Lincoln looks skeptical as he examines my offering.
A cautious sniff…
He deems it worth eating.
“You got any more?”
I put a toy mouse on the hammock, with its tail dangling down, and Lilly was very interested.
She considered…
And then told me I’m weird.
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Say hello…
To Daisy.
She is a black and white tuxie, she’s about 3 years old, she’s polydactyl (extra toeses).
And yes, she is pregnant.
Did I mention the toes?
Am I hoping for a litter of polydactyl kittens, do you think? Indeed I am.
The story is thus: when I went to pick Lincoln and Lilly up at Michelle’s after their spay/neuter surgeries last Wednesday, she asked my opinion on polydactyl cats. When I said “They’re kinda cool!”, she asked my opinion on PREGNANT polydactyl cats, and then pointed to a carrier. I hemmed and hawed (because Fred had declared that it was time to get back to a point where there weren’t fosters stuffed all over the place) and then asked if she thought Lincoln and Lilly could share the foster room with Daisy. She said Daisy is good with other cats, and so I brought her home.
Once Lincoln and Lilly have decided that people aren’t so bad (something Lilly is deciding pretty quickly; Lincoln’s taking his time on that front), we will move them in with Daisy and see how it goes. If it goes badly (which I don’t expect – Daisy’s a pretty chill girl) we can move them back into my office for a while. In a perfect world she’ll either ignore them or befriend them – they’ve both proven to be interested in the other cats they see, so they should be okay.
We know for sure that Daisy is pregnant because the vet did an x-ray, and the kittens’ spines were visible (they couldn’t tell exactly how many, but Michelle said “at least three.”) Kittens’ spines don’t show up on an x-ray until 40 – 45 days’ gestation, so we know she’s at least 40 days along (or was last Wednesday, anyway). The gestation period for cats is 63 – 65 days, so… If we assume she was 40 days gestation on February 22nd (which is the earliest she could be) and assume also that she’ll go to 65 days (which is on the higher end), that brings her to March 19th (but of course, like human gestation, feline gestation is not an exact science). Sometime between now and March 19th, we should have kittens. I think we’ve got at least a week to go, but probably more.
She is a very sweet girl – spends her time eating, snoozing atop the cat tree, and shedding. She is shedding like CRAZY, which is something I dealt with with Canasta. With Canasta, Omega-3 supplements helped stopped the super shedding in about 3 days, so I’m going to give that a try with Daisy and see if it helps. As far as where she came from: as I understand it, she was being fed as part of a colony of cats for the past 2 years, and I don’t know whether she became friendly or was friendly all along, but she was brought in to be spayed along with her sister Petal (who, I assume, was not pregnant) whereupon they realized she was pregnant and she came to me instead of being spayed. (It should go without saying, but in case you’re new to the blog and assume I’m “breeding cats and selling them to make a profit” (that will never not make me laugh), she will be spayed after her kittens are weaned, and her kittens will be spayed and neutered as well.)
She came pre-named, and you might think we are going with a flower theme, but we are NOT. Every flower name in existence has been used, probably in the last year if not the last 10 minutes, so we’re pivoting and going with a Great Gatsby theme. To repeat: WE ARE NAMING HER KITTENS AFTER CHARACTERS FROM THE GREAT GATSBY. Here’s where you come in: what shall I call the litter (which will be named after characters from The Great Gatsby) as a whole? It’s been many years since I read that book, and I don’t remember much about it (it wasn’t one of my favorites). I know someone out there has a good suggestion. Let me hear ’em!
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Newt’s livin’ the life.
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Posted on social media (Facebook/Twitter/Instagram/Tumblr) yesterday.
Good morning from a curious and bright-eyed Lilly, who is accepting petting (when she feels like it), but does not want my kisses, thank you.
YouTube link
Cinnaspin (the torbie) and Linzer (the snowshoe) were adopted last Thursday, and went home to Colorado. They were with us for a little more than 2 months, and here’s the video where you can watch them grow from the day we got them to the day they headed home. ❤
(Side note: I don’t think I’ve ever taken so many pictures of two kittens together. Talk about a bonded pair!)
In case you wondered what Lincoln’s underside looks like, here you go. He’s a white cat wearing a lovely gray tabby coat with hood.
YouTube link
It takes a little coaxing (and the feather teaser) to get Lilly to come to me, and sometimes she remembers that she’s supposed to be scared of me, so she skitters away, but then she comes back!
Good night innernets. 🙃
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Previously
2022: Yes, the belly grows ever larger.
2021: Canasta and her newborns.
2020: Pablo sleeps like an angel on his bed of kittens.
2019: (It’s not a skill they’ll ever master.)
2018: “Paws up, y’all!”
2017: “I SAID BACK OFF!”
2016: No entry.
2015: (Please note, not all cats were present for this, because they have busy and fulfilling lives and sometimes don’t feel like coming down to help me out, because they are BRATS.)
2014: It’s a hard life, being this beautiful (that’s Orlando.)
2013: ::loonyface::
2012: She yawns at me and says “What babies?”
2011: Bath time for Corbie.
2010: No entry.
2009: No entry.
2008: “What doin’, Skittyboo? What it do?”
2007: The first round of Hellcats were unfortunately faster and meaner than we expected.
2006: No entry.
2005: No entry.