Kitten!
So, after years of holding out, I'm a foster mom for a kitten.
It wasn't anything I got into intentionally - I mean, yes, I'm a member of our local animal rescue group, but I really have very little to do with the actual animals. I get attached very easily when it comes to animals, but this just kind of happened.
It started on Thursday, when my coworker went to the grocery store during her lunch break and gave me a call about a kitten in amongst the grocery carts and could I come and help her catch it? So I took off for the grocery store. I figured I would catch it and then go to lunch.
I get there, the kitten is in between a row of carts and the wall of the grocery store. My coworker and one of the grocery workers try to move the carts out of the way, since we couldn't reach it or lure it out with the food I bought as soon as I got there, and it takes off running around the building. My coworker tries to grab it, and misses, but manages to track it around the building and into a pile of boxes waiting for recycling. A great big, jumbled pile of wet cardboard, because it's been raining, and is still drizzling. And I forgot my umbrella in the car, because the carts were on a covered porch so I didn't think I'd need it.
At this point, the kitten's not even willing to let us lay eyes on it, and my coworker's getting impatient - she's got errands to run and her lunchtime is almost over. I'm not willing to leave it - there's too much traffic around here, and I don't want the poor little thing getting squished.
An hour later, I've heard her, I even caught a little glimpse of her as she moved from one hidey hole to another, but she's still too scared to come out. I'm out of time on my lunch break, so I decide to do something that I didn't want to do: use a live trap.
I go to get one, and find when I get back that the kitten has made it almost to the can of cat food... so I put the trap aside and started luring again. And this time, after another hour, I got it! The poor thing was wet and shivering, but she didn't try to bite or scratch, and she didn't panic when she got picked up, so she either hitched a ride in someone's vehicle or was dumped is my thought.
She's about 6 weeks old, grey and white tabby, and a Manx. She has not even a nubbin of tail, and it doesn't look like she had some kind of accident, it looks like she was born that way. No sign that I can see so far that it's affected her spine the way that it does in some cats, which is a good thing. I took her straight to the vet, and ran into D there, who got her looked at as a rescue by the group rather than me, which means that a) I don't have to pay for it if I don't keep her, and b) she could use our group's connections to get her a new home, because with five cats I can't take in another.
Which is why, barring an adoption falling through, little Mina will be going to live at our local grooming salon as their resident shop cat in a couple of weeks. Which if I am right about what those very fuzzy ears of hers mean, will be a good thing, because I have a feeling that she'll need to get groomed on a regular basis, LOL.
http://smg.photobucket.com/user/RurouniTriv/library/?view=recent&page=1 <-- Kitten cuteness!
It wasn't anything I got into intentionally - I mean, yes, I'm a member of our local animal rescue group, but I really have very little to do with the actual animals. I get attached very easily when it comes to animals, but this just kind of happened.
It started on Thursday, when my coworker went to the grocery store during her lunch break and gave me a call about a kitten in amongst the grocery carts and could I come and help her catch it? So I took off for the grocery store. I figured I would catch it and then go to lunch.
I get there, the kitten is in between a row of carts and the wall of the grocery store. My coworker and one of the grocery workers try to move the carts out of the way, since we couldn't reach it or lure it out with the food I bought as soon as I got there, and it takes off running around the building. My coworker tries to grab it, and misses, but manages to track it around the building and into a pile of boxes waiting for recycling. A great big, jumbled pile of wet cardboard, because it's been raining, and is still drizzling. And I forgot my umbrella in the car, because the carts were on a covered porch so I didn't think I'd need it.
At this point, the kitten's not even willing to let us lay eyes on it, and my coworker's getting impatient - she's got errands to run and her lunchtime is almost over. I'm not willing to leave it - there's too much traffic around here, and I don't want the poor little thing getting squished.
An hour later, I've heard her, I even caught a little glimpse of her as she moved from one hidey hole to another, but she's still too scared to come out. I'm out of time on my lunch break, so I decide to do something that I didn't want to do: use a live trap.
I go to get one, and find when I get back that the kitten has made it almost to the can of cat food... so I put the trap aside and started luring again. And this time, after another hour, I got it! The poor thing was wet and shivering, but she didn't try to bite or scratch, and she didn't panic when she got picked up, so she either hitched a ride in someone's vehicle or was dumped is my thought.
She's about 6 weeks old, grey and white tabby, and a Manx. She has not even a nubbin of tail, and it doesn't look like she had some kind of accident, it looks like she was born that way. No sign that I can see so far that it's affected her spine the way that it does in some cats, which is a good thing. I took her straight to the vet, and ran into D there, who got her looked at as a rescue by the group rather than me, which means that a) I don't have to pay for it if I don't keep her, and b) she could use our group's connections to get her a new home, because with five cats I can't take in another.
Which is why, barring an adoption falling through, little Mina will be going to live at our local grooming salon as their resident shop cat in a couple of weeks. Which if I am right about what those very fuzzy ears of hers mean, will be a good thing, because I have a feeling that she'll need to get groomed on a regular basis, LOL.
http://smg.photobucket.com/user/RurouniTriv/library/?view=recent&page=1 <-- Kitten cuteness!