We Miss Them So

 It’s been a very hard few weeks at the Sanctuary.

Puffin - MW

Many of our cats are moving into their middle or senior years, and, as with humans, life expectancy varies.  We talk about the senior cats (14 years is the equivalent to 70 or so for a human) and the SuperSeniors (15+). And as with humans, there are some that stay strong and healthy well into old age, and those who are taken by known and unknown factors much earlier.

Fable the valentine - MW

A lot of our cats are in those early senior years, and despite the work of our wonderful med staff, many manage to hide their symptoms when things begin going wrong with their bodies. Cats are hunters in the wild, but they are also prey of other creatures, and any prey animal knows that it has to hide weakness. It is not unusual for a problem to be noticed, and the cat gone within a week – once they show that something is wrong, it is too late to do anything about it.

Spooky helping with morning chores - KN

We are a no-kill organization – but that just means we won’t use excuses of behaviour and health to justify the unnecessary death of any creature. To my mind, that’s a very different business from what is true euthanasia – the release of a creature from a pain that cannot be endured. However necessary it is, though, it’s hard on staff and volunteers alike, on the hospital techs and the vets, and on those to take a beloved friend on its last journey.

Skittles - KN

So, though I prefer to write about the lives we cherish at the Sanctuary, this week’s blog is a picture tribute to Puffin, Chateaux, Fable, Janine, Spooky, Ninja, Minnow, Skittles, Zimmer, Darwin and Shadrack, all gone within a few very emotional weeks. The back stories for many of them can be found elsewhere in this blog.

Puffin - MD

Puffin, in his early days with us, had a reputation for biting – he was very much a do-not-touch-me cat. He mellowed somewhat over the years, and more recently he befriended several of the volunteers, and was an altogether more approachable prospect. We will miss the King of the Front Courtyard.

Chateaux - MW

Chateaux came to us with his brother Shadow – one to the FIV cats in New Aids and one to the FeLV cats in Old Aids.  Both boys were very shy. Chateaux was never a people-fan, but he loved his buddy Neptune – as big and black as himself.

Fable - MW

Fable came with his brother Vesper – either or both of them stress pee-ers. The two were bonded in their early days; more independent in the last couple of years. Fable adored people and took every opportunity to climb into laps.

Janine - KN

Sweet Janine was one of the shyer front courtyard cats, and the brother of friendly Jamie. She had just started to hover around when the humans she knew were working.

Spooky - MD

Stubby-tailed Spooky had had several bouts with health issues during her time with us – mostly respiratory problems and eye infections. Her recent gastric problems were probably cancer. Most cats seem to have resting bitch face - Spooky's markings always made her look as if she was smiling.

Ninja - KN

Ninja had been with us for years – basically a victim of black cat syndrome and never getting adopted. As a younger boy he lived up to his name, sprinting and climbing; he was a gatecrasher, darting in to gated pens when he could sneak past; in the last year he was a permanent resident in the bathroom of the volunteers' Tea-Room.

Minnow - MW

Pretty calico Minnow was part of a group of cats that lived together in Pen 2 for a while. Her  sister cats chose to stay with the Pen 2 crowd, but Minnow wanted more out of life, and could be found both inside and outside in other areas.  Outgoing and confident, she tolerated both cats and humans.

Skittles - BC

Skittles was my own love, moving from being a spooked feral to a cat that adored lap-time and cuddles. His brother Cadbury is warily accepting of petting; the rest of his clowder don’t want to be touched. Skittles was a gentle giant, interacting easily with humans and cats alike.

Zimmer - MW

Sweet Zimmer showed in face and body the rigors of a life as a feral cat. For much of his early time with us, he was seen only as a worried face looking down from cage-tops; in his last years he made up for it with a warm bed, many human friends, and much love.

Darwin - KN

Darwin came to us relatively recently with seizure problems, and needed a longer cage-stay to make sure we really had it under control. Visits to him in his cage were at floor-level, and were much appreciated - he loved to be cuddled, given half a chance. Release allowed him to explore and make more friends. In the end, though, it was a mouth cancer rather than a seizure that necessitated his passing.

Shadrack - BC

Shadrack is another big loss for me. I first got to know him as a shy cage-top cat in the Double-Wide, wanting attention (and chicken) but wary of venturing down.  Over the course of the eleven years I've known him, he's become a confident explorer, a lap-cat, and remained a determined chickaholic. 

Ninja in his active climbing days - MW

In the past year, we have adopted out many of the Sanctuary cats that had formerly been labelled as “unadoptable”, to loving, cat-savvy homes who have been able to deal with the behavioural issues that had kept them with us. We’re sad to see them go, but excited for them as well.  

Fable and Vesper were always together
when they first came to us - MD

But the departures such as the ones we’ve had in the last couple of weeks are hard on everyone. We have to hold faith that we gave a better option for most of these cats, for life would have been harder and shorter in the wild or at a facility that was not no-kill. They have known love and safety with us, and our lives have been richer for time with them.

Blog by Brigid Coult

Photos by Brigid Coult, Melanie Draper, Karen Nicholson, Michele Wright

Tyson

I have written before about Black Cat Syndrome, and how it doesn’t play out at the Sanctuary.

MW

Sure, there are a lot of black cats, but they all have personality, and it only takes a little individual attention to establish how that personality fits into the community.  And I think many of those black cats have at least one human who knows that cat really well, and to whom the cat responds.

MW

Tyson has been with us for the last couple of years. Rumour has it that he was an illegal immigrant – caught in a truck that had arrived from the USA.  He was brought in to the City Shelter, and his fear-aggression led them to send him over to the Sanctuary as a likely feral.   With us he continued aggressive for a while, until he realised that nobody was out to harm him. Since then he has relaxed into be a big loveable cuddle-boy, who gets along with practically everyone.

In the suspicious early days - PH

Mostly he hangs around the Tea-Room area – which means that there are a few other black cats with whom he can be confused. I have to confess that I don’t always ID him correctly in photos, but when I see him move, or with other cats, he’s easy to distinguish.  Cole is taller (Cole is taller than all the other black cats!). Jay-Z is tubbier (ditto) and has green eyes. Ninja is closest in body type, but a quick ear-sniff tells us that Ninja is the one getting medical care for his ear. Steele has longer fur, and won’t allow himself to be touched. Celia is smaller and swatty.

Tyson loves his toys - KN

Tyson’s a sort of in-between boy. He loves attention, allowing himself to be picked up and cuddled; he will happily follow around with whoever is cleaning the back pens.  Unlike Ninja, who likes to sneak through gates, Tyson is happy to go off and do his own thing, and then return when the human is free to pay attention again. He likes to play – a ball or a wand toy will keep him occupied for a while, and in the recent snowfall, he enjoyed chasing after snowballs, and destroying them by grabbing and kicking.  He is one of the few cats who seems to enjoy being held on his back, and it’s often the best way to clip his nails.

Tyson gets a pawdicure - BC

Tyson illustrates the clear difference between a stray and a feral. A stray usually knows that humans are a source of food and comfort; a feral only knows that they are to be feared. A stray may exhibit feral fear/aggression, but will often revert, like Tyson or like our big boy Dell in Pen 3, to the behaviour of a domestic cat; a feral may tame down to the point of being petted, but is rarely relaxed and comfortable with many people. Ferals Hillie and Merran have learned that humans are a Good Thing – but they remain wary with the people that they don’t really know. For Tyson, everyone is a friend; life is a party for him, and with us, he’s truly landed on his feet.

MW

Blog: Brigid Coult

Photos: Brigid Coult, Phaedra Hardman, Karen Nicholson, Michele Wright

Meet the Gatecrashers

Our blog this week comes to you from volunteer Pauline Chin, who is a Kitty-Comforter and who supervises the Double-Wide trailer on Sundays during visiting hours. 

For blog readers who are not Sanctuary visitors, a word of explanation: at crucial points in the Sanctuary we have a double gate system – at the front entrance, at the entrance to the back yard, and at the Moore House, Old Aids and New Aids entries.  Most pen entrances are single gates.

Pauline writes:

Regulars know about the one-gate-at-a-time rule when it comes to moving through the double gates to ensure cats stay on their respective sides.  Volunteers are quick to point out if a double gate is left open.  This is important with the front set of gates, as it's the last chance to stop any adventurous cats from escaping the safety of the Sanctuary.

Hurry up and let me through! - BC

On occasion, cats make it through a gate.  Cats have their reasons... It could be curiosity, boredom, looking for a quiet zone... Two popular gatecrashers are Cole and Ninja.  Both are large black cats.  Both can go relatively unnoticed by visitors, simply because they are black.

Ninja - MW

Athletic Ninja should star in his own movie.  Ninja really is a ninja as he really can get around the Back Courtyard at blazing speed, seemingly invisible to humans.  Ninja appreciates the company of humans, but infiltrating the back pens is so much more fun than cuddles. Sometimes he hides in the plants.  Sometimes, he stands near the planters.  Other times, he appears out of nowhere.  We look around... No cats in sight.  All clear.  The pen gate is open for a whole four seconds and a black figure swoops in.  

Doing Ninja moves - MW

Cue the chase sequence.  A volunteer runs around the pen, arms outstretched, trying to grab the intruder.  Scenario A: the volunteer captures Ninja in loving hands and promptly places him outside the gate.  Scenario B: Ninja dodges and dives into the bushes, eluding capture, the volunteer gives up and leaves, defeated.  When we can't win against the Ninja... he sits in the pen until someone else lets him out.  So whose win is it anyway?

Cole likes to be on the other side of a door;
a laundry cupboard works perfectly well!  - KN

Infamous Cole of the Laundry Room arrived over a year ago.  He was huge, heavy, and very particular about who can touch him.  These days, he is leaner, with long legs and a lengthy body - a similar build to our late Bengal Lucky.  He likes the ledge by the window, which is sometimes occupied by Emery.  Cole enjoys some human attention.  He doesn't seek it out, but doesn't mind petting.  He can handle about 3-4 humans in a room, max.  Otherwise, he will go search for a quiet space. His favourite area is the middle gates.  Volunteers have been warned and keep a vigilant eye on him.  It's only when Cole gatecrashes repeatedly in a short time that we have to place him in a timeout.  It's for his own safety; we don't want him to walk out the front door.

Slim - MW

What is it with these black cats?  The grass is definitely greener for black Slim, in the front courtyard. Slim came to us with a reputation for aggression, but in his time with us he has both mellowed out, and put on weight, so Slim is perhaps no longer such an appropriate name. He loves to sneak through the first gate and reach out towards the grass beyond the main entrance – and he loves the visitors who bring cat grass as their offering.  

Jasper waiting to get into Newcomers - MW

The newest member of the gatecrashers club is Jasper.  This brown and white tabby has been moved around plenty.  He’s hyperactive, happy, and loves games.  Play gets rough for us humans when he thinks our hands are toys.  Since moving to the Front Courtyard, Jasper has been making his own entertainment - by rushing into the middle gates and earning himself a red collar. He's been ejected out of the middle gates so many times and now tries for the Newcomers’ room door.

MW

Ninja, Cole, and Jasper are by no means bad cats.  They just have different agendas.  Ever been told not to do something, and it just makes you want to do it even more?  Cats are inquisitive creatures.  We need to feed their minds with new things or experiences.  They definitely know how to train us humans to keep them entertained.  The next time you open a gate, check behind you because you never know who might be there.

Blog by Pauline Chin

Photos by Brigid Coult , Karen Nicholson & Michele Wright

T.S. Eliot at the Sanctuary

Ollie - MW

One of my own traditions in the post-Christmas-blob-on-the-couch time is to re-read a couple of old favourites. Among the books I revisited this year was T.S. Eliot’s “Old Possum’s Book of Practical Cats” which formed the inspiration for the musical “Cats”.  Re-discovering old friends in that set of poems got me to thinking about the Sanctuary cats, and whether I could find any of them among Mr Eliot’s collection.

Ollie is definitely a Rum-Tum-Tugger. He’s a sweet boy, but (like so many cats) he has his own agenda, and we shrug and work around it.  The double-wide laundry room had, for a while, a set of steps in place for our dear departed Deety to reach his favourite shelf. This sign tells you why the steps are no longer there!

Ollie is happiest up high. He vies with other cats for the favourite place on top of the canned food cupboard in the double-wide, and when that’s unavailable, he worms himself onto a shelf in the Newcomers area.  He quite likes people – but he likes his own company even better.

Ollie investigating a not-quite empty bag! - BC

The Rum-Tum-Tugger is a curious cat
and there isn’t any need for me to spout it.
For he WILL do as he DO do,
and there’s no doing anything about it!

Eva - BC

I have a gumby cat in mind - her name is JennyAnyDots
      her coat is of the tabby kind, with tiger stripes and leopard spots
Cats are, of course, known for sleeping large parts of their days away, and Eva is no exception to this... 
    she sits and sits and sits and sits...
and that’s what makes a gumby cat!
She’s actually a pretty people-social cat, and enjoys having a visitor to sit on.  If you smell right, she gets up high on your chest and nuzzles into your hair.

Eva loves to groom Chris - CP

We don’t know much about Eva’s nighttime life in Old Aids, but I can imagine that, like JennyAnyDots, she would become  a bossy-boots and organise the other cats once we’re safely out of the way.

Santos dressed for Christmas - MW

Sweet Santos is a fixture on one of the single-wide chairs (unless he asking to be lifted up for cuddles). Santos and his brother Debo came to us when their owner went into care; they’re both elderly, and not likely adoption prospects. Santos has some health concerns, which for me connects him to Gus the Theatre Cat
His coat's very shabby, he's thin as a rake,
   And he suffers from palsy that makes his paw shake.
Santos is often found sitting with a faraway look in his eyes – it’s not hard to imagine that he might be thinking of his past, and like Gus, remembering when he played the part of Firefrorefiddle, the Fiend of the Fell.

Lucy - MW

  Bustopher Jones is not skin and bones,
          in fact, he’s remarkably fat...
We have any number of handsome tuxedo cats who might model for “Bustopher Jones, the cat about town” - but our most “remarkably fat” one is female.
Fat Lucy is a back courtyard cat, and the sister of front-courtyard Spencer (who is brownish rather than black). But she hardly has Bustopher Jones’s elegance, and except for weight, I would take handsome Tugboat as my model for the TS Eliot cat.

Tugboat - MW

Ninja is one of the sweetest of our black cats, and about as far as it’s possible to be from “a fiend in feline form”. But he has one outstanding characteristic in common with Macavity, in his genius for being “not there” when you want him. He’s a cat that loves to be on the other side of a gate, and hovers anxiously when I need access to feral pens 3 and 4. A quick look around – no Ninja – I open the gate and a black blur streaks past my ankles.

Innocent Ninja - MD

It’s no good chasing after him – though entirely ready to be picked up, he would much prefer to find somewhere inaccessible until he feels forgotten. Then he’ll come and hover round the gate, letting the world know that he was unwillingly trapped in a strange place.

Reefer loves to play - MD

If you’ve seen “Cats” you’ll know that the Jellicle cats come in a variety of coats and colours. But Eliot’s original Jellicle Cats are black and white, and rather small, and tend to be nocturnal in nature, as they wait for the Jellicle Ball. We’ve recently had several new small black cats join the feral corner in the front courtyard – Beetle, Frisky, Reefer, Cyrano – and they all qualify as shy, preferring to appear in the evening rather than through the day.

Shy Figaro - MD

But my model Jellicle has come to us from a Sunshine Coast shelter, and though starting as a classic shy evening cat, is now becoming more social and starting to interact with humans as well as other cats. Figaro should have his own blog entry at some time, but he’s a cat to watch – both in his delight in play with a pingpong ball or an interactive toy, and in his enjoyment in socializing with other cats.

Happy cat-bums - Spirit, Lorelei and Figaro - MW

Blog by Brigid Coult

Photos by Brigid Coult, Melanie Draper, Michele Wright

Food, Fun and Feline Friendship

Precious claims her own bag! - DW

Every Sunday afternoon visitors arrive at the Sanctuary, and many of them bring gifts.  Often, they’re very practical and welcome gifts – a new cat-bed, a couple of bags of dry cat-food, a bag of Fancy Feast cans. More often they are intended for immediate use – the inevitable bags of cat-treats!

Some visitors are known to bring tasty food! - MW

It’s inevitable, I suppose. We want these cats to want to be with us, and for many food-motivated cats, treats are a way of attracting them.  When sweet Gilbert first came to us he was an untouchable feral.  Many Temptations later, he has learned that humans carry good stuff, and are no longer to be feared.

MW

But it’s sometimes hard to get our visitors to see that handing around cat-treats is like having many boxes of cookies open at a children’s party. One or two treats – no problem.  But a handful of them from each of a dozen visitors, and cats are so full of goodies that they no longer want to interact.  Lori brings fish and chicken – good food for obligate carnivores – and many of the cats are already sated.

Little Orange and Latte anxiously wait for Lori to arrive - DW

I usually try to get visitors to restrict treats to just one at a time – just as you would only offer a child one cookie. What I find it’s often more important to teach is that cats love attention from their visitors as much as they love goodies – though what form that attention takes may vary.

Saffron loves bubbles - DW

Some cats are fascinated by bubbles - quietly watching them, or leaping to bat them and watch them disappear

Ninja hunts bubbles - MW

I rejoice in the Sunday visitors – many of them regulars – who “get it”. Some come almost every week, and make a point of sitting quietly with the cats who need a quiet lap and no action. Timmy, Tigger, Leland and several others have all benefited from this gentle approach.

A preferred technique for one visitor

Catnip is a favourite for many cats - though there are some that couldn't care less.  Feline opinion is divided over a preference for drooling over a catnip bag vs. the privilege of claiming the fresh green stuff.

Leland in a catnip coma - MW

Our sweet departed Bobby claimed this plant for himself - DW

Almost as much appreciated is the cat-grass that some of our volunteers grow at home and bring into the Sanctuary.  The back courtyard cats have access to grass in most of the pens, but for the indoor cats and the caged cats, a nibble of greenery is much enjoyed

The SingleWide cats enjoy a cat-grass treat - DW

Scott and Mel go from area to area, calling in with favourites all over the Sanctuary. They encourage play – they always bring fishing-pole toys, and many of “their” cats have a wonderfully energetic session with them, leaping and chasing feathers (and not fingers).

Slim jumping - AM

But they are also able to be quiet and patient when needed; they groom and pet, and sit patiently waiting for the shyer cats to approach. Mel has been doing some wonderful work with timid grey Mischa in the back courtyard.

Mischa allowing a closer approach - MD

This, of course, is the basis on which our Kitty Comforters are selected – noticing the people who are able to be quiet and patient with nervous cats; to groom, or play, or treat on occasion, and never to force interaction if the cat is not yet ready for it. Many of our former ferals will never be ready for adoption, and it’s one of the blessings of the Sanctuary that we are able to allow that, and know that feral or friendly, the cats have a safe home with us for the duration of their lives.

Blog by Brigid Coult

Photos by Melanie Draper, Angelina Mak, Debbie Wolanski, Michele Wright