Interesting times ahead

It looks as if I might be adding to Rudi and Little Cow.
The rescue from whom I got Little Cow got in touch with me yesterday to tell me the sad story of a little 12-18 month grey and white girl.
They are having trouble homing her as she has a bit of an incontinence problem. Sounds like she leaks a little bit of urine now and then, completely unknown to her. This particularly happens overnight, but also from time-to-time during the day. The vet has told them that it's mechanical, not something that can be cured.
Apparently she's incredibly sweet and friendly but is really not coping well with being cooped up in a little pen at the rescue (because of the wee problem, she's isolated). Moreover, the family who handed her in had also kept her in a little pen for a few weeks because of her wee problem (they had other cats and young children) and it sounds like she's going stir crazy and needs a proper home.
So the shelter are trying desperately to find her somewhere. They aren't overkeen on the idea of a pure farm cat as they think she's too affectionate for that, but they've asked me to consider her, given that I think farm cats are there for both work and play!
I'm going to see her next week. My concern isn't over her wee problem, but more over how she'll get on with Rudi and affect the status quo of the farm. He is king of the castle, sweet with adults but mean to other cats. If I do take her, the plan is:
* home her in the utility room at the back of the house in a nice big dog-type cage with a bed and a couple of litter trays, although she'll have free run of the whole room. We'll pop by and give her all the affection we can. The floor is tiled, so she can't cause too much damage.
* the utility room is how all of us - including Rudi - enter the house. If and when Rudi comes in the house (which he likes to with increasing frequency), we'll make sure she's in her cage. This way we can hopefully introduce them without danger - although I'd expect a bit of hiss and spit.
* over time, they will hopefully make friends or, at worse, get along. As and when this happens, we'll give her the possibility to roam around the farm and, if she wants, come back in to the utility room at the end of the night.

Hopefully this will work for her, but any suggestions welcomed! As I say, it's not a done deal, but it sounds like they've exhausted most of their options. I've told them that she can be a farm cat with benefits, so hopefully they'll go for it!

In other news:
* Rudi still lovely to everyone except Little Cow
* Little Cow coming round a little bit more every week. I have realised that Catnip is her Kryptonite!
* am feeding neighbours two indoor cats at the moment while they are on holiday. How the other half live! Bless, they are very sweet things (a 10 year old virtually blind persian and a mischievous little 2 year old tabby boy), and it's so different so see them come to me for food as soon as I walk in and then devour it within 2 minutes.

thanks for the positive comments. Let's hope she likes me when I go to see her next week...my heart's about 90% set on her, but if someone comes in who can give her an even better home, then it's not meant to be.
To answer queries:
* apparently the urine problem has been happening for many, many months. The family she was with initially thought it was one of their young children, apparently. They then realised it was her. She was initially treated for cystitis but that did no good so they handed her to the rescue. The rescue have limited funds (very understandable) and while they, sensibly, had her spayed, the vet also looked into it and said it was mechanical. I'm hopeful that getting her more active and giving her TLC will help. It sounds like she'll have some dietary issues (wet only - something to do with crystals in her wee?), but that's not a problem.
* that's a great tip, LDG. They've said that, while she's loving, she's also no-nonsense: so it could be she'll stand up to Rudi (Little Cow just runs from him)
* my dear-departed farmer grandfather wasn't much of a cat lover and would be your typical 'farm cat owner'. He'd just pop a load of food out every night, but he loved them in his own way. And moreover, they loved him back - as I boy, I felt he was like the Pied Piper, cats winding round his legs when he came out with a big bowl of feed.
* Karaleigh....I love your Hazel tales, btw. She and her kittens are sweet

hopefully going to see her Monday afternoon.
If she comes home with us, then big changes will happen! More than anything, I suspect we'll have to start using the other outside doors to stop her dashing out and Rudi wandering in. The farmhouse is essentially two cottages kocked together, so there's another two doors we can use - another back door and one front door. It'll take some acclimatising but we'll manage.
At this juncture I'm not sure how bad her pee problem is. I have been told she uses a litter tray just fine and isn't smelly but just 'drips a bit'. But I do know that, at the moment, I'm not worried about the others following her lead and weeing on the floor. Little Cow is so terrified of Rudi that she doesn't come near the house really, while Rudi - who pops in once or twice a day via the utility room (when we leave the door open ... I'll be in the kitchen and suddenly hear him being his noisy, lovable self) - has never gone to the toilet in the house. I've seen him do his business at various spots around the farm, so I suspect/ hope he'll be alright on that front.
Best case scenario: she joins the family, is a total lovebug, her pee problem isn't bad and begins clearing with TLC and exercise, she becomes friends with Rudi, brings Little Cow out of her shell and basically loves life with us as a farm cat with benefits. Not a lot to ask! And there are always alternatives if things don't go to plan; there's plenty of room on the farm for me to dip into my savings, buy an outside cat pen/ run and let her have that to call her own. But think I need to try her as an indoor 'utility room' kitty first off, for at least a month.
I'm probably over-thinking it all - not something I normally do! - but I want to make this work for everyone in the family, human and feline.

Greetings from an England that is going mad (I assume the news of the big city riots has crossed the Atlantic?)...

Anyway, I didn't get to see her yesterday but I popped along a couple of hours ago. I think describing her as a playful, affectionate, big kitten would just about do her justice! And she is gorgeous, a bluey grey colour with a white bib - just a few shades lighter than Rudi. She loved being petted and is clearly going mad with boredom in her pen/ cage. Part of her playfulness is nipping (but not breaking the skin), but having gone through that with Rudi, I reckon I can deal with it (a firm 'Ouch! No!' worked for him).

I have a teensy bit of family arm-twisting to do to clinch the deal (they think I'm going soft or mad, or maybe a bit of both), but all will be good and she'll melt their hearts soon enough. As I've said to them - 'look, if Ruby hadn't run off we'd have three anyway!'.

Using new doors etc will take a bit of re-conditioning for us humans, but it'll only be for a bit. I'm sure at some point we'll forget, but having been spayed, her likelihood of wanting to slink out is lessened, I hope. Apparently her first family let her go outdoors from time-to-time, which is great, as I'd like her to contribute to rodent patrol. That said, how much she's out and about will be down to her and, of course, the Rudicat. The introduction between them needs to be very gradual, starting with scent-based and am crossing my fingers that they get on.

(talking of rodent patrol, btw: remains of 3 rabbits killed by LC and Rudi found around the farm this Sunday...not nice but, boy, are they earning their keep)

So, I'll pick her up the middle of next week - got friends coming to stay for a few days, so best to get that out of the way first.

Finally, by the way, am going to call her Tili. As in 'uTILIty room cat'. Oh how we English like our terrible puns....

cheers for now
(p.s. there will be photos. And then some.)
(p.p.s.s. and I will look into vet stuff once she's settled - interestingly, when I saw her today, the kindly lady at the shelter said she hadn't 'dripped' overnight, so it may be that she's improving naturally as she's grows up)

hi all,

well, 'Tili' is here, has now been here for about 3 hours. What a boisterous character she is! Here are some photos

http://s1235.photobucket.com/albums/...nt=inroom1.jpg

http://s1235.photobucket.com/albums/...nt=inroom2.jpg

http://s1235.photobucket.com/albums/...theshelter.jpg

Two inter-related changes have happened:

1) we realised that it wouldn't make sense to keep her in the utility room given all our comings and goings. So we've made up the spare room. Given her potential pee problem (on which more another time), we've covered the floor in old duvet covers. We've also added 2 litter trays, 2 cat beds (actually, just carriers with towels in - means they can be changed) a scratching post/ toy and loads and loads of toys, mainly gifted by the shelter.
2) given that she's not going to be a utility room cat, we've realised Tili doesn't work. So as we are all Star Wars fans, she's Padme or 'Padders' for short.

I simply cannot believe how quickly Padders seems to be settling. She was a bit fretful in the car (probably because she thought we were taking her to the vet!) but as soon as she got in her room she started playing and exploring. Indeed, we realised we hadn't closed the door behind us and so she bolted into one of the other rooms, ran around under the bed, dashed out and back into her room. This is a girl who needs a lot of love and attention, as the shelter said. She's hopping onto laps, running around like a crazy thing and basically acting like a big kitten, including the play nipping - ouch! My hands are her toys - any tips welcomed. Rather splendidly, she also wolfed a packet of wet food within 30 minutes of being her, once we'd left her on her own for a bit.

I've been given a load more background on her and I'll share this and more photos soon. Not sure 'ferals and strays' is the right place, mind!

Thanks for the feedback, guys. She's now been here just over 24 hours and seems extraordinarily settled.
This email might be a long and rambling one, so warning in advance! Still, I've 10 minutes spare so let me tell you her story as I know it and then I'll tell you more on day 1 here and plans/ thoughts from here. As ever, any and all advice welcomed.

HER STORY
She was born at the end of January 2010, which makes her just over 18 months old. For the first 11 months of her life she lived with the lady whose cat had her. All I know from that time is that she was a good eater and enjoyed hot and spicy things, which sounds a little odd. There is no indication of her wee problem at this time. At Christmas 2010, she was bought by a RELATED (apparently) family who had 4 young children and already had 2 other cats and a Staffordshire terrier dog. She apparently got on brilliantly with everyone and everything. However they noted lots of damp patches around and ultimately realised it was her. At this point in time her many vet visits began. Initially the vet felt it may be cystitis but after treatment for this she was no better. They noted that she dripped when touched near her tail and when touched firmly near her belly, and they found her bedding was often wet. With their youngest child being at the crawling stage, their vet advised them that she needed to be caged. After a period like this they took her to the shelter and there she was for about 3.5 months till yesterday. The shelter have fallen in love with her. With their limited resources, they've had lots of vet trips with her (including a spay) and the ultimate conclusion from the vet has been that it is a mechanical issue, not a medical one. Why the shelter approached me - and this isn't something I've mentioned before - is that the shelter management were in two camps on her; half were worried about her quality of life and felt that they might need to consider putting her to sleep, the other half (the ones who initially contacted me) were of the opinion that she needed every chance and wouldn't countenance such a step. We're none of us here to judge and, having spoken with people in both camps, I'm not sure that the PTS message would have ever come to fruition, even though it was mentioned on the web site. In her time at the shelter, they felt her pee problem was 'up and down': some days her bedding would be damp, others it wasn't; some days they would notice a few damp spots, others just the one, others none. When I picked her up yesterday, they showed me a little damp corner of her cage by the litter tray - it was clear that she had 'squirted' a little bit out of her tray.

HER FIRST 24 HOURS HERE
On her character, I'll just say she's adorable, adventurous and boisterous. Padders wants to rule the house and be with people! Her room, whilst 50 times the size of her cage and with a lovely window view, is not big enough - she wants to explore the rest of the house. In terms of eating, I'm feeding her high quality wet food (a brand called Encore -very, very pricey, about 75% meat apparently) and she eats the instant the food leaves the tin and hits the bowl. At one point this morning I was convinced she was going to eat her litter; she'll have been well-fed in the shelter, I'm sure, but I think she might just have a 'piggy' personality.

I've not had any more nipping incidents yet: am following advice given and it seems she's a good learner.

On her pooping and peeing, she is definitely using the litter tray - actually saw her have a pee this morning, and it all seemed to go in the tray. I have noticed one or two very small, coin-sized damp patches in the room and her bedding was ever so fractionally damp. Joe, my nephew, is playing with her loads and he said that it was a little damp near her tail yesterday at one point. One thing we've all noticed is that the back of her legs look slightly discoloured. She has big white socks and they look a bit 'muddy' round there. It could be the litter/ the wee problem - I'll try and get a picture.

MY INITIAL THOUGHTS
Looking back over her story, I can't help thinking that - while she undoubtedly has a little pee problem - it has been exacerbated by her situation. There is no evidence that she had any issues in her first 11 months with her 'mother', although it could be they were only very minimal. Moreover, with her second family being related to her first, it is would seem bizarre that they would take on the cat if they knew there was an issue. So I can't help wondering if her issues commenced in the home with the kids and other cats and dogs. Could be diet/ stress; any number of things. Whatever, it's clear that, at the shelter, the problem hasn't been as bad. So maybe a bit of TLC will improve the situation.

WHERE DO WE GO FROM HERE
All being well....

weeks 1 and 2 - she's in that room only (it's upstairs, btw)
week 3 - a couple of times, I'm going to let her explore just outside her room. There's a corridor that leads to the stairs. I'll make sure all doors are shut and supervise her explorations. I have a feeling she'll run around having the time of her life.
week 4 - the start of some outdoor/ meeting Rudi and Little Cow time. Assuming the weather is decent, I'll pop her in a big dog crate with food, litter tray and some toys and she how she is outside for a few hours. Technically I'm not allowed to have indoor pets and, moreover, this is a big farm, so I need to get her adjusting but knowing she's safe inside and outside. Sadly no cat flap permitted either.

And then we'll take it from there. There are loads of options available dependent on her health and how she gets on with Rudi and LC, and we'll review those as and when they arise. The utility room may actually get another look in!

Sadly her urine problem appears to have got quite a bit worse over the last 48 hours. Her bedding tonight is really damp and she's left wet patches on our laps after cuddles.
Couple of solutions being discussed as to where we house her - where there's a will and all that. I'll send an update over the weekend. All will be well, we have a big property.
On a side note - and far more positively - her nipping has all but subsided. She loves to knead - she now just needs to learn that legs aren't for kneading on!! Big, big ouch.....

Hi all - so we're now a week into our time with Padders. It's been quite a trying week for all concerned (probably her in particular), but the last 48 hours have been very good.
As indicated in my last email, it was becoming evident that her leaking urine problem was getting worse. On Thursday night the family held emergency talks on what to do with her and on Friday, as planned since the start of the week, a lady from the rescue came over in the morning to catch-up.
Padders took this opportunity to do something very naughty. When we'd put her room together, we'd put a table in it near the window - her bed was on it and she was hopping up onto it to look out of the window. Anyway, as we walked in the room it quickly became evident that Padders had decided to have a pee on this table: it wasn't just spots or leakage but a fully-formed pee. The theory is that she was territory-marking now that she'd been in the room for 3-4 days.
This firmed our resolve that she couldn't stay in the spare room.
So to cut a long story short, Padders now lives in the utility room. When we're out and about, overnight and when there aren't too many comings and goings, she has the full run of the utility room. When we're needing to be in and out of the utility room a lot, she gets put in the cupboard under the stairs, which is behind a little door in the utility room. Now before anyone gets up in arms about this, let me tell you about this 'cupboard under the stairs'. It's about three times the size of an aircraft toilet, it has shelves, it's about 20x the size of the cage she was in at the shelter and, most crucially, it has a window. We kept various odds and ends in there, and it dawned on me the other day that it might be perfect for her.
Anyway, two and a bit days in and it's going really well. The window in the little room faces onto the garden, so when we're putting out washing, picking the rhubarb or generally pottering around, she can look out over us. Interestingly, even though the 'full' utility room is lovely and big, what we've found is that she seems very comfy in this little room and dozes in it even when she has full utility room access.
Another real benefit of this little room is that it is making the introduction to Rudi more straightforward. The last two evenings, I've fed her in the utility room and then put her back behind the door. I've then ushered Rudi in for his food. On night 1 she was reasonably quiet when I did this and so Rudi ate very calmly on the other side of the door. Last night, night 2, wasn't as encouraging; she was considerably more vocal (she is desperate to meet him!) and I noticed that Rudi was reluctant to come in. More worryingly, his ears flattened to his head. I cut things off at the pass and he had his food outside the back door (i.e. two doors away from her), being petted on.
I'll continue with this over the next fortnight. Then it'll be time to start introducing her to the outside world with some supervised time in the courtyard and garden (though supervising a cat is, I suspect, like nailing water to a wall). I continue to be concerned about how she'll get on with Rudi and LC, but I think they will learn to work it out between them as long as we take it slowly. I want to get to the stage where she can be indoors when we are and out and about on the farm during the day. One thing she'll have to do is temper her food intake. I leave dry food out for R & LC all day and they eat it in dribs and drabs. Rudi also gets a bit of wet food once or twice a day and he tends to eat 90% of it straight away. Padders, on the other hand, is a little pig! As soon as food bowl goes down, her nose is in it and the portion (whether wet or dry) is polished off in a matter of minutes. If she starts stealing food from Rudi and LC then she'll soon be very unpopular with them. Harsh as it may sound, I don't want to change the way I'm feeding R & LC to accommodate her; they are brilliant farm cats.
But I'm getting ahead of myself. What she's shown me in her first week here is that, in addition to being a very loving and playful (she loves wand toys)little girl, she is a quick learner - her nipping lasted no more than 24 hours and she's also been more much careful with her claws when being petted on laps (even though I have resorted to a big blanket!). It won't all be plain sailing I'm sure but fingers crossed it'll all work out

End of week update...more developments

After a good start in the utility room/ cubby hole, the week went downhill for Padders. The pee problem is a little worse than I'd initially thought and after trying to defumigate the utility room for a third time in three days, I've had to take the decision to make her an outdoor only cat. It's a great shame as she is loving and friendly, but unfortunately can't be an indoor girl. I feel bad, but we've given it a chance and she'll hopefully continue to prosper with us.

On the brighter side of things, she is an adapter and there is encouraging (maybe even excellent) news on the fitting-in-with-Rudi front.

She's now in the little outside barn/ playhouse in our garden that housed Ruby and Little Cow about a year ago during their 3 week acclimitisation period. It's fractionally leaky (remedying that this weekend) but she has lots of her comforts in there, plus some lovely beds and cosy, straw-filled spots. Best of all, it's split level: it is wooden and sturdy and was designed as a playhouse for the farmer's 2 young daughters. Apparently one would have her imaginary world upstairs while the other would be downstairs doing her thing. Padders is up and down the little wooden steps a-plenty.

Over the course of the week, there had been a lot of scent-swapping between her and Rudi and I think that has helped a lot. When I took her out to the playhouse yesterday, I let her have a little run around in the garden while I was putting her things in. Little did I know that Rudi was in the garden! Suddenly I saw him sat by the silver birch tree and thought the worst. However, what happened was that she wandered off to the silver birch, stood a foot away from him, foofed her tail at him and hissed a wee bit. And he did...nothing. He just sat there. Exactly the same happened this morning when I went to feed her - he'd obviously spent the night sat near her barn.

I'm sure you readers of this will put me right if I'm wrong but I believe this is a fantastic sign. Once Padders was back in her little house I praised and petted him to high heaven. I think he's clever (and loving) enough to pick up on my signals that I want him to get on with her and, if so, I'd like to nominate him for Cat of the Year! What an awesome lad he is.

As it's going to be the outdoor life for Padders, first stop this morning was the vets for a microchip. All was fine until the way home from the vet when she decided to have a wee, somehow managing to miss the quilt that covered the back seat. So any suggestions on how to get rid of a cat wee smell from car upholstery will be much appreciated.

For the moment we're going to supervise her visits outside. However it won't be long before we let have free run - we'll put a cat flap in the playhouse. She seemed to absolutely love her jaunt around the garden yesterday so I'm hopeful that she'll be a star. It was very evident from her time in the utility room that she craves stimulation, new things to do and to play with as she miaowed for us/ to get out pretty much morning, noon and night and it's interesting that her pee problem seemed to get worse as she did (same as it did in week 1 in the spare room). It must have been hell for her cooped up for about 6 months.

With regard to Padders' health, I have a friend who used to work for the shelter we got her but has recently started elsewhere (for what sound like political reasons). She's the one who put me onto Padders case. I've been chatting with her this past fortnight and she's been both helpful and supportive, backing my decisions to move her both times. She's also asked if I'll go Dutch on taking Padders to another vet for a second opinion on her leakage issues and I've agreed. That's not for a week so for now it's just a case of keeping her happy,fed and safe. And on that front, I'll continue to do my best.

I'll post a proper update in the next week or so (in my usual, rambling fashion but plus pictures), but for now just a short and sweet 'everything is going really well' note. Padders loves the outside life - she is such an adaptable little thing. Thanks for all the best wishes.
I must hold my hands up and say that, in her two weeks indoors, I couldn't really feel I'd bonded with her at all, so busy was I tending to her needs and making sure she hadn't piddled in an inappropriate place. Moreover, when you've only ever had independent 'grown-up' outdoor cats, having a rather needy indoor teenager is quite a change of pace!
But seeing her running around HER garden, standing proudly at the door to HER recently-refurbished house whilst showing HER first kill (a poor little tree sparrow...I'm hoping she'll move on to mice, moles and rabbits like the other two), I'm starting to get quite fond of the little lady! She clearly LOVES her little hut - I'll post pics soon. She and Rudi are also fine with one another. I haven't seen very much of Little Cow of late, but I did catch her gazing at Padders the other day in an inquisitive manner. I'm sure they'll meet properly soon, though I'm making a point of locking Padders away for the night at the moment when I do the last feed. This also means I can get some quality Rudi-time !
for now, stay well and go well