Monday 27 June 2011

H is for Hungry Cat


Hungry Cat started to come to visit us at the end of one winter about three years ago.  He looked thin, hungry and bedraggled.  He would come quietly through the cat flap to steal food.  Any movement from us and he was away again. 

We started to put food down for him every day.  Now he comes regularly to be fed and if we are in the kitchen will rattle the cat flap to let us know he is waiting.  He won't be touched, and hisses angrily if we try, showing a set of pink gums and not very many teeth.  We can get very close to him now and move about without startling him, but it's very much on his terms and he will let us know if we take liberties.

At first he would eat absolutely anything  I put down.  Now he has definite preferences and if there is something in the bowl he feels is not up to the required standard he makes a great show of burying it.

Some days he will appear with mysterious wounds, scratches on his nose, fur scraped off one leg, a whole patch of fur torn from his back.  And I worry for days, having already decided that I will only attempt to trap him and take him to the vet if something really serious happens.  I fear that the distress of being captured would make him run away from us when we release him again and then where would he get his meals?

Through the summer I steadily fatten him up and he becomes a fit, big, sleek and relaxed cat.  He sleeps in the sun on a pile of bricks and won't move for the whole day.

We have had two bad winters and through that tough time, despite all the food I give him, he loses weight, his fur gets out of condition and he becomes tenser and stiffer in his bones.  I don't know how old he is, where he is from or where he sleeps.  He could stay with us, in a bed in the kitchen.  But he won't hear of it. 

He's a handsome, tough, independent spirited old cuss.

10 comments:

Charly Harries said...

Aw, very kind of you to take care of Hungry Cat!

(Haha the word verification for this comment was "knit her"!)

sara said...

You are a wonderful person for doing this for him. I am sure he is very grateful to you...though he may not show it in traditional ways.

pinkundine said...

Aw, poor kitty. So nice of you to keep him fed and worry about him, even if he is a grumpy old git ;)

Sam Findlay said...

I love cats, this is such a nice thing you are doing! Cats can be so stubborn!

lyndagrace said...

What a good and loving thing you are doing for this independent fellow.

Anonymous said...

This is such a sad, sweet story! What a wonderful thing you do for this cute little kitty, I hope things work out!

Abbie said...

Thank you for commenting :) And it's so nice of you to take care of that cat! :D x

Unknown said...

What an amazingly sweet thing to do! I'm sure he loves you back in his own way too... for some reason now, I have the song "Smelly Cat" from the tv show "Friends" running through my mind!!

Christine said...

what a gorgeous cat & what a wonderful person you are to care for him

Emma (GirlAnachronismE) said...

What a lovely thing to do, and its so nice that he trusts you now. Just a word of advice, a family friend did just this, and when the cat was injured she caught it to take to the vet. However, the cat was too angry and distressed for the vet to get near, and it ended up not being treated. I think you are doing the right thing to leave him to heal on his own