Friday, March 29, 2024
black catscat photographscatsdaily photomewsettemr. sunshine

Daily Photo: A Sisterly Bath

A Sisterly Bath
A Sisterly Bath

What could make a happy, sunny spot on the bean counter better? A bath from your sister to reach into that impossible spot under your chin!

Mewsette and Mr. Sunshine are very similar in fur and size, but not so much in build or facial features. When I grabbed my camera, though, they both had their tails curled and facing each other look almost like mirror images. Finding the best bath photo with the least blur, especially after they started bathing each other, was easy enough, too much blur in most, but this one was a winner.

~~~

What other photos have I shared on this date?

.

CatTV Reality Show, 2017

OMG! OMG!
OMG! OMG!

CatTV just hit a new level when the actors actually turn and look at you as if they can see you!

Giuseppe has a little one on one with a goldfinch. I wonder if it’s the same one who used to visit him, or a descendant.

This was one of those photos where I had to leap to my feet and get my camera and get into position because the bird could fly at any minute, plus it was breezy and hard to get a focus. I was working at my computer in the office and totally unprepared, but managed to get a few good shots without startling the goldfinch myself—from photographing birds regularly at this window I know they can see me moving inside. Didn’t quite get the ones I wanted, and I have to wash this window after the winter, but this is still pretty exciting.

It's right there...
It’s right there…

I may be formerly feral but I love my lovins. ~Hamlet

He actually anticipates where I’m going and hops up to where he’ll be right in front of me and waves that big plume of a tail. Still can’t pick him up or hold him, but he can’t get enough pets.

Hamlet loves his lovins.
Hamlet loves his lovins.

After I put the bumblebee back outside. It apparently rode in on my flowered skirt when I went out to get the mail and was buzzing around on the floor, very enticing for kitties.

After the bee...
After the bee…

~~~

What other photos have I shared on this date?

.

Kittens and a Friendly Mama, 2016

Bowie and her kittens.
Bowie and her kittens.

We already have several dozen kittens in our rescue, but what’s three more? The little family includes a pretty gray kitty mom with amber eyes and one solid gray, one dark tabby and another dark tabby that has more white on its face than the other. Mom cat Bowie, who was a feral cat but had become somewhat friendly with Denise, has turned out to be an absolute love in the cage with her babies. That, and our luck in catching her and bringing her in are two wonderful surprises. In abut eight weeks they’ll be looking for homes, so it will be fun to watch them grow!

Among the feral cats we were trying to catch in my neighborhood in the past few weeks was a young gray kitty who was expecting, and she eluded all capture and gave birth to her kittens last Thursday. I’m not fostering them—they are staying with Denise who’s been feeding the colony—but I’ll be helping her care for them especially on her long days of work.

All eight cats Denise is caring for were born to a few cats who showed up summer before last. They found it was safe under her deck and she began feeding them. Hard to catch without help two litters were born, and then she finally made contact with the Homeless Cat Management Team so they could be spayed and neutered and we could help her with some food for them. Feeding eight cats is not cheap, nor is spay and neuter if you don’t know of low-cost clinics.

We caught five at first, then last weekend we tried to catch the last three without luck. We had been trying to ease the remaining three into traps by setting them up open and letting them get familiar with them. Bowie is the mom cat, a young solid gray girl who had grown somewhat friendly with Denise but wanted to parts of the trap.

Denise came home from work and went outside to set the traps tied open and start feeding in them and there was something on the door mat outside the front door, looking like a dead mouse at first, then she realized it was a kitten, and then she saw Bowie under the table and realized there were more kittens. She sent me a picture of the kitten and let me know what was up, so I ran up to see what we could do.

At the milk bar.
At the milk bar.

We had to get Bowie before she decided to move her kittens and we never found them, and we couldn’t just take the kittens and bottle feed them, they needed their mother, plus it was a day when the temperatures were dropping. I told Denise our best bet was to work with her friendliness with Bowie, and she had to try to pick up Bowie and we’d get her in a carrier then collect her kittens later. Denise just wasn’t sure it would work but tried anyway, and I didn’t want to tell her things don’t usually go the way you want when you try this. She went out and began to set out food for them and I hid just inside the front door with the carrier ready. Bowie came out to eat, Denise petted her and then just picked her up and scruffed her. In less than a minute I heard, “Bernadette, I have her.” I came out the door with the carrier upended and in Bowie went. I can still hardly believe it worked the way it did! Denise and I were both so happy, and are still shaking our heads it worked out the way we planned.

The kitten on the door mat had actually been dead, probably stillborn, or died soon after death. Bowie had three other kittens, clean and dry, under the table, and may have given birth to the first one on the mat, or put it there after it was born. It’s typical of a cat to remove any diseased or dead kittens so they don’t endanger the others, and stillbirths are not uncommon with cats who’ve lived outdoors, even when they are fed and looked after. Spring can be very cruel to young lives with temperatures up and down and snow and ice and rain, and a cat’s first litter can be full of difficulty. From experience I knew one stillbirth could indicate other issues like other stillborn kittens that might need to be extracted, internal infections and other live-threatening conditions. Bowie has shown no signs of anything yet.

Precious little tabby face.
Precious little tabby face.

But first to get them in a safe place. I took the carrier to the garage where Denise had a cage and then we went and collected the kittens in a little bed. The cage is tall with a shelf. We lined the bottom of the cage with moving blankets and put the kittens on the bottom level and their bellies must have been full because not a mew came up from them cuddled in a tiny heap. Then not knowing if Bowie would be frightened and try to get away we put Bowie, still in the carrier with the carrier door open, up on the shelf, then closed and locked the cage doors and covered it so she would feel safer. Denise messaged just an hour later that they were reunited and Bowie was curled in the cat bed with them.

And there Bowie has stayed since then. She’s been eating and drinking well, no signs of distress from the kittens, and all is well so far. She purrs and kneads her blankets and the cat bed and may be enjoying life indoors being very pampered

Happy mom cat with babies.
Happy mom cat with babies.

Art and Gifts featuring cats you know! Visit Portraits of Animals

AfterDinnerNap-Etsy

~~~

Feline Images from Portraits of Animals!

inkand watercolor sketch of two cats
“Magic Carpet”, ink and watercolor, 6″ x 9″ © Bernadette E. Kazmarski

Giuseppe gives Mr. Sunshine a brotherly bath in a warm and cozy bathroom.

I loved the way they looked on that red rug and visualized a simple line sketch with the brush pen, but with color added. Although the bathroom is white and mint green I still pictured a warm yellow gold background around the red carpet, and keeping with the warm earth tones, the boys in brown. I wanted pretty nearly flat colors, just a little bit of intentional shading and variation, influenced, I think, by some art I’d been recently browsing, traditional, ancient art using natural colors, and modern homage to this style. This is pretty much what I visualized. It’s available on Portraits of Animals. You can find this artwork in my gallery of Daily Sketches.



Copyright

All images and text used on this site are copyrighted to Bernadette E. Kazmarski unless otherwise noted and may not be used without my written permission, although links to your site are more than welcome and are shared. Please ask if you are interested in using and image or story in a print or internet publication. If you are interested in purchasing a print of an image or a product including it, check my animal and nature website Portraits of Animals to see if I have it available already. If you don’t find it there, visit Ordering Custom Artwork for more information on a custom greeting card, print or other item.


Subscribe to my e-newsletter

Subscribe to The Creative Cat Preview E-newsletter.


© 2022 | www.TheCreativeCat.net | Published by Bernadette E. Kazmarski

Weekly schedule of features:

Sunday: Essays, Pet Loss, Poetry, The Artist’s Life

Monday: Adoptable Cats, TNR & Shelters

Tuesday: Rescue Stories

Wednesday: Commissioned Portrait or Featured Artwork

Thursday: New Merchandise

Friday: Book Review, Health and Welfare, Advocacy

Saturday: Your Backyard Wildlife Habitat, Living Green With Pets, Creating With Cats

And sometimes, I just throw my hands in the air and have fun!

 
PORTRAITS OF ANIMALS WEBSITE
FACEBOOK | TWITTER | LINKEDIN | PINTEREST | TUMBLR | INSTAGRAM | YOUTUBE| EMAIL | PATREON

HOME

Bernadette

From health and welfare to rescue and adoption stories, advocacy and art, factual articles and fictional stories, "The Creative Cat" offers both visual and verbal education and entertainment about cats for people who love cats, pets and animals of all species.

Leave a Reply

%d bloggers like this:
Verified by ExactMetrics