Guest Blogger: A friend of the downtown cats

I used to live at the corner of 15Th ave and Scarth St downtown, I was in a cat colony of 32 friends. There was all sort of cats and kittens. I am only 4 months old. In our area where I was born there was a restaurant when open, people would feed us through the fence or if the food dropped the owners would leave it for us to sneak in and run away with the leftovers. The other four houses that people lived in was our playground, a storage shed our shelter.



After the restaurant closed and people moved from the houses, some humans would come everyday. They would feed us cat food, water and most of all played with us 10 kittens. We had a great time! That spider with bells I would catch it and try to take in my cubby hole but it always got away. When the leaves started dropping it was fun chasing those around. Trying to catch birds in a pack didn't always work. Some us little guys were just learning. One day a feather got stuck to my friends mouth no matter which way he turned or moved that darn feather would follow. Caught it with my paw it stuck there too. I tried to remove it with my mouth but again it got stuck. Dumb feather. All my friends laughed at me.



The first sign of snow in October, that was a rude awakening for us little people. Never saw that stuff before. The wind was howling, the rain so cold. We tried to hide in our shed but it wasn't heated and the holes up top didn't keep that wet stuff off us. Slowly my friends started disappearing to people what had these traps that caught us. They were sneaky, put food in the back, good food mind you, tuna, sardines, salmon, anything that got our attention. When caught they would be taken to a better place. I heard four of my friends stayed together and wee given a warm bed, good food and some loving to tame them. The new humans played with them.


In the end it was just me and some adult cats left. I just wanted to be stubborn. I wasn't going if I could help it. My mom was still around. I would hear my name, it got kind of confusing cause one day I would be "blue eyes", Houdini, Who's That!, I heard other names but little people can't say that. I hid pretty good because another person called me "Wiley".


In the end I was caught by these people. They came into my shed, set up this play maze or so I thought, put some food in the trap, it was so good, I hadn't eaten for a few days and in I went. OH NO Tricked again!



So now I'm in a foster home too. My life is so much better, I get a warm bed, blankets, all the food I want and a warm body to cuddle against. I don't know if I would've made it through the winter. It took along time to catch me but to the people who caught us and to the people that look after me I THANK YOU. Please come see me again.


Special thanks go out to Wilfred, Ken and Leanne, Diana and Mauri these are the people who worked thru warmth, cold, rain and snow to help these poor cats.
-Lillian