the kitten story

meet the kittens...

duke, the leader

armando, the lover {sorry, i had the wrong picture up before- this is armando!}

olaf, the shy guy

tess, the girlie

and larry. he's just larry.

it's hard to tell by these photos, but on thursday these were feral kittens. here's their story :: my brother was asked to check on some kittens that his mother-in-law spotted at an abandoned house. he asked for my help and we headed over thinking that we would just scoop up a box of sweet kittens and drop them off at a shelter. haha, it wasn't quite that easy.

we checked with the neighbors and, sure enough, they were wild kitties and their mother hadn't been seen for weeks. so, we cornered them and i grabbed one. two words :: teeth and claws. now, i am a seasoned cat owner but it's true that i have been cat-free since the passing of my last kitty a few years ago. i didn't expect the, um, damage that my hands received from this tiny furball. ouch.

we got smart and left to get some gloves and even a net for the next four. we also grabbed some sardines and liver pate to try and lure them out.

about 4 hours later, we had four of five kittens. the last one was hiding in the ceiling between the 1st and 2nd floors of an adjacent building. we decided to let the little guy calm down and i would go, on my doctor's advice, to get a tetanus shot. ouch ouch.

almost two hours later, we returned for the last kitty. we could not leave this guy there all alone overnight. and he {or she} was a crafty little devil. but finally, my brother made the final catch and we had all five kittens.

when we got them back to my brother's house, they would not go near us. we put them in a fairly large cage and gave them food and water. at that point, i was getting concerned that these guys may not be adoptable. it's sad, but many shelters will not take kittens that are unsociable. they will simply put them down.

as you can see, these little cuties have made incredible progress in the last couple of days. my brother and his wife have been patiently getting them socialized and now almost all of them have lost their fear of humans. {and they really love jasper, the pup in the photos}. they will be able to find a good home in no time.

we could not tell them apart until we got them collars, but then we started to see their individual personalities emerge. as much as i want to take one {or two or three} home, my landlord says no cats. but my lease is up in four months. and then i'll have another kitten story to tell.