stephanietx

Callie, my 14 yo, showed up on the patio of my apartment 12 years ago, starving and wet. She was a bit standoffish at first, but now she's a total love bug.

Hannah Grace, my 5 yo, was adopted from Animal Control (aka "The Pound"). She was 7 mos old, weighed 4 lbs, almost died the first week we had her from a severe URI and complications related to what we now know is herpes. She's the dominant one and definitely rules the roost. Total love bug and has a big purr.

Tumbleweed, whose about 14 wks old, was rescued by a fellow TCSer, CatMom2Wires, during a downpour while she & her family were stopped at a red light. We adopted him into our family July 13th. He's such a joy and brings us lots of laughter. He's got a motor boat on him and he turns it on frequently!

Click to expand...

Wow, I think I read about Tumble's rescue...I remember reading a thread about a kitty being rescued during a storm where he was clinging to the tire of the vehicle in from of the rescuer or something like that. Is that your little guy?

Zoey- semi feral adopted at a local shelter in the next town( unfortuantely they closed ) she was supposed to be 2-3 yrs but was 8-10 months old... story was she was caught in a TNR trap either pregnant or had just delivered ... Lots of work and she is my little "red dog" as she is dog like

Dahlia - semi feral from a local rescue... she was there for four years and no one had tried to tame her... She is very semi feral to date will all but me

PJ and Punky came from Whitecatlover as they were both her long term fosters... She had them from 5 weeks to just shy of 15 months ... Punky is 3 yr 3 months old... Pj passed 9.5 days ago

Sylvie - came to me from the local no kill shelter at sixth months old

When I met my husband he already had cats...."his" are:
Jake: adopted from a shelter
Jane, Henry, Punky: kittens of a cat that we had that passes last year
(two have passed in the past year, Angie was the mama, and Deke was another from her) These cats are all 5+

The others we have accumulated together...
Joey: decided to get another kitten after Ang passed, found him on CL he is now 5 1/2 ish months old.
Billy: our blind baby, was about to be taken to the shelter bc the people who had his mama cat could not handle a blind kitten and could not find anyone who wanted him. He is about 5 mos old. He and Joey are best friends and play together/sleep side by side/wash each other all the time.

Baby Stray: He has no name yet....we found him a week and a half ago in our chicken coop and brought him in. He has been sick for about 3-4 days now and we have been trying to get him well. Before he got sick we were trying to find a home for him and have not named him yet bc of it. We are leaning towards keeping him now as we are getting attached and so is he.

We also have two other strays that we brought in and are trying to find homes for....so many cats!! The strays just seem to find us, and we can't just leave them outside when they are scary thin/terrified...

Shareena: from a "free kittens" ad on the employee website at work. She was only 7.5 weeks old, but I had no idea that was too young to take her from her mother. She's a feisty little thing and still alpha cat.

Miss Patchwillow: Shareena's sister. I got her six weeks later because she was the only one left from the litter and the woman was going to take to to a shelter. She was called Patch when I got her, but I didn't think that was a very pretty name for a girl kitty. A friend of mine had written a children's story about a witch named Miz Patchwillow--a nice witch, but not too bright. I borrowed the name for my nice, but not too bright, kitty.

Goldy: showed up on my back patio in June two years ago, looked like she was about 6-7 months old. She was the friendliest little thing and just begging to come inside. She must have been somebody's pet and was either dumped or abandoned. She disappeared after 10 days, right when I was going to put a lost-and-found ad in the paper, and I was afraid the coyotes had gotten her. She reappeared 8 or 9 days later, absolutely starving. I brought her in the house then, fed her, and cleaned her up. One of my piano students wanted to take her if nobody answered the ad, but I took her to the vet first to make sure she was healthy. Yep, she's healthy, she's pregnant, she's mine.

Iris & Cali: two of Goldy's three kittens. Lion, her little (er . . . big) orange boy was adopted at six months. I still have both girls.

Merlin (aka Monkey): Last September I was benched next to an abyssinian breeder at a cat show. She was showing Merlin's brother and had Merlin there for sale. I had already started researching aby breeders, with the idea that a year or two down the line I would pick a breeder and get my name on the waiting list for a ruddy female kitten. The week after the show I drove to this breeder's cattery just to check it out as part of my research . . . and came home with a kitten! Okay, so he's not my perfect ruddy female--he's a ruddy male (neuter) and he's a complete lovebug.

Pixel - adopted along w/her littermate, Mouse in 1997 from a local family @ the age of approximately 7 weeks.
Cable - found in the road in front of the school where i was working - age approximately 8 weeks. now age 6 years.
Java - also found @ the school, but in the parking lot, looking for attention. age approximately 3.5 months. currently living w/my parents since i could only bring 2 w/me when i moved. now age 5 years.
Chip - adopted from the humane society @ the approximate age of 3-5 years. had to be surrendered this summer due to moving constraints
Firefox, aka 'Puter Bug - found on my back porch in terrible condition @ the approximate age of 4 weeks. brought her inside to pass in comfort - ended up nursing her back to health. also had to be surrendered this summer due to moving constraints

Sneaky Pie- She rode 12 hours in my inlaw's car to get here. MIL found a stray and asked if we wanted a cat. Of course the kids said yes.

HollyHeart- A friend from church found a stray that was pregnant. She had 4 kittens (she kept Bob and Blackberry who was mom). Had to find homes for 3. Holly was one of the last ones.

Didn't want another black cat, didn't want a female. We'd lost our 1st black cat last August due to kidney failure. Didn't want a girl b/c Sneaky's a girl, and I'd heard that same-sex cats can have issues- even if they're fixed. But she needed a home, so we took her.
Cheryl