A New Season Part 2

The morning after our successful trapping, David and I took the cats to Vet Care.  Brenda was there to greet us and I wonder, not for the first time, if the company knows what an asset she is to them.   Always cheerful and interested in the animals, she gives great customer service whether we're there to buy the ruinously expensive food Snowfire needs or to deliver homeless cats for altering. 

I tell her about the pregnant cat.  I ask that if Dr Drmac thinks she cannot be spayed safely he just send her back with us and we'll let her deliver.  I explain that although she is feral and even he can't touch her, the caregiver is very attached.

All day I wonder about the cats, and it is with great relief, when Cathy and I pick them up, that we learn all went well.  Three of the cats were female and all were to some degree pregnant.  With five kittens already in the colony, if these cats had delivered a colony of 30 or so could have become a colony of 50 if we were not able to take the kittens in.

When we return to the colony the caregiver is anxiously waiting. He has a shed ready to shelter the female cats while they recover.  He and Cathy take the three transfer cages to the shed.  The remaining cage is just inside the tailgate of the van, facing out.  I slide up the door and the grey male cat inside looks at me with big yellow eyes. He doesn't move.  I talk to him and he regards me with cool curiosity but stays where he is, pressed against the back wall of the cage.  Finally, I put a hand behind the cage and stick a finger through, gently poking the occupant.  He looks away, then gives me a quick, startled glance, leaps from the cage and dashes across the yard.   

As they return the transfer cages to the van the caregiver tells us about a tragedy that occurred at the colony overnight.   Just this morning he found one of the baby kittens dead in the yard.  The other four were dead inside the shelter.  He does not know what happened.  He and his wife heard nothing during the night.  Perhaps some animal got into the shelter or maybe a male cat disposed of the kittens in an effort to put the mother back into heat.   As he speaks he points out the mother cat crossing the yard.  She appears OK, but her hind legs and tail are wet for no reason we can determine. 

I am horrified.  In my mind I see the female cat, under attack, grabbing one of the kittens and running into the yard in search of safety. Hearing her babies killed as she ran and then being overtaken by the attacker and not being able to save even one.  

It's tough to be a trapper and hear about these things first hand, but it confirms for me that we did the right thing in aborting the female cats.   Some unidentified but deadly danger lurks in this colony and we really need to get all the cats altered so there are no more kittens to die in this manner.

A positive post script:  We delivered food to the colony today and the caregiver said all the cats that went to the vet are doing well.  Mama, he says, is quite grouchy and swiped at him when he offered her a can of special food, but she is well and fully recovered from surgery. The mother of the dead kittens appears to be alright too, but she is at the top of my list for our next trapping.