T(iberius) N(eptune) R(ex)

TNR is short for "trap, neuter, release" which is a program for dealing with feral cats.  The concept is that a cat will defend its territory and keep other cats from moving in, and a neutered cat won't create more cats.

I'd like to think that this really works.  But several of my cats (Nazgul, Apache, and Wilhelm) spend most of their days outside, and the yard is their territory, but that didn't prevent Hamish from moving in last year.  So now I have Nazgul, Apache, Wilhelm, and Hamish patrolling *their* territory, and that ought to be enough.

In theory.

Shortly after The Storm, Wilhelm (the tuxedo cat) started acting a little freaked out.  He'd be out in the yard, see me, and dash for cover under a bush.  I figured he'd settle down after a bit.  After all, The Storm had been pretty horrendous, and now all of the yard looked different, and there were three strange cats in the house.  One day I saw him run under the deck, and got down on my hands and knees to peer under it with a "hey, little guy.  What's the problem?"   Picture me kneeling there, head sideways, right eye peeking under the porch.  The left eye can see on top of the porch, where I see Wilhelm sitting with that "Whatcha doin'" look on his face.

Hmmmm.  I switch back to my right eye.  There's still a tuxedo cat under the deck.

No. Way.  No. Freakin' Way.   There is no way I'm adopting another cat.

Of course the first step to adopting is to stick a name on a critter, so we didn't.  But we did tag him with his destination:  TNR: Trap.  Neuter.  Release.

The trap part was easy.  Sit down and wait for him to jump into my lap.  Neuter, equally easy.  Take him to the vet in the morning, bring him home,. slightly altered, in the afternoon.  It's the release part we're having trouble with.  He didn't get the concept of "be free, little cat."   He just moved onto the front porch.

And yes, we could take him to the shelter.  But they're pretty full right now because The Storm left a lot of animals homeless, and they're taking them in from Bay county as well.  An adult male is rarely a top choice for adoption, even a healthy friendly one.  So he has living space here.

It's caused a bit of a problem trying to let my cats in and out because they don't want to go past him.  So in the evening he gets moved to the back screened in deck (with heated kitty cave) and back out the next morning after our guys go out. Yeah, nothing complicated there.  For times in between,  Wilhelm has come up with the "Kitty Uber."  If he wants in, he makes a fuss until I go outside with his carrier, whereupon he jumps in it and talks smack as he's carried past Tiberius.

Uh, yeah.  Tiberius.  Really couldn't have a cat with just initials.  We threw out a few names (including Trevor Nigel Rothchild) but ended up with Tiberius Neptune Rex.

Sigh.  At least (so far) we haven't let him into the house.  Have to stop somewhere.

The Year of the Cat(s)

2018 was a record year for cats.

Bob and I have always had cats.  To be honest, too many cats (if there is indeed such a thing).  To be precise--6 cats.  Somehow it always seemed to remain fairly stable at that number.  And we really tried to keep it there.  The line in the sand.  That which separates us from Crazy Cat People.   Somehow we thought if we ever broke the 6 cat rule, then the landslide would happen and Goddess knows how many cats we would end up with.

And then came little Wilhelm.  Found in a gutter during a deluge, maybe two weeks old, and we never did successfully find out who actually found him and how he got passed around until he landed in Bob's office.  But there's no way I could bottle raise a kitten and then give him up.

So.  Seven cats.  Now what?   We retired at the end of that year, and Bob confidently said that would probably solve the cat problem as we usually got them as campus rescues.  We clung to this belief, sort of ignoring the fact that of the seven cats, three were from campus, one was foisted off on us at our vet's, and the other three had simply shown up in the yard.  It was a convenient thing to forget.  It was 2014 and all was well.

Until February 2018.  So far, so good.  No cat "tipping point" had happened.  Then this handsome gentleman showed up.

It's not uncommon for a stray to occasionally show up in the yard.  The incumbent cats generally make them unwelcome, and we do variations of "shoo shoo."  This one had been spotted for a month or so, but ran off at the sight of us.  Until one fateful day when he ran off, turned at the protective edge of the wood, and meowed at me.  I just stood there going "Oh, crap."  Bob came over.  "What's wrong?"  "He meowed at me."  "Oh crap."

One thing non-cat people don't understand.  Cat don't generally meow.  It's a kitten thing--and sometimes the mother will meow at the kittens.   Cats meow at their people.

He had me at meow.    We had been claimed, without getting a vote in the matter (or the other cats, for that matter.  There's still some grumbling going on).  By the next day he rubbed our ankles and wanted his ears scratched  We made him a warm cat bed in the barn, but I looked out a couple of nights later (when it was due to be in the 20's) and he was sleeping on a plastic chair on the front porch.  So of course a warm bed and just possibly a dish of food happened.  I told him he wasn't our cat for about three weeks, then gave in and made it official (meaning he got his shots and neutered).

So--Hamish the Moggy.  Which translated from Northern English means "James the Cat" but it sounds so much better in a foreign language.

He's a mystery.  Totally sweet--the techs at the vet's were cooing over him.  Sociable.  Litter trained.  Obviously loved, obviously used to being indoors.   Foreclosure cat, maybe?

Eight cats.   But eight is OK, right?  No worse than seven.  We can stop anytime we like.

Until mid-October.  I might have already possible mentioned that there was a HUGE FRICKIN' HURRICANE on October 10.  A few days later I get a call from Della (Bob's sister, who lives in Mexico Beach, where that bastard of a hurricane came ashore).  Even under normal circumstances Della talks really fast.  These were not normal times and it was like listening to a vocal machine gun.  Early in the morning before I had my tea.  I sort of made out "do you want cats?"  and mumble something to the effect that I already have 8 cats.  Then awareness dawns and I realize she's talking about *her* cats.

I don't think of Della and Don as having cats, because when we go visit we are rather overwhelmed by dogs.  Three of them super active (a Jack Russel Terrier and two corgis) and one who simply takes up most of a room (the Newfie).  But she also has three cats, who had done what cats do when Della and Don were prepping to evacuate and disappeared.  Much as she hated it, she had to leave them to weather the storm.

But her house is one of the only ones to have survived ("survived" is being used loosely here; let's just say that most of it is still standing).  She and Don and the four dogs will be living in an RV in the front yard for a long time to come.  The cats need a home.

So three more are in the household.   And they are amazing.  I was expecting them to be totally freaked out.  First they have to be in a house that is being ripped apart inside, household goods flying out the windows.  Then they are dumped onto the back deck of a strange house (I opted to put them on the screened deck for a couple of weeks to have a place of their own to calm down).  They came out of their carries, looked around, thought it was pretty cool--tables to climb on, warm kitty caves, plenty of squirrels to watch, no yappy dogs).  Within two weeks they were in the house and settled down.  My cats hissed a bit, but simply got ignored.  So now the tribe includes:

Tula--about 14 years old, long haired tortoiseshell.  Bob loves torties--and it appears to be mutual.  She's not as grumpy as her picture looks.

Red Bug (which Bob insists is R-e-d-d- B-u-g-g ReddBugg as in "RagMop.")  Actually he's gone through the Durham Ellis Island, because Don found him as a kitten in some pine straw and named him Chigger which I think is a horrible name for a cat.  Della gave us RedBug as an alternative, and it works because he's a ginger.  About 6 years old and hard to get him to hold still for a picture.

And finally the little heartbreaker Stumbles.  She was born with cerebellar hypoplasia, which is a fancy way of saying she's not wired quite right.  She has balance issues and falls over easily (but it gives her a quite cute prancing walk).  She was a rescue when a meth lab got raided, and at one point had been set of fire--she's got cute little round ears because they had to be trimmed.   And, like the others, she had to  ride out a hurricane and then get dumped in a strange household.  If any animal deserves to be skittish and shy, it's her.  Quite the opposite--she's a confident little cat, very friendly and playful.

Of course, we're just babysitting these guys--but probably for at least a year.  And we've already gotten attached so Della and Don might not get them back . . . 

But it is a little crazy sometimes.

Breakfast in the Durham kitchen

And, as the saying goes--but wait, there's more.  To be continued . . . .

2019!

Well, it's here.  Another year.

Off to a bit of a rocky start.  I forgot to start cooking the beans (for the traditional beans & greens) early enough so we ended up having eggs & grits for our New Year's supper.  Not exactly traditional, but good, and besides I still have a cold so really can't taste much anyway.

I also have a tradition that what you do on New Year's day will indicate what you will be doing in the coming year.  I had wanted to take the kayaks out--it actually didn't rain today (although it was a bit warm--I mean--I'm wearing  tank top and shorts on New Year's day and that's just wrong).  But see reference above to having a cold.

I did do some small symbolic acts.  A wee bit of housekeeping.   Knit a few rows.

Did a little walking and spinning.  About 3/4 of a lap, instead of my usual 3 laps (which equal a mile) Of course. these days if I want to do a mile I have to do 4 laps, because one loop is still covered in storm trash.  We were hoping to have that cleared by now, but I have mentioned that it's been a record-breaking wet December?  Normally we get about 4 inches of rain in December.  This year we got almost 15.  Not conducive to working outside and burning.

And yes, I have spinning wheels, and use spinning wheels (the yarn in the cowl above was spun on a wheel) but I really love the meditative aspect of walking and spinning on a spindle.  Want to do more.

Bob harvested our lemon crop.  OK--only 3 lemons this year, but they're huge.

And a bit more harvesting--greens, garlic, and eggs.

That itty bitty egg likely doesn't have anything in it.  Chickens do this from time to time.  Poetically they're called a wind egg;  more rustically they're referred to as fart eggs.

The garden in general didn't do so well this year.  And the last couple of months we've been more involved with the storm damage.  But Bob felt better after listening to a radio program with Tom McCubbins, who wrote the book (literally--we have a copy) on gardening in the south.  And he said *his* garden was lousy this year.  I believe I may have mentioned it's been one of the wettest years on record . . .

We are curious to see how the garden does in 2019.  It hasn't yielded a lot in the past few years.  Possibly because the small oak tree near it got quite a bit bigger (I'm being facetious here--it became a monster) and shaded it.   But look at all that wood (and the Triffid) from the previous post.  It won't be shading anything any more.

But mostly what I did to mark the New Year was . . . sleep.  Normally napping isn't my thing, but I totally crashed this afternoon (reference above--I have a cold).  So there went my plans for a productive day.

But I'm OK with it.  I often have problems sleeping (compared with Bob, who is out before he's completely horizontal) so maybe bringing in the New Year with some good sound sleep, snuggling with a few cats, isn't such a bad way to go.