Misty had recently vanished for a week. When she returned, she looked so haggard and thin. I could see she was fighting an URI. I could also tell that she was extremely dehydrated as her third eye was almost covering her eyes. What do you do when you have a feral cat who absolutely wants nothing to do with humans? I do have to wonder what she went through before she arrived here. But now it was not time to dwell on thoughts.  I had to put a plan in place and activate it.

I went over to the feed store and bought several feeder mice that were already deceased.  Using a large syringe I pumped so much fluid into these mice they looked like balloons. I also for good measure added some liquid antibiotics. In her heyday, Misty was a great hunter. She would always bring trophies up to the house and drop them on the steps. She would make quick work of them so we generally only got the leftovers. She would stand some distance away looking quite proud of herself when I would come out of the house and scream when I saw her treasures. LOL

I am happy to report after she has had a week of these manipulated mice. She is doing much better. Her breathing is no longer ragged. Her third eye vanished in just a few days.  She also is now drinking on her own and eating a lot better.

I have no idea how old this cat is  when she arrived here I had my horses and that was years ago. The vet put her at about three years old at that time, so she has to be at least 20? I think for her it’s going to be a matter of just coming out one day and finding that she is deceased  Even looking so haggard and thin as she was I didn’t think she’d have energy to move away from me and I was wrong.

Thankfully,  I have only had a few feral cats that have behaved in this manner. I would say though looking back at how they were towards the end of their lives, she is the toughest to deal with. But at least I have found a way to give her fluids and medicine without her being wise to it.

I knew in deploying this method that there would be a possibility another kitty would take her treasure from her. But I also knew that when she did have her prey in her possession she would vanish under the house or wherever she could find a place to get away and she would make short work of the mouse or the frog or whatever she decided to catch. She even brought me a garter snake one year.  So I took that chance that she still had that strong prey drive despite her depleted state

What will happen next is completely up to God. I can only make use of the tools that I have learned over the years and living and loving these wonderful, totally misunderstood creatures.

I know it’s early. But I’ve seen Christmas trees on top of cars already. I just wanted to wish all of you a Merry Christmas,Happy Hanukkah or however you celebrate the season. May we all wake up in 2022 to a kinder world  God Bless Us, One and All-

Winter has arrived earlier than predicted this year. Temps in the lower 30’s this morning. We opened our last cans of wet food  yesterday. If anyone happens to be in the Christmas spirit a bit early  and can find it in their hearts (and wallets) to send us Friskies Shreds, we would appreciate it more than you know.

We have been adopting out to barns and homes, several of our cats over the past few months, our sanctuaries are now down to 14 cats. No one else here can leave as they are either to feral or have issues no one else would like to tackle.

Some folks have a misconception about adopting out barn cats. They seem to believe that all we have to do is capture up the selected cat and drop her at the barn. She will be fine running free and eating mice. The reality is, the cat has to be able to be caged up to 6-8 weeks inside the new barn. You have to feed, water and clean litter pans on a daily basis. Some folks don’t want to put in the work, and some cats would come unglued inside a cage and try to attack anyone helping them. Once they are released, you still have to feed them daily and deworm them every 6 months, most farmers don’t want to bother.

Misty is hanging in there, she has gained some more weight but not enough to get her through the winter on her own. I have filled the last half of Mike’s shop with straw for her and Crazy Eyes and Goblin and Twist to sleep warmly. Temps are supposed to drop into the low 20’s in a few days…

Going to be skipping the Holidays this year. I am just drained on all levels. My primary focus right now are my animals. Kota goes to see the specialist on Jan. 4th. He is still losing so much hair still and his appetite is so low . 🙁 I hope they can figure this out. It is quite worrisome.

Approaching the 3 year mark, the time when Mike left us. This year, I see that my path to grief has now included the healing process. I welcome this new path with open arms.

Goblin has been appearing on a regular basis every morning and evening right before feeding. The other day, I knelt down on the ground and opened up a can of food. I gently clicked to him, which is the sound I make with my tongue against the roof of my mouth when I’m feeding. He slowly came to me and allowed me one brief pet. Then he backed away into the bushes. Unlike Twist, Goblin did not try to swat  me or make me pay for this intrusion.

I know that someone either owns him or has owned him. He shows every tendency of wanting to trust but being afraid to take that chance and get hurt again. But he absolutely has no feral tendencies at all. I did notice this morning that Misty was up on my neighbors fence two houses away which is not like her at all. I had to wonder if goblin had something to do with the distance. So I went ahead and set up my trail cam near the feeding platform to see if I could figure out why this new behavior of Misty is showing up.

For the first time in five years, Little Creek at the back of our property is now flowing. It’s not flowing very quickly, the water is not stagnant but there isn’t a lot of it yet. But we have 15 days of predicted rainfall. My hope is the creek will fill and start to travel bringing back the fish the frogs the salamanders and all the other life that used to hang around in the waters. I really miss the beavers. They have abandoned their dam years earlier. If the water does come back full force I’m hoping they will rebuild their home and take up residency again.

I am learning to be self-sufficient once again when it comes to things going wrong here that need fixing. I am relying heavily on YouTube for problem-solving. I feel a great deal of satisfaction (although some might think it odd) my gutters needed cleaning so badly and I have successfully managed to clean out all of my gutters and it is amazing to me because I suffer from such a fear of heights. I did it as safely as I could. Thankfully staying off of the tall extension ladder and I am happy to say that all my gutters are cleared out just in time for the next downpour

Kota is doing a bit better  he seems to be having more energy and is getting interested in life again. I am supposed to be giving him a bath every week, but I realized three weeks into this process with yet another new shampoo that this was exacerbating his problem of losing hair. So I have stopped the weekly shampoos

Instead I lean on him to tell me when he is uncomfortable and needing ointment put on his belly and legs  If I see him sleeping on his back with his legs straight up in the air, that is my clue to grab the Nystatin and rub him down. Another signal is he gets these really bad blister-type sores under his legs  The ointment will cure the problem but the problem will reoccur  when I see him laying on his side and wrapping his one leg around the other to keep it off the ground, that’s when I grab more ointment and apply it.

December 21 is when we go to the specialist. It was the earliest appointment they had.

I am still missing my husband, but my path in grief is now in healing. There are no more gut-wrenching sobbing moments where I lose control and can’t stop myself from crying. (Can’t say I’m sad to see that part of it disappearing). It has been replaced with a realization that what happened to him was the best thing that could possibly happen because of the amount of pain he was in towards the end.

My oldest stepson called the other day and we talked for quite a while which is unusual because David does not like to talk on the phone. Because this is the time of year when it was all coming down on top of everybody. He just wanted to talk about his dad. I found myself sharing with him the final moments with Michael. As I told him what took place, I told him he didn’t need to share it with his brothers or his sister but I just wanted someone to know how Michael spent his final hours  Dave is the family historian and I didn’t want something to happen to me without letting Dave know how peaceful Michael’s final day was for him. I believe I was able to give Dave a smidgen of peace and I hope it brought us closer together in the sharing.

well I hear the thunder starting. I need to get off my couch and go feed the cats and turn on cat beds so they will be warm and toasty tonight. I ran an extension cord out from the house to the barn and plugged in several cat beds and weather is supposed to dip down into the 30s in the next few nights. Not exactly sure what that’s going to do with my electric bill  Time will tell. Right now I am feeding on the dry food because that’s all I have. But my cats are not suffering and we’re not even into winter yet although it feels like we are.

Love to all who drop by to read this blog. Stay safe, love each other fiercely and hug those furry ones who desperately need you