Frosty The Kitty

Midnight, the stray that has taken up residency at my house, was covered in frost this morning! I have numerous places for the outside cats to take shelter (barn, two sheds, two unoccupied dog houses, covered two level deck complete with cat boxes and loads of hay, etc) and bed down but he prefers not to leave the front porch. He just sits on the rail or curls up on the door mat. I even put a couple of baskets full of hay under the patio table when I covered it over for winter for him to get in as a last resort, but he won't have none of it.

He has longish fur and is rather wooly but I am still worried that he'll get sick this winter. He can't come in the house as he and my house kitties fight every time they get in "his territory" aka the front yard or front porch.

What is one to do with an obstinate kitty?

maybe hes just used to it and prefers to fend for himself. lol stubborn little kitty!!

Can you replace the doormat with a heated pet mat at night?

What is a heated pet mat? Can you leave it outside?

Midnight is definitely obstinate and independent. He acts a lot like a dog. He'll follow you around anywhere in the front yard. He demands (and I mean demands with claws) to be petted and paid attention to, but he will not allow you to pick him up.

He refuses to be sociable with the other cats. He will let Stormy eat with him and Angel and Leia can occassionally pass through his territory unscathed, but no one else. Milo regularly gets a beating for coming to beg for food. Kit Kat has completely quit coming to the front of the house. Peter and Midnight will sit a the front door and hiss and growl and claw at one another through the door! Snow gets chased whenever he wanders to close. And the other neighborhood strays and Midnight regularly have battles over the food dishes. He even swats Sassy when she comes out on her leash to do her business. Of course, he is bigger than her.

I think that he is just a bully. But he is a cute, endearing sort of bully.

Is he neutered? That might contribute to his bullying.

They have heated beds that don't need to be plugged in. They are mats that traps the animals body heat and can get quite warm. I can't remember the brand name though..

No, I don't think that he is neutered, but since he is stray I'm not sure.

However, he is going to the vet for a snip job as soon as I have the money, mine or not. I just don't have the money to fix him or the other two strays that showed up recently and the local vet doesn't do payment plans. I called the Humane Society but they are strapped for funds right now because they are doing a TNR program for a local farmer that has over 50 cats running loose on his farm!

Listen, I know from experience that cats seem to have an underground information system about soft touches, but 50?! I have somewhere in the neighborhood of 10 cats at the moment and only two were ones that I brought home! The rest just showed up and multiplied and stayed and I don't have the heart to send them to their death at the HS. Most are not adoptable (crazy/feral). I am having them all fixed as I have the money but right now I just don't have it. My adopted inside kitties have priority and one has been sick and had to go to the vet twice.

That said, I still hate to see anything happen to those that come to me seeking refuge. I do what I can by providing food and shelter and a trip to the vet when I can. But I still don't know where all these cats are coming from unless someone is dumping them.

By the way, Midnight is a tail-less kitty and these two new squatters have stubbed tails. Does anyone think that they may be related or have come from the same place? No one around here has cats like these.

Most likely they are related. My coworker does a rescue on dairy farms that have 50-100 cats a piece. they are all feral. She captures them, fixes them, then rereleases them. Otherwise cats can multiple very quickly (cats can become pregnant very soon after a birth of a litter). But anyway, what I was getting at, was she picked up a bunch of cats that all had an extra thumb, this is a strange condition so its a genetic abnormality that has sprung up at this location.

I suspected as much. I have had cats for years and in this area I have never seen a tail-less or stub tailed cat before.

Midnight is different duck. But I have grown rather fond of him. Even though he bites my ankles occassionally.

Wow, gotta give you props for doing all this! We have a stray calico girl at home who's just had two litters... the mother is REALLY mean and my parents have been attempting to humanely capture them and get them to no-kill shelters but so far they only managed to get the runt of the first litter (who was apparently the SWEETEST little girl and if I had been at home, I would have had a sister for Ollie)... my parents as well as the rest of the neighbors have been calling animal control, but they rarely respond, let alone do anything... now, if my parents lived in the country it wouldnt be such a big deal (also, my mom is allergic and they lay on our porch furniture), but we're right outside of Philly in South Jersey so it's no place for kitties to be running... I wish there was more we could do - bless you for doing all you've done for these stray babies!

... I am just serving God's creatures as he brings them to me. I don't buy pets anymore. There are too many out there that have no home and no one to love or care for them.

I used to fancy purebred, pedigreed animals, but I grew up with mongrels and they are every bit as as intelligent and worthy of love and care. We can only dream of a day when every litter born is anticipated and wanted but right now, why breed animals when they are so many in need?

I can testify to this because I have had seven strays show up at my house in the past 3 years. One of those is a female that I have never been able to trap and she has had two litters that I have had to find homes for.

Well, o.k. I have kept half of them! But I had them fixed.

We just fix the world one kitty at a time.

BTW - Your Ollie is too cute! Looks a lot like Peter.

god bless you for ur kindness to these strays!

This goes back to an earlier issue, the one about safe heating sources. My mom uses something called a "Snuggle Safe" heat disc. They are about the size of a lunch plate and 1 1/2 to 2 inches thick. I think they are filled with some sort of parafin (sp?) substance. If they are heated in the microwave for several miniutes (I can't spell today!) they will stay fairly warm for a few hours. They are very hot at first so they should be wrapped in a blanket. I think they were first made to go into pet beds. BTW I use one in MY bed in place of a waterbottle...warmer and no worries about waking up with wet feet!