Kitties!

We’ve had the singular experience of raising a group of kittens. They were born April 10th to a previous stray cat who we tamed over the spring.

It’s been a very rewarding and enjoyable experience, and they are CUTE!!

She had them outside our back door, nestled in a shelter Sheryl built using stored garden pots and a tarp.

Princess, who got her name due to the way she would strut around the back deck after Sheryl helped her run off cats who were bothering her, is a very smart cat.

Once the kittens were able to start moving around freely, she had a problem. She simply couldn’t contain them where they were.

She ended up moving them to a neighbor’s tree! There was a hollow about 10 feet up and she carried them all up there. It was only because I saw her walking by with a kitten in her mouth that I knew where she had stashed them.

One thing about Princess: she’s an outdoor cat. Earlier in the winter, she would not even come in when it was snowing and it covered her back. She wanted her food and a little attention and that was that.

So imagine our surprise a couple of weeks or so after she moved the kitties to the tree when she came to the back door and waltzed in! She made nice to the other cats, explored the house a bit, and stayed in for quite some time.

Then, a couple of days later, I looked out and saw that she was carrying a kitten back to the house! I went out to help her, as she had carried the smallest one and couldn’t quite handle the two bigger ones.

She brought them all in the house, to a dark, private corner she had scouted out during her previous visit, and continued to raise them.

Eventually, they grew up enough to move on to their forever homes, but we kept Althea and Princess is now an indoor/outdoor cat. I don’t like that and all the other cats are strictly indoors, but she is a Princess after all.

A couple of good shots of Althea: