Lets Talk Cats (not movies)

You may be wondering where I've been all week and why the movies have dried up and here's your answer; cats. We've also been concentrating more on Deadwood and The Wire than films, but I'm hoping to see Watchmen this weekend...

OK, I'm not famous for my tolerant nature - many things get me angry, but get this little tale - it's especially galling.

Imagine you're a lovely black cat, whose owners couldn't face paying to get you spayed.

When your owners have a baby, one of them (presumably Mum) develops an allergy and the lovely people kick you and your daughter (who's about 6 months old) into the back garden.

Thing is - remember your owners couldn't be arsed to get you spayed? Well guess what happens to an unspayed cat who is left outside for weeks? Yup - you get pregnant. Let's not judge - you're not a person, and its pretty much hardwired into you to get pregnant if you can.

Your owners do anything about it?

How about no?

How about they leave you to give birth in an old rotten Rabbit hutch? Yeah, that'll work.

And then why don't they call the local cat trust up and give them an ultimatum - If they don't come pick you up, they'll leave you in the cold to die. Nice owners you had there.

Wankers.

Things look grim for cats who are unwanted in the U.K. - twat owners like these ones refuse to get the poor things spayed or neutered and this leads to a whole lot of unwanted kittens and cats and there just anren't enough willing homes to take them in - certainly not a mum, young daughter and three newborn kittens at once. There isa great fallacy around spaying apparently and thats that a cat is healthier if they've already had a litter before spaying.

Let me make this clear, everyone in the cat arena has told me the same thing:

THERE IS NO BENEFIT LETTING YOUR CAT HAVE A LITTER BEFORE SPAYING. IN FACT YOU DO MORE HARM BRINGING UNWANTED, UNHOMED KITTENS INTO THE WORLD.
THE BELIEF IN ANY SUCH BENEFIT IS, LIKE SO MANY OTHERS, TOTAL BOLLOCKS.

For families like this one, there's a very stretched to the limit system of fostering in place - families or couples (or individuals) prepared to take in a mum and kittens in this situation and give their time and love to socialise and develop these guys. This is so they will hopefully grow into viable pets having the best possible chance of rehoming. Time and love are all you need - the trust provide food, litter and moral supportr and boy do I need moral support sometimes!

Make no mistake - there are two outcomes available to many unwanted cats - rehoming or death. It is impossible for any trust to look after all the cats that need looking after - many are feral or traumatised in the first place and don't adapt well to being looked after.

To get to the point, Mrs Algo and I have taken in the unwanted family described above.

The mum is about two years old and already has has one litter about 6 months agao (and yet wasn't neutered afterwards by her dumb f__ing owners) - the older daughter, who we've renamed since the given name was retarded, is the only one from the earlier litter still present and these two are fairly inseparable.

(Quick aside: I won't be giving the older twos' names on this blog to protect us from the owners beating me up - for calling them wankers. They are still wankers, though.)

Mumsy arrived tired but open to contact, and we've been happy with how she's settling. the older daughter is not so well socialised (partly due to the young age of her mother) and is having trouble overcoming her wariness - don't blame her, given her prior human contact.

However, today we've had the breakthrough we wanted with Odie (as in O.D. - older daughter) - she's been out of the pen (which was provided for us like everything else) and fussed a bit. With mum, treats got her out, but things were more difficult with Odie; she sniffs and lick treats but won't eat them not sure why but maybe she doesn't like fish flavoured ones - we'll get her in the end. Odie spent the last two hours of this evening hiding under our cheapass sofa but at least she's got out and about a little.

I guess I should say, if you think there may be room in your heart to help out a local trust and look after some cats please, please, please give it real thought (i.e. don't think you'll be ok then backpedal) and if you reckon you can help call them up and see what you can do.

These people do a wonderful job with very little support and staggering odds stacked against them. Any help you could give would be wonderful.

As for what happens later? After 6 to 8 weeks these cats will be rehomed - we may keep two of the kittens as our own (let's face it, we probably will) but the others need rehoming - you won't be forced to keep all 5-8 of them forever. The key thing to do is talk to the trust and see what they advise.

Oh - did I mention I knew nothing about cats until I got attached to the cat that nearly was a few weeks ago? Needless to say I am learning on the fly.

Since I won't post pictures of the old'uns for security purposes, tomorrow or sometime soon I'll probably introduce you to the kittens we've called (for now) Bootsy, Smokey and The Bandit.

Yes. The Bandit. Really.

We won't be keeping that name. But you have to call them something for reference! The Bandit is the runt, so gets called Tiny, sometimes.

Only Bootsy's name is probably permanent (for the real Bootsy go here).

A (going soft in my old age)