A Test for Indigo

I want to take Indigo to the veterinary for a new fructosimine test. Lately, she has been carrying a lot of litter about with her - between her paw pads, I suspect - even bringing it to bed at night, which is exasperating. After this had been done for three nights, the reason why the litter was clinging to her more now than before occurred to me.

If her insulin dose is no longer controlling her diabetes, it would increase the amount of glucose being released by her body through her urine, making it stickier. I have noticed recently that Indie’s water-consumption has gone up, another sign of diabetes - or, in this instance - of less control over it. She is a difficult patient from whom to draw blood, so I have been able to test her only once in the last week, but it registered a higher number than has been the case in the past.

All these symptoms indicate that her current dosage of insulin is now too low. Because she is tough to test at home, a fructosimine exam is necessary. I hope to take her in to the hospital soon.

No One's Permission

I find Sable’s progress fascinating. She has started coming up on to the bed (not while I am in it) on her own now. Previously, she did it only when Moxy was also there. It was as if he was her permission; if she saw her friend doing it, she knew it was acceptable for her, too. Now, she doesn’t need that permission.

Rather than jump up, she will risk rushing past me if I am at the computer desk and hurrying up the stairs at the foot of the bed. Yesterday, she was snoozing with her head turned away from me. I could have reached out and touched her, though of course I didn’t; I don’t want her to worry that I will try it every time she closes her eyes.

Part of her will probably always miss the outdoors. As she enters her elder years, however, the wider world will become more dangerous to her. But she grows more at ease with her inside life every day, finding her place, and thinking, ‘This is my house, too,’ and needing no one’s invitation to make herself at home.

Watching Them Watch

I always enjoy seeing the cats take an interest in their surroundings. I think of all those living with me, Moxy and Valkyrie are the most alert most often to what is going on in the neighbourhood. They love watching the birds, the dogs across the street, people going by and, sometimes, just a leaf fluttering about (that’s usually Valk).

There’s nothing like watching a cat being entertained.

The Direction of Age

It seems that I have written a great deal lately about Neville’s aging. I think it comes from keeping an eye on him and his health a little more than I do on the others. Thus, I see the changes that come rather more often to an old animal than would to a middle-aged one, who has settled into a routine arrangement with his body.

Every morning, Neville walks his slow way down the corridor to the cat-room, which I open up as I prepare everyone’s breakfasts. There, Nev eats from Millie’s hard-food bowl. She has a different kind of food than others do; she’s used to it and, while the supply that came with her lasts, she will receive that. The Nevsky seems to like it.

But many days, he stops at the bedroom, the door of which comes first to anyone walking down the corridor. He sometimes comes in and wonders where the food-bowl is. I have to re-direct him to the cat-room.

This is a slight confusion, but one nobody else suffers. Neville’s mind is still strong, I believe, but I think he can become confused if he thinks of other things than the task at hand. He handles every other chore and desire well, but I see a bit of fog creeping in at the corners of his mind. Even so, to paraphrase what I once read, dementia isn’t forgetting where the food is, it’s forgetting what it is. The delight my old lion expresses when he sees his soft-food bowl being carried to him every meal shows that he’s a ways from that stage yet.

Another Unpleasant Time for Valkyrie

Valkyrie went to the veterinary hospital today. She has been pooping liquid crap for a couple of weeks now. I haven’t taken her to the doctor sooner because in every other respect she has been well. She runs and plays, is active and alert, is eating and generally being herself. I tried eliminating different foods from her diet, as the start of food-trials to determine if one kind is causing a problem, but so far, that has not worked. And if it were something in the nutrition that is bothering her insides, then it is a sudden change, as she hasn’t been eating anything new.

She is currently eating a gastro-intestinal food which, surprisingly, she likes. It is being laced with Metamucil - or a local brand of that product, since I couldn’t find a variety of Metamucil that wasn’t flavoured. To my further surprise, Valk is eating that, too.

We will keep her on this routine for the weekend, and see if there is any improvement. Though I am pleased that she is eating the veterinary food, I have my doubts as to whether this will cure her problem.

As an aside, it was difficult to take a picture of Miss V at the hospital as she was nervously on the move the whole time.

Sources Confirm...

At the grocery store, I ran into an acquaintance who used to live in the Cosy Apartment’s building, and who remembered Sable. She was pleased that I had Sabe with me, and that she was friends with Moxy. The acquaintance told me that she recalled that Sable was a kitten at the time of a specific house-fire in town. That was in 2013, so this puts Sable’s age at twelve or thirteen, depending on how old a kitten she was at the time.

Ferals have an average life-span of six years. Sabe’s life had been extended no doubt by the food she received from the residents of the apartment building she frequented. And if she is twelve or thirteen now, she may yet live an insider-cat’s lifespan, and perhaps, with luck, when she is very old, she may let me pet her.

Too Good to Last

I have determined that, while most veterinary supplied food is detested by all cats, there are some items that everyone likes, everyone to the exclusion of the one for whom it is meant.

Neville is usually served Recovery soft-food, but others, especially Valkyrie, will consume all of it on offer if she has a chance. That I understood. But it seems that Neville’s gastro-intestinal hard-food, which I credit, at least in part, for reducing his vomiting, is a favourite of other cats, as well. I have seen Sable eating it, and now have witnessed Indigo making one of her rare excursions from the bedroom just to indulge her taste for it. I knew something was up when whole bowls-full were disappearing while I was at work: Nev doesn’t eat enough to accomplish that and, if he did, would leave half on the floor, the result of his largely toothless - though ultimately successful - attempts to eat.

I want to leave this food out, so that Neville can nibble during the day. How to keep those who don’t need it from vacuuming up the expensive delicacy in his stead is the unanswerable question.

Not To Be Repeated

Long-time readers of this blog may recall that the rescue-group of which I am a member once took cats available for adoption to a local pet-supply shop for a few hours once a month, to show them off to potential adopters. That stopped with covid-19, and it didn’t start again, due to limited time and manpower within the group.

We thought we would try it again, just once. We don’t have as many out-going cats as we had in the past, but we thought Valkyrie would do well today. Unfortunately, that did not turn out to be the case.

Poor Valk was unnerved by the noise and the preponderance of strange animals, especially dogs. She was very nervous and did not show herself at her best. This was understandable. We did, though, meet a number of nice people, including one young boy who was very interested in cats and already knew quite a bit about them: a possible rescuer in the future.

Despite her reaction at the shop, Valkyrie was not permanently scarred. As soon as she returned to the Cosy Cabin and was released from her carrier, she began purring, and running about the house to make sure everything was where it ought to be. In a few minutes’ time, she was at the front window watching birds.

While a useful adventure for the rescue-group, it was, perhaps, not worth Valkyrie’s discomfort, so she will not be required to repeat the adventure. From now on, she will have to restrict herself to charming people from this blog.

Too Smart the Cat

Valkyrie is a very smart cat. I’ve described before how she and others use the ‘lazy Susan’ cupboards in the corners of my kitchen as secret rooms. They push in one side and it of course opens the other, allowing them to walk - or, in the case of Valkyrie, run - in.

But something the other day struck me about Valk’s interaction with the revolving cupboard. She pushed in one side as usual, but did not push it enough. There wasn’t sufficient room on the other side for her to slip in. Instead of forcing her way in, she pushed the first side again, causing the other to open more fully, allowing her greater access.

I thought about this afterward. There is a subtle difference between her latest action and others. It demonstrated something about Valk’s intelligence. It is one thing to know that an action causes a certain reaction. It is something more to understand the mechanics behind it. She realised that pushing one side of the cupboard would open the other, and that pushing one side more would open the other more. It is not simply the application of a greater - or second - force to achieve a result; it is the comprehension of how something works. Not every cat would do that; this I know from experience.

I think this is often the reason for mischievous cats. They are not more troublesome than others; they simply know how to apply their trouble to a more constructive - or destructive - end. Every day is a minor excursion into the curiosity that fuels them, and the intelligence that propels them. This is Valkyrie.

A Sign of Affection and Trust, or...

Indigo doesn’t like the other cats, but she likes me. She has decided to show me in another inconvenient way.

At night, she always sleeps next to me. Right next to me. She likes to keep her face so close to mine that her whiskers tickle me and keep me awake. But now, she’s added something else. Indigo has taken to putting her paw on my nose or mouth.

It’s one of those actions that is probably a sign of affection. Or she’s trying to smother me in my sleep. In any case, I am loathe to restrain her, as she wants to show that she likes me, or thinks of me as a kind of security. It is a gentle reminder that I am her only friend; she purrs when she does it, so she must feel some pleasure at her display of trust. Or she’s trying to smother me in my sleep. It must be rather a lonely world Indie inhabits, disdaining the company of other animals. That’s why I endeavour to spend a little time each day with each of the cats, so they won’t feel ignored, and to let them know that I reciprocate the feelings they have for me.

Even if one of them is trying to smother me in my sleep.

On Guard, Sometimes

Saturday was a chilly, rainy day, better spent indoors than out. But the birds were finding little tidbits in the eavestroughs of the neighbouring house, and Moxy, for one, was keeping a close eye on them.

Later, he saw more a little farther away. One has to be on guard all the time at the Cosy Cabin. Well, whenever one isn’t sleeping.

Millie is Small

Everything about Millie is small.

She is very light-weight, though she doesn’t seem under-weight. She has a little mouth that talks more than one would think - but in a tiny voice that can barely be heard; even her hisses are subdued. Her paws are minuscule, and it looks like she’s walking on little pins. She threw up a hairball the other day; it was the smallest hairball I’d ever seen: not more than half an inch long. Everything about Millie is small.

Except sometimes her eyes.

Watching the Complexity

Relationships among cats are interesting to observe. I have commented recently about the friendship between Moxy and Sable, probably predicated upon their acquaintance previous to coming to live with me, which may be one of the reasons why Sabe hasn’t developed any significant comradeship with Brazil and Valkyrie, while Mox, priorly an insider/outside cat, has.

Something I have noticed about Sable and Moxy just recently is that Sable seems to have more invested in the friendship than does Moxy. While the latter will approach the former, brush up against her, sniff her, Sable is the one who usually initiates physical contact. I have watched her numerous times as she comes up to the Mixer and pushes her head against his, and even licks his face. She also ‘talks’ to him; giving her distinctive short yelp several times when she sees him.

Is this the natural progression of the comfort that came from a familiar face in a strange environment? Moxy, much more socialised than Sabe, was correspondingly comfortable with being in first the Cosy Apartment and then the Cosy Cabin, and less reticent to accept as friends other cats that he found there. Sable, on the other hand, has been chased a couple of times by Brazil, and seems to have interpreted Valk’s attempts to play with her as vague threats.

And so Moxy’s appeal to Sable is understandable, just as is Moxy’s less needy response to the other cat’s displays of friendship. I don’t expect Moxy to grow tired of Sable; he doesn’t appear to be the sort to shed relationships, but rather the sort to collect them. This dynamic, though, will give Sable the time required to explore the possibilities of growing closer to other felines, and to me, while giving her an anchor in her new world.

It is clear that those who claim that cats are naturally aloof and distant simply haven’t observed, or couldn’t be bothered to observe, how these fascinating animals interact with each other. Though there may be the loner among the species, cats, like humans, enjoy and thrive in friendships, and I am fortunate to experience them in the Cosy Cabin.

Canada Day!

Happy Canada Day, everybody. Today is going to be hot here; the cats have already found their cool spots. I have the day off of work, of course, so will spend most of it with the beasts. They care little for nations and the affairs of mankind, so as long as they receive their rightful portions of food - which are rather less than they actually get, according to them - they will enjoy the holiday, as well.

Ferals in the Morning

I and a colleague at my work-place feed and water a small colony of feral cats. We conducted several operations over a few years aimed at spaying and neutering all the ferals we could catch - some may recall reading about those adventures - and we eventually got them all. Most of the kittens were put into homes. A number of the adults eventually disappeared, no doubt dying before their time, as is often the case with ferals; at least they did not reproduce before then. Those in the photographs below comprise the hard-core feral membership. In the first picture are Bijou (grey and white); Bauble (black and white facing the camera); Sonata (very dark tortoiseshell) and Fresca or Shasta (left side toward the camera; differentiating those two is very difficult); Shasta or Fresca is at the second dish, and Mirko is nearest the camera.

In the second photograph is Auvergne, who prefers to dine alone at his table for one. The third image is Auvergne when he was trapped, almost seven years ago. Perhaps tellingly, he was caught because he came to eat the bait before any of the others arrived. Even then, he was eating by himself.

All are male except for Sonata and Bauble, who, despite her slight size, produced the four last kittens I had to trap.

The ferals are doing well, considering their outsider lifestyle. Bijou has some matts but sheds the worst of them. They have suffered some visible infections but have recovered. They get along, though none seems to like Auvergne, and Mirko hisses at everyone. But at meal-times, I can pet them, and this morning, Mirko followed me after I set out the food, and asked for head-scratches. It’s the first time he’s done that. I think several of these, such as Mirk and Bijou, could be insider-cats, given a great deal of time and patience. Unfortunately, we don’t have enough foster-homes for the socialised cats who need them, never mind ferals.

But these ones are being fed, and given clean water. Where they go between meals, I cannot guess. I never see them except when food is in the offing, but I suspect they associate together in their free time. They’ve survived frigid, wet winters and dry, blazing summers, and have lasted longer than most outsiders. We’ll take care of them for as long as we can, and, if need be, and if we are able, we will see them off at the end, when their times have run out. I imagine, however, they will, one by one, simply stop showing up for meals. That will sadden me. But we all stop showing up for our meals sooner or later; it’s what we do until then that matters; whom we meet, how we behave, and whether we abandon some our disadvantageous behaviour along the way. Just like these ferals in the morning.

Wetting Belles

Since I applied the same policy to the cat-room as I had to the library - blocking off the one wall against which Millie was wetting - she has used the litter-box exclusively. I have started again allowing the other cats into the cat-room while Mills is there, but only permitting one or two at a time, if they are quiet and still. Millie is coming out more and more but still doesn’t care for the other cats, any more than they do for her. The only ones who do not hiss at her are, predictably, Moxy and Neville. However, integration can take as long as it wants; the important thing is that our soft and smooth newcomer uses the litter-boxes, instead of a wall. I hope she doesn’t realize there are three other walls in the room…

In a strange twist, I think Sable is wetting outside the litter-box, too. At first, I blamed it, unfairly I now believe, on Millie. It occurred in the library, after all, but not against a wall. It was in the middle of the floor - much less troublesome to clean up and sanitise, if no less troubling, period. I thought it had occurred when Millie sneaked downstairs during one of her excursions out of the cat-room. I closed the door to the basement thereafter when Mills was free. The second time it happened, I wondered if I had indeed closed off the downstairs. The following times, though, the puddle was under the hammock that Sable often used; indeed, the hammock was a little wet with urine. The latest time, Sabe was still in the hammock, with some fluid under it and, as I saw when she vacated the bed, some on the fabric. This had transpired despite my washing it.

This is quite recent. Whoever is doing it - and I suspect Sable now - just started. I have removed the hammock to the storeroom, and the misdeed has not been repeated. If Sable has been habitually wetting outside the box, I would have found some other examples by now; if under the bed, where she still sometimes lies, I would have smelled it. I think this is a very rare instance, and related somehow to the place (the library) and the item (the hammock). What the cause is, I cannot say. Like Millie’s problem, it will likely be forever cloaked in mystery. But I can live with unsolved puzzles if they don’t recur.

Building Her New Life

How well Sable is integrating, not just into the gang of beasts but into the house and indoor life, pleases me immensely. In these bad photographs (one takes them quickly when Sable presents the opportunity), one can see recent progress. In the first, Sable is lying just within the sitting room, which is a new spot for her; it’s more comfortable on the carpet than the hard linoleum under the dining table. She even came into the sitting room while I was in it, relaxing on the couch.

The next photo depicts Sable finishing up some left-overs while Moxy looks on. I was at the kitchen basin, just a couple of feet away.

Then there is the image of Sable and the Mixer walking together into the sitting room. A few minutes later, Moxy jumped up onto the carpeted top of the bookcase under the window. Sable didn’t follow him; she as yet lacks the confidence to do so. Mox wasn’t trying to get away from her; he just didn’t think about her not coming with him. Soon, though, I expect to see Sable jumping up to lie under the window, as the other cats do. It wasn’t long ago that she first learned to leap up onto the bed.

With the help of her friend, and the examples of the other cats, Sable continues her journey from the feral life.

Sometimes In Bad Lighting...

Sable is growing less wary of me. She still doesn’t care for me to come near, but her definition of ‘near’ is lessening. I can walk within two feet of her, and she will hurry past me within the same distance while on her way elsewhere. If I am bringing food or water, she will remain sitting or lying close by. She has also taken to lying in the sitting room, albeit close to the entrance from the dining area.

So far, I’ve found only one disadvantage to this reduction of caution. I sometimes mistake her for Imogen, and therefore approach too casually, too suddenly, causing her to take fright. Even if I pause to determine who is the black cat before me, it isn’t always clear. Sabe has a silver-tipped right ear (due to frostbite) and a notched left ear, and her tail has a crook in it. And Sable's face has rather a sad expression much of the time. But in gloom, or when her head is turned at an angle, identity is not always certain.

Though the fact that I can confuse the pair even at close quarters indicates that I can reach close quarters, and thus is a positive development, it still makes for periodic excitement.