You all know this one:

Jack and Jill
went up the hill
to fetch a pail of water

Jack fell down
and broke his crown
and Jill came tumbling after.

You'll be happy to hear that in this version, Jill didn't go tumbling after!

Jack & Jill
needed a thrill
so they went to live at Muddpuppies

The cats played and chased
but in his haste
Jack tumbled into the toilet!

Yes, it's true, the cats are doing well except for a mishap with the potty!  Megan, the manager was doing paperwork in the back room and was watching the cats running and chasing each other when suddenly Jill chased Jack into the bathroom and then there was a splash and the two ran back out with Jack leaving little wet footprints behind! 

They are still hanging out in the back room most of the time, but have figured out where their favorite toys are for sale on the shelf and keep stealing them and then hiding them under the shelves in the back!  At least they aren't tearing open bags of food which was my main concern!! 

I also took the kittens into the vet today.  They don't need to be on antibiotics, but I will be keeping a close eye on them in case they get worse.  Palermo is scheduled to be neutered a week from Friday. 

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Boy, get a day late with the weekly kitten update and I start hearing about it!  Don't worry, no bad news about kittens, only bad news about my computer!  While we were at JJ's on Friday night for the Sasha fundraiser, our computer died.  Hubby is ordering a part that will hopefully save it but for now it's out of service and we don't know if the hard drive is fried or not.  So I'm composing on my new computer now, but I haven't had time to load my camera software yet, so no picture capabilities.  The good news is that I did take kitten pictures on Monday and I beg your patience and promise to have them up as soon as possible.  But I can tell you how everyone is doing!

Koko, my oldest black kitten (around 11 weeks old now) tested positive for giardia, so he and mom KiKi were both treated with nasty-tasting medicine.  It's a good thing that I practice quarantine methods because that is something that can spread like wildfire!  Giardia causes severe diarrhea and can run them down quickly.  This kitty had needed fluids a couple of times and finally tested positive and so was able to get the help he needed.  He has an application on him, so hopefully he can finish getting healthy and go home!  His mother is usually very sweet, but she hated the medicine.  I had to do the kitty-burrito trick where you wrap them in a towel so they can't move while getting medicated.  I hate to do it, but otherwise she'd turn her head every time and waste the medicine.  Without the towel trick she did a pretty good impersonation of the possessed person in The Exorcist. 

Sasha and the babies had a big week too!  Yesterday Jack and Jill got to go live at Muddpuppies for awhile and so I did some musical chairs for kitty living arrangements.  I spent the majority of the day cleaning cat cages thoroughly including washing linens and bleaching litter boxes.  (for a good time don't call me!)  Sasha and kids got moved out of the kitty playpen and into a huge ex-pen.  (exercise pen normally used for dogs)  The babies were starting to get out of the nestbox, so I gave them a litter box with low sides and they started using it right away.  They're just 4-weeks-old now.  So on their 4-week b-day I gave them a can of food to see if they had any interest and they devoured it!  So now they have free access to all of mom's food and are enjoying their combination of mother's milk, canned food and even dry food already.  Now if I could just get them to teach Venice's kittens their table habits!  Developmentally, the kittens are starting to play and wrestle, they think they can run and take a few running steps, but then wobble a bit and sometimes fall down.  It's all so cute!  They love having all the room to be little maniacs.  Sasha is also enjoying having room to get away from them.  That's what I had been hoping for in the playpen because it has shelves for jumping up on, but she never really enjoyed them.  It's interesting how different cats like different things, most of the cats love the shelves and sit up as high as they can.  I guess she feels more comfortable with her feet on the ground.  I gave her a 2nd cat bed so that she can catch a nap away from the babies.  It's neat seeing them starting to act like individuals but then still just being one big kitty lump at bedtime.

Venice is doing well.  Still skinny, but she should bulk up when those babies finally start eating more solid food, but we did make great progress recently.  I've tried giving those babies several types of food.  They have 3 brands of dry food including Royal Canin baby formula with tiny little kibbles for tiny little mouths.  I've tried prescription Science Diet AD which most animals love, Fancy Feast which is a very palatable and smelly cat food (smellly is good in canned food if you are a cat, it's not the thing that humans want in canned food though!) and finally bought a really stinky new expensive kind.  So in the last 24 hours, we've made some good progress.  I was still seeing Florence and Palermo attack the food everytime I put it in there, so I held out the others for awhile and then got Rome to eat from the spoon and lured him to the bowl and now he eats canned food without any prompting from me (was that so hard?  c'mon cats, I just want you to eat!)  Pisa and Sicily were interested in food but had no desire to eat it on their own, so I had to give them some tough love.  They got put in a cage together without mom.  They got no food for 3 hours, then were offered AD.  Pisa had a nibble, I ended up syringe-feeding Sicily.  I left them overnight with a small amount of canned food and water.  This morning I offered fresh and Pisa nibbled, but not Sissy, so I went to Muddpuppies to check on Jack and Jill and bought a canned food called Tiki Cat.  This is the closest thing that I've found to real hunks of smelly fish.  I put a small amount on a plate for them and both cats attacked it!  So after having a good meal, they were allowed to rejoin the family.  The good news is that tonight when I opened another can of it, Florence, Palermo, Rome, Sicily and Pisa all jumped right in and were tearing off pieces of it.  Now to just get Naples to join the feeding frenzy, but she has no interest in food.  The good news is that I think she grew a little.  Hopefully with the others eating so well they're not nursing as much and leaving more for her.  I still worry about these guys, even though they've made great strides, their biggest accomplishment to me is the fact that they're still alive.  They are still very underweight and unthrifty.  I think that I'll be taking Pisa and Florence to the vet tomorrow.  Pisa seems congested and Florence had runny eyes.  We'll see what antibiotics they want me to use on such tiny babies and what sort of doses. 

Sometimes people ask what they can do to help or what sort of supplies we need.  If you are feeling generous and are in the area, Muddpuppies has a donation crate for us and I have a feeling that I'll be going through a lot of Tiki Cat food!  The cans are ninety nine cents a piece or a 12 pack is  $10.50.  It's a good excuse to stop in and visit  Jack and Jill and to buy a treat for your own pets!  Jack and Jill are doing well so far, they're hanging out in the back of the store and taking a little bit more time to get adjusted.  When I first got there to visit today, we couldn't find Jack, but he had found a spot under a shelf in the storage area and was taking a nap.  Silly boy had us all worried for nothing.  They have collars with bells on now so that Amy and Megan (the owners of the store) can tell where they are.  I'm sure they'll be obnoxiously affectionate with everyone once they feel at home.  Still it was nice getting to visit them and play and snuggle and know that I won't have to be scooping their box!

In other cat news, Belle (the 6-year-old persian/himalayan mix) and Troy (the 9-month-old black and white boy) both made the big step of moving to PetSmart.  Poor Troy was terrified and tried hiding in the spot between the litter box and the square shelf.  I made him a little fort out of the square shelf, a cat bed and a blanket - the cat bed sits inside the little box and the blanket is over the top and hanging over the front and back so that he can just barely see out and people can bend down a bit to peer in at him.  I'm sure that within a day or two he'll be at the front of the cage demanding attention.  He did have a rough day, he had to go to the vet, had a fecal that had to be direct from the source - ouchie!  (his friend Gabriella still has loose stool, so I wanted to make sure he didn't have anything), got microchipped and had his shots - poor guy, to go through that and then have to deal with PetSmart!   I brought Belle up there last night and she seems to have settled in well.  She is probably enjoying not having to see all the other kitties around.  Toledo and Uno are still at PetSmart but are sharing a cage and getting along great!  It would be neat to see them go home together.  I never would've expected them to make such a cute couple.

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What a gorgeous day on Saturday.  I had company in town and we didn't expect many adoptions other than kittens, so I wasn't really worried about missing the day, but they had great luck without me!  Unfortunately we didn't have very good luck with the kittens, but quite a few older kitties got to go home instead!  That's always amazing this time of the year.

Dogs: Trixie, Selena & Sage

Cats: Steak & Shake, Ella, Capone, Toffee, Tres, Tyra, Marissa & Taylor

Trixie: lovely older golden doodle, came into foster care when her owner moved into a nursing home and couldn't care for her anymore

Selena: read our dog foster blog to find out lots about her - the link is over in my link section on the right, a long term foster with lots of energy who turned into a really nice dog with the right guidance, she really bloomed once Laurie was able to spend extra time working with her

Sage: what an awesome temperment and a beautiful dog, I forgot what mix they said she was, my best guess would be husky/lab/border collie and a little Heinz 57 for good measure

Steak & Shake: we're all amazed that this long-term resident at PetSmart got adopted!  She was scared when she first arrived, then spunky but soon mellowed out into a sweet but very playful cat.  She found a perfect match - the family has another young cat with the same personality so they'll have each other to wrestle and entertain!

Ella: sweet grey cat that came from a desperate call from an animal control officer who didn't want her in the kill shelter (Ella was pregnant, but wouldn't care for her kittens so another mom is raising them and she's off to enjoy a new home, smart cat!)

Capone: our sweet siamese bob-tail boy wanted to be an only cat and got his wish!  The family had just lost their 16-year-old cat and needed another one to fill the void.  Capone made himself right at home and has eased their burden quite a bit!

Toffee: one of our early mothers this year, weaned her kittens and found a home before most of the other kittens are even ready for adoption!  She got to go home with Tres!

Tres: our grey tripod cat with 3 legs.  Someone saw him get hit by a car and stopped to pick him up.  The good samaritan paid for the medical bills including the amputation of the injured leg.  His resident cats were not as charitable and wouldn't accept Tres, so he found us and we were able to find a great home for a wonderful guy!

Tyra: our only kitten adoption for the day!  We have plenty left for next week, so if you're looking for a kitten, let us know!

Marissa: a kitty that I got around New Year's but that had to be quarrantined for 3 months due to an exposure to feline leukemia.  A daughter of one of our volunteers agreed to foster her and of course fell in love and couldn't bear to part with her.  I guess my plan worked!  I didn't know if she'd keep her or not, but the good news is that Marissa tested negative and found a home!

Taylor: beautiful black cat with a winning personality.  I helped one of our volunteers pick her from animal control and she was the fast adoption that we figured she would be.  What a sweetie!

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I went a bit overboard on buying cat toys clearance toys after Christmas and when I really started putting them away I thought I'd lost my mind.  But now I remember why I need so many - kittens are stupid!  I can't tell you how many I've thrown away in the last week after fishing them out of the litterbox!  So while I'm glad that I have cheap toys for them to burn through, I'll play with my new, more expensive toy!  My hubby agreed to let me buy a new camera that I've been drooling over for quite some time.  So of course I had to take some pictures to see how it worked!

Tulips

There is a reason that spring if my favorite season.  I love going out to my garden everyday and seeing what else has come back to life.  It's hard to imagine that all of that is laying under the surface for the rest of the year.  I have now officially documented all of the plants in my yard and have a couple hundred pictures to prove it!

Lexi

This is my Lexi, she's hard to get pictures of because she's afraid of the camera.  I took this with my zoom lens from across the yard.  Poor baby has come so far - she used to be afraid of her own shadow, but a few of the old fears remain.  The next picture is my old man Jake.  He's 13 this year which is getting up there for a collie mix.  He's starting to slow down, he still pulls like crazy and is ready to go on a walk, but by the end, he's walking behind me.  That's never happened before.

Jake

Now for the moment you've been waiting for - kitten pictures!  Today's photo-shoot victims were Rome and Pisa.  I get a lot of comments on Pisa, so I thought I'd keep shooting her, and she's always so willing to cooperate!  They're 7-weeks-old here and not nearly as big as they should be.  Only Palermo and Florence have mastered eating out of a dish so far, but they all seem to be doing better with the litter box.  Another developmental milestone is that these guys seem to understand gravity now!  Before when I'd put them up on the platform that is my little kitty photo studio, they'd just run for the edges and I'd have to catch them.  Now they'd stop and look over and decide that they better stay on top.  Much easier to photograph them when you can actually do things like focus the camera instead of catching kittens!

Pisa

This is also the age where if they're not extremely healthy, they start looking a little gross.  Here Pisa has a little albon stuck in her fur, that's the medicine for the loose stool.  It'll come out eventually!  The good news is that Pisa has gotten much more active and has really been playing hard, which you'll see right now.

Wrestlemania

Don't worry, Rome defended himself, but at this point he was so focused on the new toy that he just wanted her to go away.  Too bad you can't hear how he's growling at her like such a big boy.  There was even a hiss at the end - too cute!  Rome is the only boy from the original litter and loves to explore.  In fact when I open their door I have to make sure that I catch him first or he's off and can take a long time to find again!  I love this picture - the toy is almost as big as he is! 

Rometoy

Rome

Here's Rome just looking scruffy and cute!  He had just been wrestling and tumbled into the water bowl, so he's almost dry in this picture. His right front foot was the worst off, it's still soaking!

Jack

Jack and Jill are also hard to get pictures of, they just never sit still!  I had taken these guys from a foster home that wanted to get out of keeping cats and these guys have had loose stool pretty much their whole lives.  We think food allergies are to blame.  Jack is finally firm and Jill has gotten much better.  They're ready for a new home.  Who ever adopts them will be lucky, they are very cool cats!  Very loving and they go crazy over toys!  It's so much fun to give them new toys because they'll play with anything and just get so into their little games!  They just need special food amd combine that with them being black and having the loose stool history (even though they're very good about using the box), it won't be easy to find them a home.

Jill

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Sasha3weeks!

It's everyone's favorite time - kitten pictures!  I didn't have much time today, so I just quickly got some shots of Sasha's babies, exactly one week after the last pictures which makes them 3 weeks and 2 days old.  I'm trying to use the basket to show them growing - last week I picked them up and put them on the edge of the basket.  This week they have enough control to sit up and look out for themselves!  They're starting to explore more and have ended up on the outside of the nestbox, then they mournfully meow until Sasha or I help them back in.  Next week they should be crawling out on a regular basis!

Venice's kittens are hanging in there.  They have roundworms, but I already started treatment for that.  I'm still doing supplemental feedings.  Palermo is still the biggest and strongest.  He  could potentially get adopted on "schedule", the rest will have to linger here longer while they bulk up to weigh enough to get spayed.  I do think that they all looked a little better tonight, so I'm hoping they've made a decision to rally. 

Koko the black kitten had another fecal today and has giardia.  That's a big part of why we have to keep new cats caged and isolated.  Luckily he hasn't been allowed to run free and so it's contained.  He starts treatment for it tomorrow and hopefully can be adopted soon. 

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Earthday!

I hope you had a happy and meaningful Earth Day!  We celebrated as a family by helping a group clean a park.  It was a glorious day to be outside and the kids loved playing in the water discovering all kinds of things like really cool fossils and lots of trash!  We won an award for the most interesting trash - someone's credit card that expired in 1978!  I also found a roll of film that had been exposed and was quite weathered, we found where someone had dumped a whole load of bricks into the creek and even a whole bunch of plastic leaves were scattered about!  But the biggest thing that we found is what ties my Earth Day experience into the realm of saving animals.  We found tons of rusting metal things and plastic! 

A couple of the kids helping out found things like an old tire and a cell phone in the water, one found an old rusty hubcap.  All of those things contaminate the water for the wildlife that depend on it as a drinking source.  But the plastic is what really does the damage.  I couldn't begin to count the number of plastic bags that we found!  Some animals end up ingesting it and it can block their intestines.  Other animals get wrapped up in the plastic and suffocate or are greatly impaired by carrying the plastic around for a long time.  I saw a picture of a turtle who had gotten a six-pack holder around his middle and his shell grew around it as if he was wearing a tight belt.

I really hope that everyone will stop to reflect about what Earth Day means.  To me it is leaving as little impact on my environment as possible and to make careful choices.  Our society has gotten to be so numb to things being disposable, is it any wonder that they feel like they can just chuck out their pets when they tire of them?  Why can't you upgrade to the newest kittens each spring just like the new mobile phones? 

Do your part for the planet that we live on.  When you think about recycling, include pets into that philosophy.  Adopt, don't shop and adopt for life.  Now that we're all doing the right thing by the pets, don't forget to use resources wisely - like don't waste water and electricity and make sure that you fill that recycling bin each week!  I come from a state where it is illegal to put recycleable materials into a landfill and so it shocks me how few people recycle in this state.  It's so easy and once it become habit, it's so effortless and you'll be amazed at the volume of trash you can keep out of a landfill.  It makes me very happy to think about all the plastic things that can be recycled so that we don't have to always start with raw materials!   

If you won't do it for yourself, make the world a better place for your pets!   

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It was a slow day, but we have some adoptions to report that didn't exactly happen as part of our adoption day.  The theme today seems to be adoptions of animals that were older and/or returned. 

Dogs: Simon, Rodeo

Cats: Mosaic, Pepper, Sinatra & Princess Annaliese

Simon: adorable little beagle, hopefully he picked a good new family, poor guy has been bounced around a bit between homes and is hoping to stick a landing in one forever

Rodeo: I think we had him down as a catahoula mix - very cool looking white dog with spots.  His poor new mama was so excited to be getting him that she got there very early and had to wait for awhile, then her sister came up to meet her new dog-nephew and you could tell that he was going to be welcomed into this family with open arms!

Sinatra: he officially got adopted today, he had been out on a trial basis, which we very rarely do, but this was someone that we knew and who works at PetSmart.  She adopted the cat for her grandmother and we wanted to make sure that grandma wanted a cat and was able to handle it before we made it official.  Sinatra spends all of his time following her around and napping with her - a great arrangement for both.  And the adoption is in the employees name because when grandma can no longer care for him, she will take him in and keep him for life.  You can see why we went to extra lengths to make sure that this was going to be good for the family and the cat. Sinatra is a 5-year-old Himalayan that I pulled from death row at a shelter.

Sinatra!

Mosaic: beautiful long-haired dilute calico that got returned with a rare gum disease.  After seeing a specialist for the condition she was ready for a new home and got adopted during the week.

Pepper: another returned kitty got his forever home, we knew he'd go fast, he was only at PetSmart for less than a week and was young, friendly and declawed - not even on the website yet!

Princess Annaliese: Our big surprise adoption!  At 8-years-old, she got returned in November for having accidents with loose stool.  Barium x-rays showed Inflamatory Bowel Disease which is now under control!  She had been being fostered at MuddPuppies and a woman who owns a shop in the plaza fell in love with her.  I think they're going to miss her at the store and so will all of her fans!  She had quite a few people who came in just to see her.  Hopefully they'll like the next kitty that gets to live there.

Princessmp!

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I've been preparing for the worst with Venice's kittens - runty kittens make me nervous.  They're just so delicate.  I've been syringe feeding them to make sure that they have enough nutrition, but they're just not growing.  Everytime I go near them, I do a quick count and a sigh of relief when I see six still moving around.  What I wasn't even remotely prepared for was an emergency call from PetSmart about one of my adult cats.

Gracie!

Gracie has been up there for about three weeks now.  She'd always been a very quiet kitty, seemed wise beyond her years.  She liked to snuggle but wasn't crazy about the other cats, so she prefered hanging out in her cat playpen instead of actually playing.  People have been saying that she was acting depressed at PetSmart, but still eating and drinking and using the litter box.  Today someone noticed that she was panting, so the vets were called over immediately and right away they could tell something was wrong, so they called me.  I rushed her to our vet who did x-rays and determined that she was a very sick girl.  She had a hernia in her diaphragm and her intestines had gone through the hole and were wrapped around her heart.  After consulting with two vets and several of our officers, we made the hard decision to end her suffering.  Her only shot at survival would be a trip to Columbia and would be very expensive and chances weren't good for a full recovery.  The time and money weren't the main part of my decision - I've done plenty of crazy things for these cats and if I knew that going to Columbia would've saved her and that she wouldn't suffer I would've done it in a heartbeat.   I stayed with her until the end and wished I could've done more for her.  At least she didn't die outside and alone.  I'm still just shocked that she's gone.  This condition is very rare, one vet today said that she'd only seen this once before and another vet said that it wasn't something that a private practice could handle.  The longer you do this and the more cats cross your doorstep, the greater your chances of running into the medical oddities, yet to me she was just a gorgeous girl who got a bad deal in life. 

While I was up saying goodbye to Gracie, I said hello to another cat.  Her owner got a divorce and moved to an apartment that doesn't allow cats.  She gave the cat to her mother who couldn't care for her anymore.  She felt bad that the cat was full of mats and that she couldn't afford to get her groomed and felt it was best to find her a new home.  She's a sweetie.  My daughter and I are still debating about names - some possibilities are Cinderella, Belle or Charlotte.  We're pretty sure that there's a princess hiding in there somewhere.  She's six years old and will be gorgeous when her coat is in better shape.  We groomed out several mats at the vet's office, but her coat is very dry and will get better with grooming and a richer diet.  She is a persian/himalayan mix.  No time to grieve, there's always another cat that needs me.

Persian!

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GolfLooksEasyhh

Enjoy this little video about golf!  You may ask why am I including a golf highlights reel on my cat blog, but the answer is simple!  We're having our first ever golf tournament on Friday, May 16th.  Please visit our website for more information www.heartlandhumanemo.homestead.com.  We need teams to play and sponsors for the event.  Door prizes, raffle baskets and hole sponsors would be greatly appreciated.  It's a friendly game, so even if you're not a great golfer, come on out anyway!

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Sorry that the weekend kitten photo shoot was late this week - I was camping with the Girl Scouts.  The good news is that the girls came out much better than some of the parents who had trouble letting them go!  But we had fun even though it was cold and rainy.  Luckily the kittens were all warm inside!  And while we were camping, one of our foster homes had another litter born - 3 solid blacks and 3 solid greys!  Hopefully those will be the colors that people want this year since we have so many of them!

Sashababies!

Here are Sasha's babies at 2 weeks + 2 days old.  Eyes are open and they are crawling around, but for the most part are content to just lay in a big pile in their nest box.  They're starting to be able to lift their bodies up, but don't properly walk yet; it's more of an army crawl.  Their eyes are so blue!  They also got moved to a new house yesterday, not that they would really know it.  I had them in a cage that I like for birthing, it's quiet and dark and protected from drafts, but not much room for mama.  For the first couple of weeks, mama doesn't need much room, but she's starting to want a few moments without her babies, so they're in a cat playpen now so mama can jump and stretch a lot more!  The whole nest box just got transfered over, so no big change for the kittens except that it's brighter now. 

Sashababies1!

Venice!

Venice's babies are about 6-weeks-old now and are struggling a bit.  If you look carefully, you can find all 5 of the kittens nursing in this picture!  You can also see the difference between the big kittens and the runts.  The orange boy is the biggest (Palermo) while Pisa, the black and white next to him is just tiny in comparison.  The poor calico stuck under Palermo!  Once and awhile I'll get a litter that just doesn't figure out that the food bowl is for them too.  So I've started supplementing them with canned food through a syringe.  4 out of 6 think this is a wonderful idea and can't wait for more.  The other 2 think that it's strange to not have milk in their mouths, why are you giving me this stuff?  But I can tell the difference since I've started supplementing and hopefully they'll all have a big growth spurt and start eating on their own!  In the mean time, I'm also giving the runts a couple of nursing sessions a day without the bullies around. 

Pisa!

Pisa is the runtiest, but her other natural siblings aren't far behind her.  This picture just cracked me up!

Florence!

Florence is a runt but not for long!  She loves the canned food and it won't be long until she realizes that the stuff comes in a bowl too!  She's going to be longer-haired and already enjoys a good snuggle!

Palermo!

In one week Palermo has gone from looking like an over-stuffed hamster who could barely get his belly off the ground to a playful little scamp who likes to start trouble!  It's hard to fathom that in 2-3 weeks he could be big enough to get neutered and then adopted! 

Palermo1!

Coffee

This adorable little pup is at our vet's office and looking for a home.  She's hopefully getting spayed today and then will be ready for adoption!

Toilet!

I thought you might like a little "potty humor" and no, this isn't at my house!  My pets don't drink from toilets - I was able to train my kids from an early age to always put the lid down (now if they'd remember to flush 100% of the time, but at least the lid is down!)  She just looks like she really enjoyed that drink!  Many of you know Possum, and it's a good thing that she's not a dog or you'd have to worry about getting a kiss from her!

Possum!

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