Moonpie

(c) 1996-2008, PetRescue.Com

       Moonpie was rescued in 1994. We had been called to a house where the owner had found four very distressed little kittens locked in a compartment of his boat. We have yet to figure out how they got in there! They were in pretty bad shape so we immediately brought them back, cleaned them up and fed them. We then went back to try to find the mom cat. We soon spotted Moonpie. As the kittens were calico and orange, and also, as we could see that she was a nursing mother, we assumed that the kittens were hers. We managed to lure her into the garage and catch her in a net. We brought her back with us and placed her with the kittens. It was immediately obvious that she was not the mother because she was not even slightly interested in them. However, she was full of milk, so she had babies somewhere - but where? This situation is always problematic. We knew that if we couldn’t find the babies, we would have no choice but to release her so that she could go and feed them. If we didn’t, they would probably die. If we did release her, we realized that our chances of recapturing her would be slim to none. Feral cats are incredibly smart. They survive in the wild by not trusting humans and they also learn very quickly what scenarios they need to avoid in order to keep surviving. If you trap a feral cat one time, it is extremely difficult to catch them again. That is why we double check trap settings beforehand and make sure that all arrangement are in place before attempting a capture.
      On this particular day, luck was on our side. As soon as we arrived at the house we heard the sounds of pitiful crying coming from inside the garage. We had no problem tracking down the source of the cries of four of the most beautiful kittens we had ever seen! No wonder we didn’t have too much problem luring Moonpie into the garage! We put them in the carrier with her and she immediately started nursing them. Thank goodness we had a happy ending!
      All four kittens were socialized by us and thus we were able to place them in wonderful homes. Moonpie was a different story. Although not as feral as she originally was, she is still very shy. Avoiding humans is an acquired skill which enables ferals to survive out in the wild. They have a hard time letting go of it so it’s only on rare occasions that she lets down her guard and allows us to pet her. It doesn’t matter. Our love for Moonpie is not based on our ability to touch her. The most important thing to us is that she’s home, she’s safe and she’ll never feel hunger or fear again.

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