The Great Cat Roundup of 2013

Pile O' Kittens

We live in the country and by country I mean that at night we can hear coyotes yipping and during the day we can drive 4.7 miles to our choice of five different banks and the Dunkin Donuts. We live over the bridge and past the sharp curve, next to the pasture where the wild turkeys roost.

We also live on a dead end road right down from the county animal control center (i.e. the pound.) Which means that city folks, people who live five minutes from the bank, who just can’t bring themselves to take their pregnant girl cat to the pound drive to the end of our street and dump Fluffy off in front of our house.

Then they tell their children that they’ve taken Fluffy to the country. Big fat liars.

Fluffy immediately goes feral. Feral is a word that means wild. It’s the equivalent of Fluffy becoming a saber-toothed tiger with a dash of bad tempered panther. Then pregnant feral Fluffy takes up residence under our chicken coop, looking to eat, drink, and be merry for tomorrow she delivers—two to two hundred kittens.

The next thing I know, my husband and I are forced to organize a cat roundup complete with live animal traps, bait, welding gloves, and assorted ancient hunting methods.

Or as our granddaughter Zoe (9) said to her mom on their way to our house, “I sure hope I don’t miss the cat roundup.”

Cat roundups may sound fun. They’re not. They’re harrowing invitations to divorce as evidenced by the following exchange.

“Babe, hurry! Get the cat carrier! I’ve got her,” I said, during a recent cat roundup. Wearing gardening gloves, I’d managed to sneak up on a hissing, spitting mother of SEVEN new kittens and grab her by the scruff of her neck. She’d had her SEVEN adorable kittens in our hen’s nesting box.

“Hang on,” he yelled, “I need to find my welding gloves.”

The black, yellow-eyed demon continued to hiss and spit while I started to sweat. Her tail whipped back and forth. Her SEVEN kittens yawned and stretched.

“Hey,” he continued, “where are my welding gloves?”

“Are you kidding? I’m holding a panther in here by my arthritic fingertips.”

The hissing became snarling.

He wandered into the chicken coop, pulling on his gloves and carrying the cat carrier upside down.

“Seriously, Dude, hurry up.” The snarling exploded into yowling mixed with screaming. Mine.

I tried to push the cat into the fifty-dollar deluxe leather cat carrier. She shape shifted into a flying squirrel and launched her thrashing body, claws extended, at my husband’s right eye. There was more screaming. His.

She landed against the back wall of the chicken coop and stuck.

“Get her!” She shape-shifted into an invisible banshee ghost and disappeared.

Her SEVEN adorable kittens meowed sweetly, flexed their tiny dagger claws, and fell asleep.

“Why did you let her get away?” I snapped.

“You dropped her.”

“My hands are small. You know that.”

The conversation deteriorated from there and before it was over he was calling me a big whiney baby, and I was accusing him of being a foot-dragging slacker. And we don’t even own any cats.  

Please, I’m begging you. Take care of your cats. The marriage you save may be mine.

Linda (Great White Hunter) Zern