To whomever you are, the kind persons who adopt the kittens we’ve cared for since they were born, here is some information you will be glad to have about their first weeks of life.
This litter was born in late April 2017. We had known their mom was pregnant and had been keeping an eye on her—when she disappeared, we figured she’d given birth. It took us a few days to find out where she was hiding them. But I’m getting ahead of the story; you should learn more about mamma.
The mother of these kitties is a thin, polydactylic (extra-fingered) tan/brown tortoiseshell. She appeared in our Munichburg neighborhood about three years ago—apparently she had been the pet of one of the many renters on our block, who apparently moved away without notifying her—and taking her with them. We have a revolving door of abandoned cats on our block, thanks to plenty of low-income rentals, and people who don’t take responsibility for their pets. We feed the cats they leave behind and work with Wild Thing Feral Feline Fix to keep them from breeding. Unfortunately, we were unable to get “mamma” fixed “in time.”
So back when “mamma” first appeared in our backyard, as a young adult cat, she had to try to fit in with four or five other, interrelated cats, which was difficult for her. Compared to the semi-feral cats, she was rather outgoing and loved to be petted. As time has gone on, however, she has become more wary.
By the way, we often call her “Thumby” (Thummy) for the large thumbs on her front paws.
Last year, Thumby had a litter of kittens—her first—but some never-supervised neighbor children discovered them and carried them away when they were quite young, and we didn’t see them again. No wonder Thumby hid her second litter carefully!
So when Thumby had this litter, we kept an eye on her to see where she might be hiding her kittens. I found her nursery one morning when I was mowing our lawn—Thumby flashed away from my mower and ran up the steps by our driveway, hesitating halfway up to stare wildly at me and hiss. I immediately stopped the mower and investigated . . . she had emerged from a yucca plant near our driveway. I approached cautiously and peered into a sheltered hollow on the ground amid its base of bladelike leaves—the leaves, bending over, formed a perfect little chamber for the litter—and what I saw looked like Easter eggs. It was only about a week after Easter! The little calico looked like a pretty Easter egg, curled up with her gray and white spotted siblings. I didn’t reach in or touch or pester them—they were sleeping, and mamma was watching worriedly from the steps behind me.
We kept an eye on them, and when it looked like it was going to rain, we rigged up a shelter out of a cat carrier near the yucca plant . . . but when it finally rained that evening, mamma moved all her kittens into our backyard, under a potting bench that offered excellent shelter. This is also near where we regularly feed our the stray kitties. It wasn’t long after this, and after a continued stretch of rainy weather, that she moved the kittens into our downstairs sunporch.
She soon got into the pattern of staying indoors with the kittens, in our sunporch, during the night, then spending days nursing the kittens under the potting bench. We lured her and her kittens indoors each evening with canned food—ensuring they’d have a peaceful night, safe from raccoons, opossums, stray dogs, and other cats that roam our neighborhood at nights.
And so the kittens grew up more or less indoors, amid the miscellaneous extra furniture, lawn furniture, and boxes we store on our sunporch; it is basically a carpeted garage. They learned to use a litter box early; we rigged up a spare bonsai pot as a step for them to get in and out of the box.
We worked at socializing them with people, picking them up and petting them, holding them on our laps, being gentle overall, cooing and talking to them, and playing “string” and “milk jug ring” and then “string tied to milk jug ring.” They also loved the catnip mice we bought for them! They totally hid them somewhere; good thing we bought a three-pack!
As they’ve gotten older and the temperatures have grown hot, they spend less time indoors, as our sunporch is not air-conditioned. They all have acquired fleas pretty bad, but I have not felt confident about them being old enough to tolerate Cheristan or other topical flea treatments. Sorry; I hope that when they are settled in a “forever” home, you’ll rid them of fleas and they’ll receive all the veterinary care they deserve—and they do deserve the best.
I should talk about their individual personalities, which have emerged quite strongly.
First is “Lois,” whom we named for an older cousin whose personality is distinctly strong-willed, smart, and straightforward. Practical. Lois is the calico that looked so much like an Easter egg the first time I glimpsed her as she was curled up with her littermates. She has been the first to try anything.
The first to venture away from the nest (I think the first to open her eyes, too). The first to start nibbling at solid food. The first to play “string” with us. The first to start climbing on anything and everything. The first to clamber up the one step to our sunporch. The first to venture farthest out into the yard. You get the picture.
She has a no-nonsense personality yet at times rather sad eyes—a sort of gravitas far beyond her years—er, weeks of life. Her head, face, and build is a lot like her mom’s . . . although she is fluffy, I suppose, like her father (whoever he is).
Second is “Half-Gray” (sorry, we never came up with a name for him; I’m sure you will devise something clever and fitting)—“named” for the way his face is divided into gray and white sides (which is a quick way of distinguishing him from his similar-looking sister, whose coloration is more balanced-looking).
The gray and black markings on his back are something like his brother’s. He is a little athlete, with a chipper personality. He is the one that almost always mews when you pick him up. He was the first one to purr, and he is the one who purrs the easiest. He will be a good-time kitty, a cat’s cat, and a true friend to his humans. He likes to jump onto plants—I told you, he’s an athlete. Of all the cats in this litter, we think he would be a good kitty for someone with kids.
When Jennifer of Wild Things came to pick up mamma and the four kittens, the mamma was trapped in a cage on our lawn (she’d been there a few hours, and we’d put a sheet over the cage to keep her calm), and three of the kittens were fast asleep—making them relatively easy to pick up and put in a carrier. But “Half-Gray” was nowhere to be found. We discovered that he was sleeping under the extra folds of the sheet we’d put over mamma’s cage. I thought it was sweet that he, of all the four, had wanted to be near her. Indeed, as soon as she was trapped, he went over to her, and he must have stayed by her the whole time.
Third is “Dreamboat”—again, a non-name. We also call her “Sleepy.” I’ve played around with calling her “Doris” and “Debbie,” but I’m sure you’ll think of a pretty name for her—to match her prettiness. She’s fluffy, with marbled gray and black on her back, with white paws, a white face and shirt front, and pink nose.
Practically a show cat. Once, when we were letting the kittens explore some of our house, she found a floor-to-ceiling mirror at the end of a hallway—and actually saw her own reflection! She tried to play with it.
From Day One, she has been the sleepiest of the four. Her favorite “game” is “The Perfect Sleeper”! When we would enter the sunporch with delicious canned cat food, all the cats would get excited—but she would snooze on. She’s extremely easy-going, and she would be an excellent cat for an older person. I’ll bet she behaves very well in a home. She will probably have a tendency to put on weight; she’ll probably be one of those cats whose food you must ration.
And she will be someone’s dear little snugglepuss. Of the four, she is the one that seems to identify with people best—she looks deep into our eyes as if trying to read our thoughts. The day Jennifer picked her up, little Dreamboat was lying flat on her side on a flat rock in the shade next to a flower bed. It was a hot day, but she looked cool and comfortable. It was especially hard to put her into the carrier.
The fourth kitten is one we’ve called Arjuna, or Arjie, or Archie. He is the one that’s all gray tabby, the only one with truly short hair like his mamma (not fluffy), and the only one to have inherited his mother’s extra digits on his forepaws. I hope whoever adopts him looks well beyond the novelty of his unusual hands—for he is a complex cat. He’ll need someone who can tolerate some weirdness.
He’s the “runt”—always got pushed away from mamma’s teats by the other kittens, had a hard time nosing into the food bowl at dinner time. He kind of developed a Napoleon complex—out of nowhere, he jumps onto his siblings and picks “fights” with them (kitten sparring, rolling, tumbling). He loves to play with things—often, he would be last to the dinner bowl because he was distracted by something he had found on the floor to play with. He loves games that involve him swatting his big forepaws down onto something—like smacking at a string being dragged across the floor, or batting around a nugget of garden mulch.
But despite his apparent aggressiveness and fearlessness, he is the only one of the litter that has been fearful of us—he has habitually run away when we reach for him. We named him Arjuna for one of the main characters in the Bhagavad Gita, a famous, indomitable warrior who, at the beginning of the text, collapses in fear and worry as he surveys the opposing army. I could see little Arjie requiring a little extra patience, and an understanding of his extra energy and weird cat ideas. He is a complex character and will be a unique, unforgettable fur person.
If anyone’s thinking of getting two of the kittens together, I’d suggest Lois and Arjuna together, and the two gray and white ones together (Half-Gray and Dreamboat). Arjuna also gets along well with Half-Gray (the two boys).
But they all get along fine with each other.
Here’s another picture of their mother. We have several more photos of the kittens (including when they were younger) and of their mamma and would be glad to share them with the people who adopt these kittens. . . . I know I wish I had photos of my cats—which we adopted as full-grown adults—so I could see what they looked like as kittens, to see what their littermates looked like, to see pictures of their mamma.
Best wishes,
Jule Schroeder
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