Another Mouth To Feed!
by Julie
(Alhambra,IL.USA)
Buddy - picture added later - photo by Julie
Yesterday, my husband Rich was cutting some trim on our carport when he noticed some movement near the patio. (It is 26 degrees here and covered in snow). A feral cat burrowed under the cushions on a chair. Rich took it some cat food and it ran off. Rich arranged the waterproof cushions where they would block the wind more and left the food out.
He said the cat was sneezing. Today I went out and the cat was nesting in the cushions. I called for it and it jumped down and began to eat the food. It will not come near me yet. The cat is very large. It looks like a cross between "Wilson" and a Main Coon.
Rich asks, "Do we really need another mouth to feed?". But then he called today on his lunch hour to find out if the cat was still here and if it was eating.
It reminds me of the book the "Little Prince", when the prince tames the fox and the quote, "We are forever responsible for what we tame".
If it were a domestic cat we could find it a home but since it is feral it is going to be a slow process of building trust. Trust is non-transferable! We don't believe in cages. We do have a live trap for the capture and relocating wild animals to the woods by my father's farm.
If the cat gets sick we will use it but otherwise we will not traumatize the poor soul. I will try to send a picture later on. It is just too skittish right now. It is holding a personal space of about twenty feet.
Update:...
This is an update to the above submission. We are calling this cat "Buddy" although we still haven't determined what it is. It let me get with in ten feet of it before it began hissing. I added a picture too (heading page).
Julie
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