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March 24, 2008

All sorts of animals active at the Lagoon this morning. Happy and I were on dawn patrol and it was great to see the morning light. Completely different than the later day stuff I've gotten too used to.
Shar & I saw this feral cat on Saturday hop down a woodchuck hole like she owned the place. Now her tracks are all over the trails and she has moved in. I fear for the songbirds. I think she could drop them with her laser-beam stare alone.
Speaking of, here's young Master Cardinale, sitting pretty. Lots of singing back and forth these mornings. NOTE IT: Also heard my first RWBB (Red-winged blackbird) doing it's telephone impression this morning. That is a sure sign of spring around these digs.
Then there's these guys doing their bookends thing. They are both Great Blue Heron, but the morning sun is giving the front guy a little tan. I hope his legs are not frozen in the creek. If he is, he didn't seem too worried about it.
Kinda "saw" this concept shot (rare for me) of the sun coming up behind the Longfellow Pergola (sorry, it's not Stonehenge) lighting up the frost on the bergamot. Won't be long until we're helping plant this years colors. Can't wait to see how "Sister Teresa," Master Gardener, has it laid out this year. Bring on the hummingbirds. Oops, getting a little ahead of myself.

5 comments:

Anonymous said...

Ooooh, a feral cat. One of my cousins, several times removed perhaps.

buthidae said...

Ooooh, a feral cat. Such a headache for your PR persons. Speaking as a cat lover, I'd much rather see your songbird populations flourish than a bunch of feathers on the ground. The former won't happen with that maverick predator in the picture...

mnainfochair@gmail.com said...

Yes, Ooooh, a feral cat. I have alerted neighborhood security and we are tracking by land, sea, and hair. I mean, air.
Seriously, I will talk to my friend the gardener who works the garden up the hill from the lagoon and get the city involved. Last year they had to trap a groundhog out of the decorative kale and are always shooing the rabbits. It's ironic because I know multiple neighbors further up the creek near our house that have lost cats in the area to something and no one could figure out what was happening to them. Our former cat Harry came back to the house a couple years ago with nasty teethmarks in his butt, someone said that is the way raccoons will usually fight. This was after he had previously shown up with a bad headwound prompting the nickname, "Horrible Headwound Harry" (as you may remember from SNL fame as well.) So I think this feral cat will have it's hands full. Like being on America's Most (or least) Wanted, depending on how you look at it.
I can see this requires a post about previous animal control issues in our neighborhood... Like the deer and the three headless bunnies story... Hmmmm... back to the archives...

Anonymous said...

I'm a cat lover too, but over the years I've (slowly) come to the conclusion that cats belong inside. I had the aforementioned Harry since his early kitten days. I resisted keeping him in because he so obviously loved being outside, and being a good mama I of course wanted my boy to be happy... But when I finally bit the bullet and started keeping him in I was surprised to find that he accepted it and didn't seem to miss going out after the first two weeks or so.

Anyhoo, this particular feral cat is actually rather attractive in real life (in this pic she looks quite intimidating) and it's a little sad to see the life she's living. I'm not sure how to go about catching her, but it would be nice if she could find a home somewhere. That is, assuming she would want a calm, relaxing life after living like a wild animal. But regardless of what happens to her, I agree with buthidae: there is NO WAY I want to see her with an eastern bluebird in her jaws, no way at all.
~Sharon

buthidae said...

If you're intent on catching her, your local humane society will probably either lend or rent for cheap a live trap. If she just showed up as an adult, maybe she's more stray than feral, and socially salvageable.