Bonnie and Molly get spayed

Our kittens are now more than 6 months old, and even though they are still small, playful kittens, both are female.. and a neighbor’s tom has already been hanging around— yowling and meowing around the house at night.

Bonnie, the one with white paws, is finally (mostly) tame, and we can pick her up most anytime. She even spends some time indoors every day and is litter-box trained already, and we all just love her. :)

Molly, on the other hand, is still (mostly) wild. She will get within about 2 feet of us but no closer, and even though she will come right up to us when we are putting out their food or milk, she runs whenever either of us reach for her. We have tried and tried to get close to her, with no success. When we are out in the yard doing something, she even follows us around like a little dog, watching our every move, but always staying just out of reach.

Molly seems to have a sweet personality, and we have so wanted to tame her too, and bring her in along with Bonnie. I have tried many times to lure her into the house, leaving the door open, putting their food bowls indoors, trying to lure her with milk and tuna and everything I could think of. She came in the house a few times, but would always zoom out as soon as I reached to shut the door. We even tried the hav-a-heart trap again.. we had caught her once in it already, a few months ago when they had to go and get their kitten shots. She wouldn’t be fooled again though, and would not come near the trap.

We even placed a big cardboard box on top of her cubby several nights in a row, and while she was asleep, one of us would sneak out onto the porch and try to get the box down over the cubby opening with her in it.. lol She was always too fast for us though, and would be out of the cubby and off the porch most of the time before we even touched the box.

Molly stays just out of reach

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Hearing the yowling tomcat at night, I was really getting worried. I love both of these little kittens, and the two of them along with Mama-Kitty.. well, three cats is enough for us. :) (not to mention the fact that it can be dangerous for young kittens to have babies themselves.. and sometimes they do get pregnant, sometimes at even as young as five months.)

Last weekend, we got out a large kennel we use for the dogs and put it out on the front porch. We fed them in this every day, just leaving the door open and putting their bowls inside. They got used to it quickly, and were in and out of it for the next three days. On Tuesday evening, we decided it was now or never. :)

Hubby tied a string to the door of the kennel, threaded it back through the kennel, out, and up and over the porch rail and ran the string across the porch and through the living room window. We put their cat bowl, filled with tuna, in the back of this large kennel… and waited. Hubby crouched down in the living room floor below the window while I hid behind the front door, watching through the small glass window. Both kittens went into the kennel, I gave the signal, hubby pulled the string, the door slammed, he held on tightly while I ran out onto the porch and latched the door. We got her! lol We got them both! :)

We then brought the kennel into the house. Bonnie was fine, but little Molly was so scared. I decided to try and get the kennel into the bathroom, so we could let them out and still keep them confined in a small area– plus, there was no where for Molly to hide in there. To make a long story short, we both handled Molly and cuddled her and petted her off and on for the next several hours, and then many times over the next few days, (only suffering a few small scratches in the process :) ).

The vet was busy all day on Wednesday and couldn’t fit them in, so we ended up having to keep them in the house until Thursday morning. Hubby then took them both to the vet, kennel and all, early that morning. They were both spayed before noon on Thursday, spent the rest of the day and night at the vet’s office (his standard procedure, all animals must stay overnight for observation after any type of surgery), had all their needed shots, and we brought them home Friday morning. :)

Bonnie is tame now

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I kept them both in all day and overnight here to make sure they had no complications, and they slept quietly most of the rest of that day and night, getting up to eat and play a little bit throughout.

Meanwhile, during all this, the Mama-Kitty was absolutely forlorn. I’ve never seen anything like it. Now, she’s not wild anymore, but she still won’t let us touch her, so it’s not like we could bring her in too. For those days and nights that the kittens were away from her, she was the saddest, most depressed cat I’ve ever seen. She went from one door to another, from one window to another, all around the house, for three days, meowing and crying for her babies.

At one point, I felt so sorry for her that I moved the kennel into the sunroom and opened it up, letting the kittens out into the room. Mama-Kitty was just outside the glass doors on the deck, and when she saw the kittens inside the house, she pressed herself up against the glass, while they did the same from the inside. I’ve never before heard such mournful meowing, from all three of them.. The meowing went on and on, and eventually, I had to put the kittens back into the kennel and move it inside a bedroom where Mama-Kitty couldn’t see in — that was the only way to get any of them to settle down.

Mama-Kitty moped around and meowed the entire time they were gone to the vet’s office. When she wasn’t pressing up against a door or window, she laid and meowed on the deck or in the yard. She would eat her food and then go right back to meowing, sometimes even slapping at the door with her paws. If I opened the door for her, she wouldn’t come all the way in, but would step up into the doorway and meow as loudly as she could. (which would get the kittens to meowing back, from where they were inside the house)

Mama-Kitty moped around for days

On Saturday afternoon, after they both slept quietly for hours and then ate a huge bowl of food, we decided it was time to reunite them with their mother. I opened the kennel door and let both of them out inside the house. Bonnie just started playing with her toys in the living room floor, but Molly jumped up on a table and looked out the window, and started meowing and meowing. Mama-Kitty heard her, and started meowing back, from outside. lol

I opened the back door, and Mama-Kitty literally came all the way into the house (for the first time ever)! She evidently had had enough and was determined to get to her babies! She came around the corner from the den into the living room, and then Molly finally turned around and realized her mother was there and that the door was open, she zoomed to her mother, as did Bonnie — then all three cats ran out onto the back deck. They romped and rolled and licked each other.. and now, all is well. :) After bathing them extensively, Mama-Kitty then led them out into the front yard, where they played and ran and jumped for several hours. She was absolutely ecstatic to have her babies back, and kept running from one to the other, washing and nuzzling them. I love these cats. :)

Mama-Kitty is the blur.. lol

They are happy cats, and now that that is over with, we are happy people. :)

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Related posts:
Stray cats & how Mama-Kitty got her name
Bonnie
Another cat update
Molly