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- Mar 15, 2013
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There are a couple of very young, female cats that live outside my house that my boyfriend and I have been feeding for the better part of a year now. I'm not for CERTAIN where they came from, but I'm pretty sure my neighbors left them when they moved. In any case, they were pretty pitiful and tiny when they showed up at my door but we're not allowed to have pets so I just started keeping food and water out for them.
Since then, we've had 2 tom cats hanging around (HUGE, wild looking furballs! lol) and I think we're pretty much feeding them too, since the food bowl is ALWAYS needing filled now! They will never let us get even remotely close to them, though, so I've never messed with them. Anyway, with males around, it was a pretty much a slap of reality when we realized BOTH our females were in heat.
After talking about it, we pretty much decided that we couldn't afford to feed two new sets of kittens, on top of the cats we feed now and I think I've grown a tad attached to my 'porch kitties' so 'dumping them' was way outta the question! The local shelter is high kill and has no facilities for cats anyway. Any cats they get are automatically put down. The only other shelter around here, a no-kill shelter, said they were completely full and having trouble placing even the kittens, let alone adults. No help there. We just decided to spay them both and leave everything business as usual.
Both cats were spayed yesterday morning, and are resting in my bathroom right now!
(Hope my landlord doesn't drop in! lol) We plan to keep them in our bathroom until their pain meds run out, at the very least, which we have a four day supply of.
That's the story! Now onto the questions:
One cat is a calico, the other is tuxedo. The calico is a absolute sweetheart. She loves attention and will nuzzle and paw you like crazy to get attention. She's noticeably bigger the other cat, but still barely an adult. She also pretty much stays in our yard, instead of wandering like her 'friend.'
The tuxedo cat is a bit different, personality-wise. She loves attention, but she won't go out of her way to get it! If you manage to find her, being as she likes to take off who-knows-where and come back when she's hungry, she will let you pick her up but she stiffens up and digs her claws in. Eventually the chin-scratches win her over and she melts into a big softie, though and she hates to be put back down.
Which leads into my first question!
Since we brought them home from the vet yesterday, no one is safe! If you step in my bathroom right now, you will attacked by purring, pawing, leg rubbing fur balls and heaven help you if you need to 'sit down'. Might as well count on having a warm, fuzzy lap! Both cats are acting like they are absolutely starved for attention! Even the tuxedo, which is the part that makes me wonder. She's normally a little bit skittish and she normally makes YOU approach HER. Is it because of the surgery? Here's to hoping it stays this way, though, I love the attention myself.
Second- My landlord is very against having animals in the house. When can I put them back outside? I'm nervous about that, partly because I worry about infection and because the calico would NOT stop pulling at her stitches when we first brought them home. She seems to be content to ignore them now, though. If I catch her doing it again, I'll ask about getting her a cone.
Lastly, the males. I hate the idea of having someone 'get rid of them' so that's not an option for me, but I would love to not get woke up in the middle of the night by a yowling cat fight under my house anymore! Also, even though we keep food out, I've caught them in our trash, which is disgusting to me! (I know that's what they do to get by, but I have a diapered toddler...need I say more?) Are there 'nice' ways to make them find somewhere else to roam around?
Since then, we've had 2 tom cats hanging around (HUGE, wild looking furballs! lol) and I think we're pretty much feeding them too, since the food bowl is ALWAYS needing filled now! They will never let us get even remotely close to them, though, so I've never messed with them. Anyway, with males around, it was a pretty much a slap of reality when we realized BOTH our females were in heat.
After talking about it, we pretty much decided that we couldn't afford to feed two new sets of kittens, on top of the cats we feed now and I think I've grown a tad attached to my 'porch kitties' so 'dumping them' was way outta the question! The local shelter is high kill and has no facilities for cats anyway. Any cats they get are automatically put down. The only other shelter around here, a no-kill shelter, said they were completely full and having trouble placing even the kittens, let alone adults. No help there. We just decided to spay them both and leave everything business as usual.
Both cats were spayed yesterday morning, and are resting in my bathroom right now!
(Hope my landlord doesn't drop in! lol) We plan to keep them in our bathroom until their pain meds run out, at the very least, which we have a four day supply of.That's the story! Now onto the questions:
One cat is a calico, the other is tuxedo. The calico is a absolute sweetheart. She loves attention and will nuzzle and paw you like crazy to get attention. She's noticeably bigger the other cat, but still barely an adult. She also pretty much stays in our yard, instead of wandering like her 'friend.'
The tuxedo cat is a bit different, personality-wise. She loves attention, but she won't go out of her way to get it! If you manage to find her, being as she likes to take off who-knows-where and come back when she's hungry, she will let you pick her up but she stiffens up and digs her claws in. Eventually the chin-scratches win her over and she melts into a big softie, though and she hates to be put back down.
Which leads into my first question!
Since we brought them home from the vet yesterday, no one is safe! If you step in my bathroom right now, you will attacked by purring, pawing, leg rubbing fur balls and heaven help you if you need to 'sit down'. Might as well count on having a warm, fuzzy lap! Both cats are acting like they are absolutely starved for attention! Even the tuxedo, which is the part that makes me wonder. She's normally a little bit skittish and she normally makes YOU approach HER. Is it because of the surgery? Here's to hoping it stays this way, though, I love the attention myself.
Second- My landlord is very against having animals in the house. When can I put them back outside? I'm nervous about that, partly because I worry about infection and because the calico would NOT stop pulling at her stitches when we first brought them home. She seems to be content to ignore them now, though. If I catch her doing it again, I'll ask about getting her a cone.
Lastly, the males. I hate the idea of having someone 'get rid of them' so that's not an option for me, but I would love to not get woke up in the middle of the night by a yowling cat fight under my house anymore! Also, even though we keep food out, I've caught them in our trash, which is disgusting to me! (I know that's what they do to get by, but I have a diapered toddler...need I say more?) Are there 'nice' ways to make them find somewhere else to roam around?
