Thursday, March 28, 2024
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Daily Photo Reprise: Kitty in the Courtyard, 2011

tuxedo cat through fence
Kitty in the Courtyard

I saw this exact kitty skitter across a street when I was photographing something else in that neighborhood and slip through the posts in a gate. Luckily the street isn’t very busy at all, but the cat’s actions, and the way it ran through the gate as if it was heading home, made me concerned that it might be a stray nursing mother cat.

I finished my photo session and slowly rolled down the street in my car; I have often found stray cats are less suspicious of a car moving slowly by on the street than of human footsteps. Even though I was barefoot and walking on a sidewalk, highly unlikely to make much noise myself amid all the ambient noise of a late afternoon in a small town, I felt the car more appropriate.

As I rolled past the gate I saw the cat through the posts on a sidewalk bathing, and the cat saw me. The gate and courtyard were adjacent to an huge old abandoned rooming house that had been condemned after our flood in 2004, but people and animals regularly made it a home. I pulled over and got out leaving my engine running to mask my sounds, and aligned myself with the openings between the slots on the fenceposts.

A good camera with a viewfinder and a zoom lens makes a dandy telescope. I zoomed in on the kitty as it alternately stared at me and sat, turned around and reclined while bathing. A quick check of the white belly didn’t reveal the telltale signs of a nursing mother, and while the kitty was black in the important areas I think I detected the presence of a matched set of identifiers under the tail. Plus his, as we’ll assume, face looked as if it was developing the jowly look of an unneutered male.

As I got closer to the fence he got up and ran to the back of the courtyard. No sign of other cats or of kittens, and I was surprised to see the courtyard looking fairly neat. I’ll swing past there a few times as I pass through that side of town to see if I find more cats. If I do, I’ll talk to the neighbors, of which there are only two left on this street, but I think this one is on his own for now.

I did talk to people who lived around there but they all produced their own cats; I never did find out who this cat belonged to.


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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.

2 thoughts on “Daily Photo Reprise: Kitty in the Courtyard, 2011

  • thank you for trying to help. it always means so much to me when I see people who care enough to reach out. Being on the wrong end of things too many times can harden one’s heart to mankind, it is nice to be reminded that there are more people then I know who care.

    Reply
    • Connie, even just finding out who he belongs to is important–there are so many homeless cats out there, and there are people who can’t afford care or food too, so it’s important to put them in touch with the things they need, like low-cost spay and neuter and TNR programs, as well as homes for kitties.

      Reply

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