Barn Kitties

Despite of all our best efforts, we still have quite a few barn cats. I brought two with us when we moved--one Pete who had actually been a house cat down in Colorado until he decided he like my plants better for cat boxes, and Pumpkin the grey and white kitty in the middle of the top picture. Pumpkin got abandoned by his mom with his other litter mates when he was barely 2 or 3 weeks old. So he decided he wasn't going to sit around and starve, he was going to get rescued! About 10 o'clock one night, I could hear a cat outside meowing for all it was worth, when I opened the door to take a look, this little bedraggled skin and bones kitten came scrabbling in looking for some grub. Most wild baby kitties take some time to tame down, but not Pumpkin, he was all about being friends with the hand that fed him. Out of all his other litter mates, I think we were able to save 2 more and the rest had died already.

The rest of the cats were either here when we got here (along with about 40 others that we slowly thinned out) or have showed up since. I managed to get these pictures with 4 of the wild cats along with Pumpkin. I really like the little white cat. She won't let you pet her, but likes to watch what you are up to and I see her around quite a bit. The others I mostly only see at dinner time. There are at least 2 more wild cats that I see pretty regular plus Pete, so we have more than plenty. There are also a few toms that seems to come and go and I don't see them very often, but when they are around, they aren't apposed to jumping in the dinner line as well. As long as I don't see a mouse around here, I'll keep feeding them I guess. It's funny to go in the barn and see all these eyes peering down at you. There is also one crazy brave pigeon who also lives with all the cats up in the rafters of the barn. I'm always surprised when he shows up again.

Carter thought she would climb up the ladder into the barn loft to check out the cats herself this week. I had been outside working when I suddenly realized I couldn't see or hear her anymore. She doesn't wander off very often so I was pretty surprised. I went looking around and finally found her at the top of the ladder, crying because she couldn't figure out how to get down. Thank Heavens she hadn't tried! Luckily all she got was a good scare and a good lecture on not climbing up there again unless mommy (or daddy) is with her. I think she believes me this time!