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Rescued-- UPDATE & New Kittens- update 10/30/23

What I am guessing to be day 21( week 3) for these little guys. The 2 orange are definitely males and the gray and little Calliby are females for sure. Wished I had my camera last night when they were pawing and " kind of" wrestling with each other :slightly_smiling_face:

The receptionist at my vets office told me to let her know when the kittens were ready. Her mom wants one!!

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OMG!!
They are adorable! Love the bald face on the calico, very striking.

I wonder how much it would cost to overnight a box 'o kittens to my house? :thinking:

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Why donā€™t you inquire @PintoPony. You have timeā€¦

As happens I have given them all names. I was trying to stay detached but you know how that goes.

  1. Orange with white on the tip of tail is Thomas.

  2. Orange with no white on tail & less on face is Rufus.

  3. Calico( well, she is as I was told a calliby ) is named Calliby.

  4. Gray is Jenny.

I keep reminding and saying to myself " I am not keeping anyone, I am not keeping anyone" ā€¦

Silo has found a way out :rage: and at first he was in there every morning but the last 3 mornings he has been in the hay, looking at me when I come up into the loft.

He has a date on Tuesday to get fixed and I hope I can find him in with mom and do some modifications to keep him there till then.

At least he is a male and canā€™t have kittens!

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Checked on them Friday afternoon and the pen was completely empty. There was a small gap at the bottom where I come in and I guess I didnā€™t notice. Enough for her to get through and everyone gone :cry:

I hoped she had them stashed in the hay bales but we have 350 in there now and where to start?

I went down to make dinner ( family has to eat)and it was torture and I canā€™t even describe what I was feeling. Got dinner done and in the oven and when I went back up to the loft I saw BK!!

She hissed, spit, growled and swatted at me and I knew they were close and then she turned and went into the bales along the wall, so I started there.

It is not easy digging out bales along the wall and I had a small flashlight so I could shine it down before I put my foot down. I was so scared she had them at floor level and I knew I would never get to them. Thinking of them trapped in the hay and it was so hot I just felt sickā€¦

I moved about 10 bales and there she was with Calliby and Jenny, had them stashed in a little space between bales. I grabbed them and her ( she was NOT happy) got them into the crate, locked it and went back wondering where the others were?

Found Thomas next along the barn wall and I am guessing he crawled and fell off the bale ledge. He was a good 2 feet down and I could barely reach him but I did and he was unharmed as he fell into loose hay along the 2x4 support for the wall.

There was no sign of Rufus. I moved bales as best I could, felt around, tried to see with my light but no luck. I finally was able to get a bale out of the corner at the back wall and looking down there was Silo and Rufus! As I reached to try and get him Silo scratched the heck out of my hand but I got him.

I went and reinforced the pen door and put more chicken wire on top so there is no uncovered space.

So far so good. Silo can still get in and out somehow, but not BK holding a kitten.

Way more stress , agony and excitement than I ever wanted in my life right now. This morning they were crawling all around me and little Calliby was swatting my hand :slightly_smiling_face:

I absolutely love these babies. How is that possible? I am a dog person.

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Ah, nothing like a roller coaster ride. Iā€™m attached to them and all I have are their pics.

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:scream:
Way to elevate your heart rate! :heartbeat:
Glad you found & corraled everyone :ok_hand:
Jingling for No.More.Drama! until everyoneā€™s seen the vet.

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Glad you found them all safe and well! Hope your hand is okay, watch closely for infection.

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Oh lordy my heart skipped a beat for a sec! Glad you found them and were able to get them back in their little house. She is taking protective mom a bit too far. I think your assessment that she will never be tame is probably spot on.

Like @Brown_Derby - I only have pics but still rather attached to the little fuzzballs.

Make sure you wash that hand with Betadine and if it starts to swell go to ER. There is nothing like a cat bite or scratch for infection. I know form multiple miserable experiences. I donā€™t learn quickā€¦lol.

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So sorry for the panic and stress. How awful. Thank you so much for not giving up and finding them all. What a relief. You done good!

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Not just you! On my first read-through I missed the bit where she found Rufus, and was so worried. But I knew she couldnā€™t have sounded so relieved in the last sentence if she had in fact lost him, so I reread and found that he was with Silo.

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Glad you found them! I hope you can keep them locked up. Any passing tom cat is a danger to the kittens.

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I knew you guys would understand what I was feeling. Somehow she did it again yesterday! When I saw it empty again I went down and got my daughter as reinforcement and extra labor if needed.

Thankfully it wasnā€™t needed. This time she put them along the other wall , at the very front and all I had to do was move one bale :roll_eyes:

I donā€™t know why she wants to move them. I guess she feels too" out in the open" and exposed and if she gets out this time I will be shocked. I can barely get in now!!

I spent the next 90 minutes dripping sweat as I scoured every inch of that pen and wired down any place where the roof met the wall that she might get through and did more on the roof as well. Can they walk upside-down? . So far so good.

She is " fairly" tame and I can walk right up to her and either pick her up or pet her , no problem but she still has feral moments and I have to watch my back so to speak because she will still scratch or bite if she feels threatened . Like when I am trying to feed and water her and bring things in to do that. Seems to get her dander up.

Silo is not going to be tame , I fear but I do have him in a large wire crate (as of this morning)in BKā€™s enclosure with food, water and litter. He has a date with the vet tomorrow morning.

I washed and scrubbed my hand and apply triple antibiotic ointment and even where he bit through my fingernail ( OUCH) is fine. I will have long, thick gloves on tomorrow when I transfer him to the carrier.

We do have a stray cat at my neighbors place @moonlitoaksranch she just told me yesterday and that worried me not only for the kittens but for BKā€™s possible raging hormones when that time comes around :astonished:

I talked to my vet and they said they will spay her no matter if she was pregnant again or not.

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Ow! Little ingrate.

Hope your hand is better. And hope that BK stops moving the babies - she has to realize you are helping all of them.

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Is there some way to make the pen feel less exposed? Maybe by draping a blanket over part of it or something?

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It might help her feel more secure if you put a cardboard box on its side within the cage. This comes their cat cave and makes them feel safe.

Just a regular amazon or chewy box made my feral mamas feel much less stressed out. It gave her a place to ā€œhideā€ her babies

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I have a big box and I will try that thank you!!

She was out this morning but the kittens were in! She obviously couldnā€™t find a way back in. I need to look over the pen again and see what I might have missedā€¦ She is going to be the death of me :grimacing:

It is so hot. The upper loft doors are open and I have a heavy duty fan circulating the air above them and you can see their little bodies all stretched out with them laying on their backs and feet splayed up in the air . Looks like some awful thing happened in there :grin: but no panting or heavy breathing so I think they are ok.

I really have to watch what I am doing when in there now. Every time I moved around Jenny was right by me. I kept putting her with everyone else and suddenly there she was again. I donā€™t want to squash anyone!

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We had our mamas in a grain bin but we used a cat carrier for the mamas and a bucket for the kittens and moved them into an extra large dog crate in our garage. It doesnā€™t get nearly as hot in our attached garage (good shade trees and the ac from the house helps). Is that an option for you? Kittens have trouble controlling their body temperature and can get heat stress much more easily than the mothers. Itā€™s admirable that you have the fan to cool them, but I was just wondering if there was an easier way to keep everyone where theyā€™re supposed to be and nice and cool.

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I was just going to ask - do you have a room in your house that you could use temporarily for these little ones and mom? Maybe another bathroom? That way everyone could be contained and kept cool until it is time to go out. This will also help keep mom (and babies should you decide to keep them) stay around and the house will become their ā€œbase.ā€ Sheā€™s a good mom but the decision making is a bit suspect sometimes, right?

How did Siloā€™s trip to the vet go?

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You could also try what we do with our rabbits: give them some frozen bottles of ice. One likes to flop over a one liter soda bottle; the other likes to lean next to a squarish cranberry juice bottle. We rotate them out when the ice melts out. The fan blowing over the bottles helps a lot as well.

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Am I the only one who canā€™t see the pics? Iā€™m so bummed, but love hearing the stories anyway :grinning: