On March 9th, Morgan aka “Brother” arrived with the other of Karen’s cats. Told at the time that the all black cat was a male and “untouchable.” I put him in with four of her other cats in the stall enclosure. He scrambled out of the trap and onto the rafters and stayed up there for weeks. I was worried about him, his eyes looked wonky (for want of another word) I finally gained his trust enough to corner and capture him and take him to the vet.
Turned out “Brother” was a female so we named her Morgan. It was suspected she had an impacted scent gland behind her eyes which was causing her strange appearance. We put her on meds and I took her home and deposited her into my introduction cage so I could medicate her easily. I have been working with her slowly since and have discovered she loves butt rubs and gentle ear massages. This morning, I let her out to join general population.
Here she was when she first arrived:
And here she is this morning, on top of the Intro cage. She is still on her guard but my hope is now that she can move around with the others, she will gradually learn that no one here will harm her and we can continue to work on her socialization
oh my goodness, she is beautiful. you can sure see the difference in her eyes. I wish I lived closer to you so I could come and play with them. I could hold them a and squeeze them and love them and call them all George. lol
How on earth did she mistake an adult female from an adult male? On the other hand, if she just shoved them into containers and kept them there, maybe she never got a good look at that end of things…
Loads of applause for your work with these animals and best wishes for your continued success.
This morning, Morgan was in the Intro cage (I had left the door opened) I got my first headbump from her when I was feeding her and it was hard! Then she rolled over on her back and invited a belly rub! No biting or scratching as she enjoyed a gentle scritch in the early morning hour. The other cats are ignoring her. They are used to the revolving door of cats our home sometimes represents.
It’s funny how fast some of those ‘wild’ cats can turn around once they know they can trust a human. And her eyes look much better.