R.I.P. Kitten
A friend of mine (hi Aaron!!), who I hadn't spoken to in some time, asked me today if I had any pictures of the stray kitties I was feeding. Said kitties live out behind my apartment in droves! Yes, a drove of kitties. I don't actually feed them all; my husband and I leave that job to the crazy lady that lives a few doors down and has been feeding the cats for years. We singled out a momma cat and her kitten to feed when we had the chance a few months back.
The momma cat we have named Little Kitty. She is sweet, but I absolutely fell in love with her kitten. I eventually named him Bozo because h was very unbalanced and goofy. Sometimes he would sit on my back step, forget where he was, go to back up and just about fall right off. He was wacky, chased his tail (and anything else that moved), and had eyes that were way too big for his head at times. I watched him stalk, chase, and run from a fallen leaf one day for a half hour. He was fantastic!
At first, both Little Kitty and Bozo were very scared of us and wouldn't even come within a yard of our back door. This eventually changed over time to the point where, if I left the kitchen door open while cooking, Bozo would creep onto my inside welcome mat to see what I was up to. I thought about getting a butterfly net and capturing him. I should have!
Unfortunately, I did not. Disaster hit! I found Bozo dead only two days after he tried to sneak into my apartment. He was lying under a nearby bush, his little paw covering his face. I got close to see what was wrong and saw that his fur was coated in blood, and it looked like he had an injury to his torso. I couldn't look anymore and ran off; all I knew was that he was definitely dead.
I proposed to my husband that the cold could have killed him! Perhaps his stomach was filled with water and when it got really cold at night, the water froze, expanded, and made his stomach explode. He told me to stop telling people my theory because it is ludicrous. I know it is, but it seemed like a more dramatic and fitting death for my little kitten than what really happened.
All we can discern is that some animal took a huge chunk out of his midsection. A friend explained that it could have been a territorial fight since kitten was old enough to be sexually active at this time (just like those darn teens, they start to young!). It also could have been a raccoon or a neighborhood dog. Either way, kitten was mortally wounded and hid under the bush to die.
I still miss him a lot even though he wasn't really my kitten. I can't really have cats inside my apartment because I'm too allergic. At least I was able to get pictures of him before he died:
Rest in peace, Bozo!!
The momma cat we have named Little Kitty. She is sweet, but I absolutely fell in love with her kitten. I eventually named him Bozo because h was very unbalanced and goofy. Sometimes he would sit on my back step, forget where he was, go to back up and just about fall right off. He was wacky, chased his tail (and anything else that moved), and had eyes that were way too big for his head at times. I watched him stalk, chase, and run from a fallen leaf one day for a half hour. He was fantastic!
At first, both Little Kitty and Bozo were very scared of us and wouldn't even come within a yard of our back door. This eventually changed over time to the point where, if I left the kitchen door open while cooking, Bozo would creep onto my inside welcome mat to see what I was up to. I thought about getting a butterfly net and capturing him. I should have!
Unfortunately, I did not. Disaster hit! I found Bozo dead only two days after he tried to sneak into my apartment. He was lying under a nearby bush, his little paw covering his face. I got close to see what was wrong and saw that his fur was coated in blood, and it looked like he had an injury to his torso. I couldn't look anymore and ran off; all I knew was that he was definitely dead.
I proposed to my husband that the cold could have killed him! Perhaps his stomach was filled with water and when it got really cold at night, the water froze, expanded, and made his stomach explode. He told me to stop telling people my theory because it is ludicrous. I know it is, but it seemed like a more dramatic and fitting death for my little kitten than what really happened.
All we can discern is that some animal took a huge chunk out of his midsection. A friend explained that it could have been a territorial fight since kitten was old enough to be sexually active at this time (just like those darn teens, they start to young!). It also could have been a raccoon or a neighborhood dog. Either way, kitten was mortally wounded and hid under the bush to die.
I still miss him a lot even though he wasn't really my kitten. I can't really have cats inside my apartment because I'm too allergic. At least I was able to get pictures of him before he died:
Rest in peace, Bozo!!