# Strange cat.



## Racing roadkill (17 Nov 2019)

There’s a cat, that’s been hanging around my place recently. It may be a stray, it doesn’t seem to go far from my house, and seems very friendly. I’ve been feeding it, and it seems happy enough. Last night I was lounging around on my recliner, after a 100 mile ride, and it started making itself at home, whilst I was trying to watch a movie.









It had muddy feet, because it had been out and about, hence the towel. So it looks like I’ve been adopted by a cat then.


----------



## roadrash (17 Nov 2019)

certainly looks like you are the chosen one, at least until it decides otherwise of course


----------



## stephec (17 Nov 2019)

There's a cat that's started prowling round our garden, nicely groomed so probably not a stray.

It tends to keep it's distance though and isn't very friendly. I did think of feeding it but if I'm successful there could be a little old lady somewhere wondering why her cat hasn't come home for days. 

Shame as I like cats but my little girl is allergic.


----------



## Salty seadog (17 Nov 2019)

stephec said:


> There's a cat that's started prowling round our garden, nicely groomed so probably not a stray.
> 
> It tends to keep it's distance though and isn't very friendly. I did think of feeding it but if I'm successful there could be a little old lady somewhere wondering why her cat hasn't come home for days.
> 
> Shame as I like cats but my little girl is allergic.



Maybe a swap.


----------



## raleighnut (17 Nov 2019)

We've had 2 cats adopt us, nearly 3 but Mao from next door doesn't count (she still goes home)


----------



## Globalti (17 Nov 2019)

Cats have no loyalty if they think they can get better food elsewhere, or at least better food until they succeed in killing and eating you, which is what they secretly hope.


----------



## winjim (17 Nov 2019)

So you've stolen somebody's pet.


----------



## Drago (17 Nov 2019)

Might be worth getting a vet or kennels to scan it for a microchip. That notwithstanding, it seems to have adopted you.

Sprocket would be a good name for a cat.


----------



## Racing roadkill (17 Nov 2019)

winjim said:


> So you've stolen somebody's pet.


Nope, 100 percent it’s decision. When it first turned up, we thought it was a kitten, because it was so small and scraggy looking, within 2 weeks, it had nearly doubled in size, and it looks like it was a seriously neglected / stray / whatever, adult cat. It’s free to come and go as it pleases, it seems to like it at my place. “Stealing a cat”  good luck with that.


----------



## Racing roadkill (17 Nov 2019)

Drago said:


> Might be worth getting a vet or kennels to scan it for a microchip. That notwithstanding, it seems to have adopted you.
> 
> Sprocket would be a good name for a cat.


I took it to an animal shelter just up the road, to check, and it doesn’t have a chip. It seems happy enough here.


----------



## Racing roadkill (17 Nov 2019)

Globalti said:


> Cats have no loyalty if they think they can get better food elsewhere, or at least better food until they succeed in killing and eating you, which is what they secretly hope.


True. It brought me a dead sparrow last week. I don’t really do dead sparrow, but it doesn’t know that, and it’s just trying to help me, because I’m obviously crap at catching sparrows.


----------



## Drago (17 Nov 2019)

Its adopted you as part of its brood. You're supposed to eat the dead sparrow.


----------



## Drago (17 Nov 2019)

BTW, you are Danny Huston AICMFP.


----------



## screenman (17 Nov 2019)

The cat has found another slave.


----------



## Racing roadkill (17 Nov 2019)

Drago said:


> BTW, you are Danny Huston AICMFP.


You have a point. People are always trying to take ‘sly’ photo’s, and I’ve never got it, until now Although he’s a fair bit older than me.


----------



## fossyant (17 Nov 2019)

A lad I was out with today said their cat had moved 'in' to their house. They even knew who were the original owners were and did speak to them about it. My neighbour's cat spends most of it's time at another neighbour's in the corner of the cul de sac.


----------



## MartinQ (17 Nov 2019)

https://thecatgallery.co.uk/collections/t-shirts/products/at-least-the-cat-loves-me-t-shirt-navy


----------



## Chris S (17 Nov 2019)

Drago said:


> BTW, you are Danny Huston AICMFP.


He looks more like Morrissey from The Smiths.


----------



## Chris S (17 Nov 2019)

screenman said:


> The cat has found another slave.


We used to have a cat that used to come in, get fed and then leave.


----------



## Racing roadkill (17 Nov 2019)

MartinQ said:


> https://thecatgallery.co.uk/collections/t-shirts/products/at-least-the-cat-loves-me-t-shirt-navy
> 
> View attachment 493258


Yep, that’s about right


----------



## Racing roadkill (17 Nov 2019)

Cats aren’t loyal, they are psychopaths. As long as you get that, everybody’s happy.


----------



## Mrs M (17 Nov 2019)

Congratulations, you have been chosen


----------



## Reynard (3 Dec 2019)

Cata are very talented at upgrading their lifestyle. Smart wee things. Welcome to the fantastic world of being a cat owner slave 

I would still be inclined to make a few local inquiries to check he or she doesn't belong to someone - just in case, although going by what you say @Racing roadkill it doesn't seem likely.

Plus looking at neutering if it hasn't been done already. If a boy hasn't had a pompomectomy it's pretty obvious, both from a visual and olfactory perspective. Girls are more difficult, but if a girl suddenly becomes markedly more affectionate and has a predilection for shoving her bum in your face, then likely she hasn't been spayed. Oh, and she might get a bit operatic as well...


----------



## Racing roadkill (3 Dec 2019)

When she first turned up, she really was very scrawny, and neglected looking. She ate like a horse, and spent a lot of time making herself at home, she nearly doubled her size, then disappeared as quickly as she had appeared. We have a theory that she may have been accidentally abandoned, and was trying to find where the people that had owned her had gone. There was no chip, or collar or anything, but she was showing behaviour that indicated she wasn’t a stray. Anyway, she did a disappearing act, and hasn’t re appeared. However, another cat has appeared, and started to make himself at home as well, but we think we know who this one belongs to, and is just being a cheeky sod. There were a few bits of cat food and the like, left from the last visitor, and he’s finished those off, so that’s a bonus.












This one is as daft as a brush, and sort of ‘snorts’ rather than meows when he wants something, which is hilarious. He comes and goes, but doesn’t spend all night indoors, like the other one did, this one isn’t at all neglected either.


----------



## alicat (3 Dec 2019)

Racing roadkill said:


> This one is as daft as a brush, and sort of ‘snorts’ rather than meows when he wants something, which is hilarious. He comes and goes, but doesn’t spend all night indoors, like the other one did, this one isn’t at all neglected either.



I read somewhere that miaowing is cats attempting to talk 'human', rather than something they do to communicate to other cats. Perhaps your latest visitor didn't get that memo.


----------



## Chris S (3 Dec 2019)

I saw something on TV saying that cats don't meow at other cats. They've obviously never seen two cats on a fence blocking each others way.


----------



## glasgowcyclist (3 Dec 2019)

Racing roadkill said:


> Anyway, she did a disappearing act, and hasn’t re appeared. However, another cat has appeared, and started to make himself at home as well



Your address has clearly been added to a feline database of Air BnB scammers.


----------



## Reynard (3 Dec 2019)

Racing roadkill said:


> When she first turned up, she really was very scrawny, and neglected looking. She ate like a horse, and spent a lot of time making herself at home, she nearly doubled her size, then disappeared as quickly as she had appeared. We have a theory that she may have been accidentally abandoned, and was trying to find where the people that had owned her had gone. There was no chip, or collar or anything, but she was showing behaviour that indicated she wasn’t a stray. Anyway, she did a disappearing act, and hasn’t re appeared.



This worries me... Sounds like she may have been pregnant, and has probably holed up somewhere to give birth...


----------



## johnblack (3 Dec 2019)

This is Bear, he turned up one night about 5 years ago, wouldn't leave. we asked around the village, put it on FB and no takers. When we eventually went to the vets with him they contacted the owners on the chip and got no response. He has an amazing appetite for rats, squirrels and rabbits, eats the lot. You don't choose cats, they choose you.


----------



## glasgowcyclist (3 Dec 2019)

johnblack said:


> You don't choose cats, they choose you.




Aye. Dogs have masters, cats have staff.


----------



## Racing roadkill (3 Dec 2019)

Reynard said:


> This worries me... Sounds like she may have been pregnant, and has probably holed up somewhere to give birth...


We did consider that, but when the vet looked for a chip, she didn’t think the cat was pregnant.


----------



## Reynard (3 Dec 2019)

Racing roadkill said:


> We did consider that, but when the vet looked for a chip, she didn’t think the cat was pregnant.



Mmmmok. 

It's hard to tell in the first three weeks anyway.


----------



## Racing roadkill (19 Dec 2019)

Curiouser and curiouser said Alice.
This was in my local rag today.
https://www.dailyecho.co.uk/news/18...s-get-second-chance-life-found-box-eastleigh/
They were found just about a mile from my house, and the daft looking tabby one, looks very similar to the cat that was hanging around a while back. The timing would have been about right too, and it would explain her behaviour.


----------



## oldwheels (20 Dec 2019)

We used to joke that we had half a cat. He had been a stray and adopted by our upstairs neighbour but was still very timid. When she went off on holiday we looked after the cat but to save the faff of going upstairs I eventually persuaded him with quite an effort to come into our house to get fed. When she returned he went off back home again but came to visit us from time to time. It reached the stage that when we went away he sat on his home windowsill but as soon as our van arrived back he was off downstairs like a shot to greet us and had to be persuaded unsuccessfully that he really lived upstairs and that it was not just his feeding station. Eventually we got him full time when his keeper moved away.


----------



## MartinQ (20 Dec 2019)

Racing roadkill said:


> Curiouser and curiouser said Alice.
> This was in my local rag today.
> https://www.dailyecho.co.uk/news/18...s-get-second-chance-life-found-box-eastleigh/
> They were found just about a mile from my house, and the daft looking tabby one, looks very similar to the cat that was hanging around a while back. The timing would have been about right too, and it would explain her behaviour.



Small world, we lived in Bishopstoke for a few years.


----------



## Racing roadkill (20 Dec 2019)

oldwheels said:


> We used to joke that we had half a cat. He had been a stray and adopted by our upstairs neighbour but was still very timid. When she went off on holiday we looked after the cat but to save the faff of going upstairs I eventually persuaded him with quite an effort to come into our house to get fed. When she returned he went off back home again but came to visit us from time to time. It reached the stage that when we went away he sat on his home windowsill but as soon as our van arrived back he was off downstairs like a shot to greet us and had to be persuaded unsuccessfully that he really lived upstairs and that it was not just his feeding station. Eventually we got him full time when his keeper moved away.


That’s a typical cat then.
I’m going to the animal shelter where these cats were taken, later today to see if I can adopt the tabby, as soon as it’s ready.


----------



## raleighnut (21 Dec 2019)

Racing roadkill said:


> That’s a typical cat then.
> I’m going to the animal shelter where these cats were taken, later today to see if I can adopt the tabby, as soon as it’s ready.


That's good, very few people adopt older cats whereas kittens are easy to home.


----------



## Racing roadkill (21 Dec 2019)

raleighnut said:


> That's good, very few people adopt older cats whereas kittens are easy to home.


I think you may have mis understood there. The older tabby isn’t at the shelter, presumably it’s back where it lives, the kittens are at the shelter, it’s the tabby kitten I’m looking to re home.


----------



## Mike_P (21 Dec 2019)

I had a new neighbour who had a cat, or so I thought as I was completely fooled by seeing it down the road and then when I got home seeing it in her back garden. Eventually I found out their were two from the same litter and the one that was always in the back garden (Oscar) had been hit by a car and had survived on probably it's eighth life. It could hardly walk and one day I saw another cat looking for a fight with him, so took aim at the aggressor with a stone. Those who say cats have no feelings were subsequently proved wrong.
When he had enough strength to walk and jump he immediately sought me out and would spend hours almost glued to me. One weekend I was asked to look after them and as soon as I got home Oscar bounded into my house and sat at the top of the staircase no doubt hoping I would put his towel on the bed, it had got to the point that he would not go onto the bed without his towel being on it. I said "I was hoping you were next door, I've got to feed you", he cocked his head to one side and gave my remark some consideration, walked out of my house and jumped on the shed overlooking the neighbours back door. Proof if there ever was they can understand what is being said to them.


----------



## raleighnut (21 Dec 2019)

Racing roadkill said:


> I think you may have mis understood there. The older tabby isn’t at the shelter, presumably it’s back where it lives, the kittens are at the shelter, it’s the tabby kitten I’m looking to re home.


Ahh, I had the feeling mum and kittens were at the shelter,


----------



## Racing roadkill (21 Dec 2019)

Mike_P said:


> Proof if there ever was they can understand what is being said to them.


Right up to the point where you say “don’t you flipping dare ( insert thing you know damn well they are going to do anyway)” then they suddenly stop understanding.


----------



## MartinQ (21 Dec 2019)

Me trying to be an influencer .... :-)

https://genkigear.com/product/cat-moralities-unisex-t-shirt


----------



## Reynard (21 Dec 2019)

Racing roadkill said:


> Curiouser and curiouser said Alice.
> This was in my local rag today.
> https://www.dailyecho.co.uk/news/18...s-get-second-chance-life-found-box-eastleigh/
> They were found just about a mile from my house, and the daft looking tabby one, looks very similar to the cat that was hanging around a while back. The timing would have been about right too, and it would explain her behaviour.



As I said... 

Glad you're looking at adopting a kitten though. Would recommend having a quiet word with the shelter about trying to do a TNR on mum to prevent any more kittens xxx


----------



## Reynard (21 Dec 2019)

Mike_P said:


> Proof if there ever was they can understand what is being said to them.



Oh yes. There's definitely a good brain to a cat although I find that the girls tend to be brighter than the boys by some margin.



Racing roadkill said:


> Right up to the point where you say “don’t you flipping dare ( insert thing you know damn well they are going to do anyway)” then they suddenly stop understanding.



That too. I have a tortie.  And a blue & white who *thinks* she's a tortie.


----------



## Racing roadkill (21 Dec 2019)

Reynard said:


> As I said...
> 
> Glad you're looking at adopting a kitten though. Would recommend having a quiet word with the shelter about trying to do a TNR on mum to prevent any more kittens xxx


I’d agree, but we don’t know where mum is.


----------



## Reynard (21 Dec 2019)

Racing roadkill said:


> I’d agree, but we don’t know where mum is.



Likely she won't have gone too far - entire females tend to have a smallish range, unlike entire males, whose territory can be as big as a couple of square miles.

Wouldn't hurt you to mention it though.


----------



## Racing roadkill (21 Dec 2019)

Reynard said:


> Likely she won't have gone too far - entire females tend to have a smallish range, unlike entire males, whose territory can be as big as a couple of square miles.
> 
> Wouldn't hurt you to mention it though.


Given the lay of the land, I’d guess mummy is at ‘home’. ‘Home’ didn’t want the rug rats, and that’s why we are where we are. Even if these ones have dibs on them, there’s about 30 kittens there that need a home ( and a few older cats ). The only problem with the older cats is that they usually won’t live as long as the kittens, which means more frequent visits to the shelters. That’s not a bad thing per se, but I’d rather have a kitten which I can mould into the psychotic killer I want it to be


----------



## fossyant (21 Dec 2019)

Racing roadkill said:


> it’s the tabby kitten I’m looking to re home.



Only one !


----------



## Reynard (21 Dec 2019)

Racing roadkill said:


> Given the lay of the land, I’d guess mummy is at ‘home’. ‘Home’ didn’t want the rug rats, and that’s why we are where we are. Even if these ones have dibs on them, there’s about 30 kittens there that need a home ( and a few older cats ). The only problem with the older cats is that they usually won’t live as long as the kittens, which means more frequent visits to the shelters. That’s not a bad thing per se, but I’d rather have a kitten which I can mould into the psychotic killer I want it to be



Oh yeah, that's pretty well much the crux of the matter - it's a frustratingly common story when you volunteer for a rescue. All because someone can't be arsed to neuter their cat, or want them to have "just one litter" etc...

That's how I ended up with Madam Poppy - she was an unwanted kitten. I'll have had her for 10 years on Christmas Eve.  She came here at three and a half months of age, although she's hardly a psychotic killer - more a neurotic, paranoid tortie lump... 

Lexi is my psychotic killer, and she came here as a young adult - she was an emergency foster as we had run out of cat pens (we were in the process of taking 42 cats out of one house here in Ely) and she sort of... stayed...


----------



## Reynard (21 Dec 2019)

fossyant said:


> Only one !



Well, everyone knows that the best toy for a kitten is... another kitten...


----------



## Racing roadkill (21 Dec 2019)

Reynard said:


> Well, everyone knows that the best toy for a kitten is... another kitten...


K+1?


----------



## fossyant (21 Dec 2019)

Racing roadkill said:


> K+1?



K+1+1+1+1 in this house.


----------



## Milzy (21 Dec 2019)

If it was happy with a family it wouldn’t be a traitor to them. Maybe been abandoned. Usually it’s the pedigrees who’ve been chipped.


----------



## Reynard (21 Dec 2019)

Milzy said:


> Usually it’s the pedigrees who’ve been chipped.



Nope, not necessarily. It's been Cats Protection policy for the last five years or so to chip every cat that comes through its doors.

Every cat I've had since 1998 has been chipped - and they've all been non-pedigree.  It's something that's always made perfect sense to me.


----------



## roadrash (21 Dec 2019)

I wouldn't dream of having a cat that wasn't chipped, just for my own peace of mind


----------



## Mrs M (21 Dec 2019)

Every cat from SSPCA also come chipped.


----------



## Racing roadkill (22 Dec 2019)

70 quid for an adult cat apparently. There’s a deaf, white 5 year old that needs a home. She’s a sweetheart, I don’t like the name they’ve given her, but I can call her whatever I like, she can’t hear me anyway. She’s an option for sure.


----------



## Mike_P (22 Dec 2019)

Racing roadkill said:


> There’s a deaf, white 5 year old that needs a home. She’s a sweetheart, I don’t like the name they’ve given her, but I can call her whatever I like, she can’t hear me anyway. She’s an option for sure.


Might be worth considering neither can you tell her off, not they normally take much notice admittedly.


----------



## Reynard (22 Dec 2019)

Racing roadkill said:


> 70 quid for an adult cat apparently. There’s a deaf, white 5 year old that needs a home. She’s a sweetheart, I don’t like the name they’ve given her, but I can call her whatever I like, she can’t hear me anyway. She’s an option for sure.



£70 basically covers spay, vaccinations and wormer / flea treatment, so that's not bad at all.

She'll want to be kept as indoor only though, for obvious reasons.

A friend of mine has a deaf white girl. Dora is as mad as a box of frogs - she loves to sit in bags, perch on shoulders, play with the drippy tap and just adores cuddles and attention. She's brilliant at responding to touch though, and most cats will learn hand signals whether they're deaf or not.

Having said that, deaf cats can respond to sounds that they can "feel" through their paw pads and their whiskers, e.g. a loud hand clap or something of that ilk...


----------



## DCLane (22 Dec 2019)

One of my son's* two cats is mute, but not deaf. Usually that's good except when it got stuck in the shed.

* My eldest who's at university, but has had to leave them behind.


----------



## Racing roadkill (5 Jan 2020)

In an unexpected twist. The mummy cat has reappeared in the last couple of days, carrying on as if she’d not been anywhere. Standard cat then


----------



## Reynard (5 Jan 2020)

Well, cats *are* creatures of habit... 

Worth getting her trapped and spayed given she's turned up again. At this time of year, she could well be preggers again pretty much PDQ.


----------



## raleighnut (6 Jan 2020)

Reynard said:


> Well, cats *are* creatures of habit...
> 
> Worth getting her trapped and spayed given she's turned up again. At this time of year, she could well be preggers again pretty much PDQ.


Yep, 'Lord Fluffington' has taken to prowling at night again, he is a lad.


----------



## Reynard (6 Jan 2020)

raleighnut said:


> Yep, 'Lord Fluffington' has taken to prowling at night again, he is a lad.



Fortunately, Mr Gingernuts, who the girls take pretty short shrift to, is now Mr Gingernutless.  

We (when I say we, I mean CP and the lady on the neighbouring farm whose barn he sleeps in) managed to do a TNR on him over the summer. He'll be a much happier lad without those pompoms. And funnily enough, I don't see him as much anymore...


----------



## raleighnut (6 Jan 2020)

Reynard said:


> Fortunately, Mr Gingernuts, who the girls take pretty short shrift to, is now Mr Gingernutless.
> 
> We (when I say we, I mean CP and the lady on the neighbouring farm whose barn he sleeps in) managed to do a TNR on him over the summer. He'll be a much happier lad without those pompoms. And funnily enough, I don't see him as much anymore...


We don't know if he's someone else's Cat though, he spends a lot of time at ours but he may have a home too. The plan is if he ever comes in needing the vet for injuries to have him done then but as he is fine with all of ours he gets to keep em for now. 
In other news there is an almost identical Cat that we see sometimes, whether this one is a sibling or an offspring I don't know.


----------



## Reynard (6 Jan 2020)

raleighnut said:


> We don't know if he's someone else's Cat though, he spends a lot of time at ours but he may have a home too. The plan is if he ever comes in needing the vet for injuries to have him done then but as he is fine with all of ours he gets to keep em for now.
> In other news there is an almost identical Cat that we see sometimes, whether this one is a sibling or an offspring I don't know.



Quite possibly - there are a lot of folks around who, for whatever reason, won't neuter their cats. Wouldn't surprise me if sibling / offspring is the case. Madam Lexi has around 300 relatives living in the local area...

I should explain - we i.e. Ely CP, took 42 cats out of one house, and Lexi was the mother of the entire males in that house. The woman was selling kittens through the local small ads.


----------



## raleighnut (6 Jan 2020)

Reynard said:


> Quite possibly - there are a lot of folks around who, for whatever reason, won't neuter their cats. Wouldn't surprise me if sibling / offspring is the case. Madam Lexi has around 300 relatives living in the local area...
> 
> I should explain - we i.e. Ely CP, took 42 cats out of one house, and Lexi was the mother of the entire males in that house. The woman was selling kittens through the local small ads.


I don't think there's a 'cat hoarder' locally but I suspect there is a semi-feral cat colony nearby, good pickings to be had by cat-flap-burglary . That's how 'Fluff' found us and he's by no means the first in fact he's the 3rd to have adopted us but there have been many others who didn't move in and just treated the kitchen as a Café (there's always 2 bowls of biccies down, normally Whiskas and Go-Cat)


----------



## Reynard (6 Jan 2020)

raleighnut said:


> I don't think there's a 'cat hoarder' locally but I suspect there is a semi-feral cat colony nearby, good pickings to be had by cat-flap-burglary . That's how 'Fluff' found us and he's by no means the first in fact he's the 3rd to have adopted us but there have been many others who didn't move in and just treated the kitchen as a Café (there's always 2 bowls of biccies down, normally Whiskas and Go-Cat)



Well, you know as well as I that cats are masters of upgrading their lifestyle... 

I live in between two feral colonies - after dark, I see all manner of cats hunting in the garden. Don't see hide nor hair of them during the day as Poppy and Lexi are very territorial.

Trouble is, when I'm trying to trap a specific cat (usually a male needing a pompomectomy) I'll catch all sorts of cats except the one I want.  There was one particularly irate blue tortie and white, whose command of feline swear words was quite legendary. I had to wear leather gauntlets to open the trap in order to release her...


----------



## Mrs M (7 Jan 2020)

“Pompomectomy”  
They do look just like those wee pom-poms you get on throws and such like


----------



## Ming the Merciless (7 Jan 2020)

Racing roadkill said:


> You have a point. People are always trying to take ‘sly’ photo’s, and I’ve never got it, until now Although he’s a fair bit older than me.



He’s 57 so you are similar ages.


----------



## Racing roadkill (7 Jan 2020)

YukonBoy said:


> He’s 57 so you are similar ages.


 I’m 46


----------



## Ming the Merciless (8 Jan 2020)

Racing roadkill said:


> I’m 46



The years have not been kind


----------

