This morning, I grabbed Cooper and threw the recycled bottles in the truck and headed to town to turn them in for kitty kash! 🙂 On the way to town, Cooper was staring out the window and he alerted to something. I thought it might be deer, so I slowed down. It was a kitty! A beautiful, young tortie in the weeds so near the highway, I was afraid for her. I had no carrier in the truck as it was full of bottles, so I whipped a U-turn and hustled back home, threw food and carrier in the truck and off we went again. I was praying the entire time she was still okay, approachable and safe. As I got to where I had last seen her, I noticed a car had pulled over and there were a couple out peering through the weeds. I parked next to them and asked them if she had been hit? They said no- she was in their car but she didn’t want to seem to leave and her nipples looked funny.
We searched a good 45 minutes for babies, but it was like looking for a needle in the haystack. I finally told them that I would just take her and see if she has babies. We put her into the carrier and I drove home.
She is uber-friendly although she has the typical tortie attitude, I am calling her Addie. I checked her belly, and yes she has had kittens recently, but she is almost out of milk and there are no noticeable wear marks around the teats. I took her back to the place where I found her and said a prayer and let her out of the truck but she just laid in the weeds and purred. I think she was dumped and they kept the kittens. That is what she reminds me of- she shows none of the typical signs or motherhood, when I brought her home and put her in the deck enclosure, she didn’t scream and cry or pace and try to get out of Dodge. I’ve had this situation plenty of times before and the ones who are actively nursing will fight tooth and nail to get back outside, back to their babies. She just wants to lay on the floor and purr.
With the fourth coming up, the asshole who is killing cats and the hot weather- at least she is safe and sound and won’t come to harm.
Yes, even if Addie had her kittens in the wild, they are clearly old enough to take care of themselves. But you’re undoubtedly right about the mum beind abandoned. It shows that those who love kittens aren’t necessarily cat-lovers, too.
I took her back this morning and repeated the experiment. Again, she laid in the bushes and looked at me like “Gee, this is a pretty spot!” She had been crying non-stop most of the night, so I put her back in the carrier and walked a little bit through the undergrowth hoping she would cry out to her babies. She didn’t even cry once. So I set the carrier down and stepped back to see if she would cry out to them- nothing silence…:(
I put her back in the truck and she cried all the way home.