Have a visitor

She's been causing problems with my dogs for a few weeks.  They keep treeing her and escaped the yard once to chase her.  We decided she probably wasn't a neighbor cat and put food on the porch in hopes of catching her.  She only seems to come to our porch when there is bad weather so for a few days we didn't see her.  Then she showed up today in the rain and tucked herself on the porch where we couldn't reach her.  We got her into a loaner trap but when I got her to our cat room I decided she just wasn't acting that wild to confine her all night and let her out in the small room.  Once she realized we do not eat cats she was desperate for petting.  She has been inhaling food.  It's a tough decisions between food and petting.  The place that loaned us the trap will check her microchip tomorrow and if no owner will spay if needed and do vaccines for $20.  Then we have to decide what we are doing with her if no one comes forward looking for her.

Sometimes its worth having the dogs peace disturbed.

Im sure they will get soon pals, when the dogs realize she does now belong to the house, she is an integrated part of the family pack.  And she will get used to them too.

Tx for helping this girl!

Oh sweet baby! If she doesn't come up with a chip, you can consider keeping her, if you think the dogs will get used to her.

If not, I hope you can find a good indoor home for her. It appears that she was someone's pet at some point.

Thank you for rescuing her!

She's beautiful! I've noticed the pregnant girls get desperate for attention (hormones?) hopefully this isn't the case though. If she's already allowing you to pet her she's definitely adoptable so I guess the real question is, do you want to expand your family? haha

Thank you for giving this lovely girl the second chance she deserves. 

No chip and no reports to animal control or the shelter looking for her.  No response to the online lost groups.  She's living in my upstairs.  I took 2 of the dogs up there and it wasn't really a problem while she was in the cat room with cat trees and shelves but she doesn't want to be on the same level with them.  There's no way to get from the bottom of the stairs to other rooms where we usually are without going on the floor for a few feet and the young husky always comes to sniff her.  She wouldn't harm her but excited huskies don't have good personal boundaries.  We play with the kittens every night when putting them up in the cat room until morning.  At first she was only interested in petting the whole time but lately she's given some half hearted attempts to attack the toys too.  My husband is fine with keeping her if she can adjust to the dogs indoors.  The dogs mostly ignore cats in the house.  The husky is the only problem since she's so young and wants to investigate everything and bounce around when cats get to running and playing.

She's beautiful! Agreed -big hugs for being so kind!!!

Agreed on the husky comment -so well put! I don't think many sled dog puppies have good "personal boundaries" when excited --especially with kitties

It sounds like you already have at least one other kitty already? (I noticed you said "kitties"-although could have been an autocorrect thing). If so - you've already got a good idea if your dogs will be eventually be ok with her.

Regardless - she's (smartly) behaving like most kitties (especially ones who've been outside and already as an unfriendly dog encounter or two!)--she knows if she stays "high" the dogs can't get her. Chances are-given time-the dogs (if the only real issue is curiousuty vs aggression) will eventually lose such intense interest in this new "exciting new thing. " And she'll figure out they're not a real threat (as long as they aren't). In the meantime (& it may take some time)--if you can, do something like position things like chairs/cat trees/shelves/etc to give her a way to manipulate from area to area on a higher plane than the dogs. Giving her options "up and away" will probably increase her confidence in how to get around the dogs if need be. The Jackson Galaxy book "Catification" actually has some very attractive suggestions for offering cats options to explore on levels.

If she's playing already -she's already a lot more comfortable. Which -given the fact that she started out just days ago - pretty terrified--is amazingly quick progress!!!

Hopefully this will end up working out for all of you ---since it sounds like she's already "chosen you."

Keep us posted!

What a beautiful little Calico!  Seems pretty smart, too.

She pretty much immediately calmed down once inside.  My husband saw her crash around the porch and run past him the first time so he was quite surprised.  There was just a couple minutes of tension and then "pet me, pet me, pet me".  

The problem with getting her into the rest of the house is the bottom of our stairs end in a narrow little area that connects all the downstairs rooms.  Nothing can be put there and still walk through.  In about 5' any direction there is a doorway and a safe spot right inside it but there is no way to get there except on the floor.  Since she doesn't know where the safe spots are she won't cross the tight area of nothing.  I might see if I can get her to a cat tree to sit and then carry her back to the stairs after a short while.  That way she learns about one of the rooms, sees the dogs doing nothing, and then is safe again.  I would so love to open that area up but we just don't see a way.  I thought about checking if the wall could just be cut down into a half height so at least it seems more open and there would then be a ledge leading straight out of there.  More "counter" area for us and easier for cats to move through the house.  My husband wasn't impressed with the idea though.

Kaliska said:

 
She pretty much immediately calmed down once inside.  My husband saw her crash around the porch and run past him the first time so he was quite surprised.  There was just a couple minutes of tension and then "pet me, pet me, pet me".  

The problem with getting her into the rest of the house is the bottom of our stairs end in a narrow little area that connects all the downstairs rooms.  Nothing can be put there and still walk through.  In about 5' any direction there is a doorway and a safe spot right inside it but there is no way to get there except on the floor.  Since she doesn't know where the safe spots are she won't cross the tight area of nothing.  I might see if I can get her to a cat tree to sit and then carry her back to the stairs after a short while.  That way she learns about one of the rooms, sees the dogs doing nothing, and then is safe again.  I would so love to open that area up but we just don't see a way.  I thought about checking if the wall could just be cut down into a half height so at least it seems more open and there would then be a ledge leading straight out of there.  More "counter" area for us and easier for cats to move through the house.  My husband wasn't impressed with the idea though.

Click to expand...

Could you rig up some sort of shelf / cat walk a little up?  It doesnt not need to be antything fancy, may be even quite crude, "homemade".

Ogtherwisse your plan sounds good.   Carrying her over has the advantage the dogs gets it extra strong  she is under your protection and part of the pack, a big no no to bother nor attack.