Here Kitty, Kitty, Kitty!

I love cats – I must, I have five of them currently living with me. To be fair I love dogs too, and have two big ones, a (neutered) male blue-eyed Siberian Husky named Duncan and a (also neutered) male Chocolate Lab named Ranger. OK, they will get their pictures here too:

But this post is primarily about cats. We had six cats at one point but the sad attrition of old age has thinned the ranks over the last couple of years.

We lost Spooky and Katy within weeks of one another back in 2007. They were both strays who made their way to our house and came to stay.

Below is Barney, the most recent cat to have gone over the Rainbow Bridge. We lost him back in April.

Barney was a shelter rescue. He spent a lot of time with my #1 son Jason, sitting in his lap whenever he was at his computer, and sleeping in his room. He was a big guy, a loving companion, and had a heart-tugging way of hugging you with his front legs while tucking his head under your chin. He did have an ongoing weight problem, and would eat until he upchucked some days, if we weren’t careful to remove all food quickly. We had to really police his eating to control his weight to remain under 16 lbs, and he would try and snitch things off the table or counter – even licking the butter dish (yuck). He had been found as a stray and being declawed, I think he must have had a hard time surviving on his own, and never forgot the feeling of going hungry. Someone loved him very much as one point, because he was also neutered and had a very sociable attitude toward people. Barney was also a big talker, so I suspect there was some Siamese in his background.

We had to have dear old Barney put down earlier this year, when a heart condition sent him into a downward spiral that he was just not going to recover from. We guess he was about 6 when we took him in, so he was approximately 12 when he died. We do miss him terribly, he was one of the most loveable and cuddly cats I have ever shared my home with. He was #1 son Jason’s special buddy but we all cried buckets of tears that day.

Most of my cats have always been strays or rescues like Barney, so I am always on the lookout for those needing a good home. All of my cats have been altered too, either coming to me that way like Barney, who was also front declawed (something I would NEVER do) or they get spayed or neutered as soon as I can afford to do it. Besides not adding to the sadly unwanted and all-too-burgeoning feral animal population, an altered cat stays home and roams less, and is less likely to spray or get into fights and get hurt. But until the latest furballs joined us, we were down to just three rescued male cats.

Max was a young but fully-grown rescue from the same shelter as Barney back in 2002, where he had been left with his sister, who got adopted first. We actually got Max a couple of days before we got Barney. He is about 8 years old now. I had seen him on the local cable access program as up for adoption in September and was surprised that he was still there in November when we brought him home. We met Barney the same day and fell in love with him too, so Jason and I went back a couple days later and adopted him. They were buddies over the years. Max is currently top cat here, and spends his days hunting chipmunks and field mice and his nights curled up somewhere warm and dry. He has a mostly sunny disposition and he will sit up on his hindquarters to pat his paws together in a pleasing gesture when he wants something.

Shadow was a rescue too; we got him back in 2004 when he was roughly 4 years old. He had lived for a while in a small apartment over a closed general store in the next town. It was there he was abandoned for 2 weeks in June with 29 other cats when the tenants skipped out on their rent. The place was a nightmare mess, but the landlord was very accommodating and worked with the animal control officer to find these unfed, dirty, sick and mostly half-feral kitties new homes. When #2 son Brian and I went to get Shadow, he had just been vet checked and neutered, and other than being groggy, he seemed relatively OK. He does have lovely shining black fur and beautiful markings. He turned out to be very paranoid about human contact and mostly hid on us, bolting away if you so much as made eye contact, and still seems rather frightened of men. I suspect he was abused at some point, poor baby. He will now tolerate some handling and occasionally sits with my mother, and purrs when I pet him, but it has taken us years to rebuild even that much confidence in people. He loves other cats though, and he and Barney used to snuggle often. We figure he is approaching 10. Shadow mostly stays indoors, though he will ask to be let outside on the nice, warm days. He doesn’t leave the back yard and is too scared of other creatures to think of hunting, though he once caught a moth and looked very surprised when he did.

This is Oreo, with his 'paws of death' (he is front polydactyl, AKA double-pawed). He is also a rescue, and we had him neutered. Oreo is from an aunt of Stacey, who is #2 son Brian’s girlfriend. Stacey’s aunt takes in pregnant female cats from the local rescue group Kitty Harbor (http://www.kittyharbor.org/) and they are allowed to give birth and raise their kittens to an adoptable age. Moms and kittens are vetted and the mommies get spayed and everyone eventually finds a good home.


Oreo came to us back in 2006 as a kitten and he has the most endearing personality you could imagine. Of course with those big paws and his rather assertive personality, he has to challenge Max now and then for supremacy. Even as a kitten he had the most ferocious deep-throated growl and the adult cats would back off and leave him be, but he is a real sweetie with people. Stacey can hold him upside down and sound asleep in her arms for hours. Oreo also spends most of his time out stalking things and we have found he is murder on frogs and birds, which I try to discourage.

If you follow our other blog which is Companion Dragon Tales, (http://magicdragonverse.blogspot.com/) Oreo appears as Oliver the cat, who is all black, to distinguish him from Shadow, who remains black and white in the stories. We changed the name and coloring slightly for copyright and clarity reasons, but the personality is about the same.

Jason misses Barney very much. The month we had to put Barney down, Stacey’s aunt had a couple new litters of kittens born, one or two of which were reported to be gray and white. Jason did say he wanted another cat of his own, so he was interested, but they had to become of an adoptable age first, so there were some months in between. But last month, not one but two new male kittens came to live with us!

Merlin was not the kitten Jason went to look at, the gray and white male was supposedly already adopted. But Merlin has so much of that loving personality that Barney had that Jason chose him anyway. He will even hug your neck like Barney did, or nuzzle Jason’s beard, and he spends a lot of time sleeping in Jason’s room, companionably nearby. Merlin is quiet and gently playful, though he has no problem bossing around his little sidekick whenever someone needs to be put in their place. I love those markings, and with his bright green-gold eyes, he will be striking as an adult. He was born April 5th, and so is almost 5 months old, and will be neutered soon. Merlin made himself at home from the beginning and he will someday be boss cat here. He exudes a quiet dignity in all he does.

Mischief is the kitten Jason was supposed to go look at, but another family had said they wanted him, so he was initially unavailable. They changed their minds and so he came back a couple days later. Jason went and visited with him, and decided he wanted Mischief too, and we all agreed that would be OK. Mischief was born on April 15th and so is not from the same litter as Merlin, but they have grown up playing together, which makes their adjustment here a lot easier for both. Mischief will be neutered soon too; we will likely take him in with Merlin and get a twofer… He is somewhat smaller than Merlin and a real little rascal too. Mischief is excitable and lives up to his name in getting into just about anything and everything. He never walks anywhere, he runs at full gallop, always in motion until he falls asleep. He is a love bug too; and he gives lots of spontaneous kisses, when he can sit still long enough to spend some time with you. He hasn’t chosen one person as his ‘own’ but is rather free with his fleeting moments of affection. This is one of those cats that will wake you up just to say I love you for the fifteenth time, but he is a cutie so no one minds. Mischief will not be as big as Merlin, but he makes up for that in bravado and sheer audacity. He has the most ‘cattitude’ I have ever seen in a kitten. Thanks to Roger’s mom for that apt description of the feline philosophy of “I meant to do that,” while walking away from disaster with head and tail held high

The adult cats here have had a bit of an adjustment to their new little companions. Max is still the biggest holdout and he hisses like a snake whenever one of them gets too close, which they keep trying to do. Max prefers to sleep outdoors right now, or in some (hopefully) inaccessible spot if the weather is inclement. Oreo just eats and runs, or on rainy days will squat somewhere safe and watch the kittens with wary eyes and maybe just a tinge of envy. Shadow hid for a couple of weeks in my mother’s closet, but now is out of the closet (no pun intended) most of the day. Always an opportunist, Shadow is taking advantage of the kitten’s cuteness factor and joining them in begging for scraps at the table or refrigerator. But every morning now we have the race after breakfast when the two kittens gallop up and down the stairs and the long second floor hallway, which is great for skidding stops and wall bouncing tin foil balls. They do keep us entertained!

Please, if you can, help us all cut down on the unwanted pet population. Get your pets altered, so that they don’t produce any unwanted progeny. And if you want a new pet, consider a rescue or shelter animal. You will be saving two lives that way; the life of the animal you adopt, and the life of the animal who will replace it at the shelter. I have the living proof here, that with some TLC and patience; even an older animal can make a great companion. I love all my fur kids, no matter where they came from, and have never regretted taking one in, no matter how fleeting our time together has been.