Friday, February 19, 2010

Jaxx is Back!!

In the past few storm posts, I mentioned I was looking out and worrying about a couple of feral cats. Well, one was poor Pyewacket that had to be put down last week. The other was Jaxx. Around the first of December, my neighbor sent out an email to be on the lookout for a brown and black ear tipped cat that escaped from her carrier. Her name was Jaxx and had been ear tipped, spayed and given her shots. My neighbor and others felt she was a stray that started hanging out with a feral group and they decided to try to keep her inside and see if she would tame up a bit, when she got loose from her carrier.

Well, I kept my eye out but never saw her until the night before I was going away to Orlando for a board meeting in mid-January. I had brought all the cats inside and was keeping them inside for the 2 days I was going to be away so I wasn't replenishing the food on the front porch. Around 10:00 pm I heard a commotion on the front porch and saw a brown and black cat fussing with a raccoon over about four measly pieces of kibble that were left in the bowl. I chased away the raccoon and the cat ran off too but immediately came back and was crying at the bottom of my porch stairs. I put out a can of food and I never saw a cat wolf down food so fast. I then put out another, then another, and then another! She wolfed down four cans of food!! I was afraid she was going to throw them right up again! I called my neighbor and said to keep an eye out for her and relunctantly had to leave for the airport early the next morning.

I started seeing her regularly in my back yard. She was hanging around my shed and I would see her crawl under it. We still had snow from our past storms and very cold weather so I could not try and trap her until the weather got better. Well, it never did. I was feeding and seeing her regularly until the first big storm hit on February 5th. After that I never saw her. I waded through snow every evening and put down dry kibble next to the shed. I always saw cat tracks, but it could have been any number of cats in the neighborhood.

Since going back to work on Tuesday, I decided the snow had gone down enough and paths had been forged so that if she was still around she could make it to where I usually fed her, next to my back porch. So I opened the window and called her and put out a can of wet food. I called and called but she never came. Wednesday morning the food was gone, but again, it could have been other cats, possums or raccoons. Wednesday night I went through the same routine. I called and called and lo and behold up popped a little ear tipped head! She was crying and hopping through the snow to get to where I had the food. Oh it was great to see her. She didn't wolf down the food so I know she was able to get to the kibble I was putting down for her. I talked about my day as she ate a few feet below me. In fact. I was just about to tell her what I was planning on eating for dinner when she turned and gave a big stretch and sauntered back to the shed. "Oh, okay", I said, "see you tomorrow." Isn't that just like a cat?

6 comments:

Lynne at Hasty Brook said...

What does ear tipped mean?
Glad she showed up and that she weathered the storms.

possumlady said...

Hi Lynne, Ear tipping is what the TNR (trap, neuter, and release) folks do to feral cats (well, actually it is the vets that do it). When they trap cats to get then neutered and to get shots, the vet then cuts off the top portion of one of their ears so that they can be easily identified as having already been neutered.

My little Oliver is an ear tipped stray. He must have been hanging around a feral colony when he got trapped. He is now a very happy indoor kitty!

Hopefully the same thing will happen with Jaxx when I try and trap her after the weather starts warming up! Luckily she already has someone who is willing to take her in. Certainly, not me!!

KGMom said...

Oh, yes--stretching, the very picture of non-chalance.
What were you saying?
YAWN.

Glad you have reconnected with Jaxx.

Elin said...

Thanks for sharing the information about ear tipping :)

Glad Jaxx is back !~

Chrissykat said...

What a lucky kitty to have people who actually care about her. I hope she's able to be trapped again and try the life of a pampered INDOOR kitty! Good luck with sweet Jaxx.

Charlemagne and Tamar said...

We're glad to hear that Jaxx is back and doing okay. Can't imagine why she wants to stay out in the stormy cold weather - we'd be heading straight for the door to come in.

Charlemagne and Tamar