Late Tuesday afternoon I took this photo of the kittens and their mom. They were resting out under the big pine behind the woodshed. I told Roger that I was concerned that they were really vulnerable out there. They had definitely outgrown the little space where they had spent the past four weeks. While they did run under there any time they felt threatened, they were happily inclined to explore a little bit of the space around them in their adorable kitty way. We had first seen them on Sunday, and we never saw the kittens again after this pic on Tuesday. We did find the momma cat hiding under our deck in the backyard Wednesday morning. She has spent almost all of her time there since. No kittens. It is coyote season, which reminds us of what happened here last
Memorial Day weekend 2012.
We still plan to trap mom and take her to a "no-kill" shelter. This is not the outcome we had expected at all, but it really is typical of the hard life of domestic and feral critters whose lives overlap the wild.
UPDATE:We set up the motion sensor camera under the deck, just to really make sure momma cat was alone. Roger crawled under there Thursday afternoon and did not see any kittens. But we wanted one last verification. And yes indeed, there are two kittens under there with momma. Not sure where they were hiding or if she just brought them under there, but they are there. Momma just had her first meal in the unset trap. Plan is to set it on Monday. Wish us luck. We'll keep you posted. Then it'll be kitten trappin' time. And we will be so glad when this saga is over.
it hurts my heart to think of those little fluff balls as coyote food.
ReplyDeleteAw, when I saw your title, I was afraid to read. So sorry those little babies didn't make it. Nature is so harsh.
ReplyDeleteSo, so sad. Life in the wild is very hard, and it is especially hard for feral animals, as they are simply not as well adapted to survival in the wild. Shame on the people who abandoned mama cat in the first place!
ReplyDeleteIf you are able to get Mama quickly, there's a good chance in this early summer season that the shelter will have a litter of orphaned kittens who could use Mama's help.
Yeah, it's a real shame their little lives ended so soon. Is it possible that mama cat moved them somewhere else?
ReplyDeletemama cat would not be hanging out alone if she had successfully hidden the babies.
ReplyDeletewhen we lived in japan, a feral mama took her babies up in the ceiling -- we discovered this when one of the kittens fell down between the walls. [the walls were just fiberboard with a space in between.] my husband rescued the mom and the rest of the kittens, but our landlady -- who lived in the other part of the duplex, and could hear all the meowing -- evicted them.
we put the cat family in a doghouse outside, and mama took her babies away. then, we were able to rescue the baby between the walls by taking out the electric socket and luring it with food. little buddy kitten got evicted, too, and we think he was eaten by a tanuki who hung out around the yard.
i don't think there even was such a thing as feral rescue in japan, when we lived there in the 1980's.
ReplyDeleteour daughter lived in japan for a year in college -- just a few years ago. she naturally found a lost kitten right away (apple, not far from tree), and one of her professors happened to know the only cat rescue lady in town! so that story worked out well. but it often doesn't for feral babies, here or there.
Nature can be sad and cruel to the most vulnerable. I hope you can capture the cat soon.
ReplyDeleteyay! for safe baby cats!
ReplyDeleteWell, now you can rest a little easier, and easier still once they get rescued/adopted.
ReplyDeleteHey, I just realized that you said there you found finally two kittens, but you started with three. Did I miss something?
ReplyDeleteWe've only seen two kittens. Haven't seen the gray one since the disappearance Wednesday morning. It's a bit hard to see under the deck, but whenever I do see the kittens, it's only the little pale one and the black one playing.
ReplyDeleteIt's worth the effort, and I'm glad it's having a more positive resolution, but it's also the way of nature. Perhaps there are some coyote kits who are being fed now too.
ReplyDelete