Kitten Rescue

No sleep for the wicked, so I may as well write about this evening's excitement:

This evening, vinfille and I took the dogs for a walk. Returning home, we heard a cat meowing, and we were curious. We put the dogs inside, and went to where we heard the cat, just three houses down the street. We discovered that the meowing was coming from under the hood of our neighbour's car, so, a bit alarmed, we rang the doorbell and informed our neighbour that there was a cat in his engine. He seemed unconcerned, and informed us that his wife had just recently chased the cat out. I asked him if it was a cat or a kitten, and he told me it was a kitten. Again, he seemed completely unconcerned about a kitten under the hood, so vinfille and I left.

We returned a short time later, after nightfall, with flashlights. Fortunately, we found the kitten sitting underneath the car, and not actually in the car. Unfortunately, when we approached too closely, it went straight into the old canal which parallels the street...

This canal is probably about fifteen feet across and ten or so deep. It has not been an active canal in years, since the city built a new and improved version which runs behind our back yard. In the meantime, this old canal has filled with all manner of muck, runoff, and ooziness. A great variety of wetland plants and trees now grow out of it, and it stinks like a stagnant swamp. Which, at this point, with no actual water running through it, it is.

It was into this stinky bug-infested marsh that I went crawling, flashlight in mouth, to search out this kitten. I could see no more than a few feet in front of me through the thick tangle of layers of reeds and jewelweed. With vinfille spotting from above, I tracked it much more by sound than by sight. Of course, every time I drew near to the cat, it would slip further away.

After a good half hour or so of this, we lost track of it completely, and decided to take a break for dinner.

I returned alone after dinner, determined to find and catch the kitten. I prowled back and forth along the canal a few times, listening. Finally, I stopped and popped a squat and waited. I heard a crunching noise almost directly below me, and after some peering with a flashlight, I saw the kitten almost within reach, munching on... something. I thought I had it this time, but it slipped away and led me on another thirty minute romp through the muck.

I guess it probably just got bored, and let me catch it. vin and I brought it back to the garage, where it immediately devoured a half can of tuna fish.

We could not find a peepus, so we assumed it was a girl. I named her Jewel, since I was crwaling through a great bed of jewelweed (one of my favorite flowers) to find her.

vinfille has suggested that we not keep the adorable little varmint, since our dog Paola will no doubt find her a tasty snack. So, we called out cat-owning friend to take her for the evening, and tomorrow I will take Jewel to the vet to make sure she is as healthy as she looks. Hopefully, in the next few days we can either figure out where she came from, or find a new home for her.

Here are some pictures of the adorable little critter:

Posted by emer0084 at August 10, 2005 01:51 AM