This is Mabel

She is feral

But that does not mean that she is homeless.

This is Mabel’s front door.

It is in our back yard.

Our back yard is full of cat poop.
Not just Mabel’s. I estimate that there are at least nine thousand stray cats in our neighborhood. And most of them think that our yard is a great place to put their poop. I love them all equally. But Mabel is the only one I have agreed to feed.

I keep a zip lock bag of Kit & Kaboodle beside a chair inside the garage door that opens our basement to the world.

I feed her to win her affection.

Though she is not shy, she doesn’t talk much. She is cautious, curious and polite. She is appreciative, but keeps her distance.

She wants love, but has issues with trust.

It’s a hard life. But she doesn’t complain. She’s a survivor.

We can’t feed them all. That only encourages and creates more poop.
But I’ve felt a certain obligation to help her.
Winter is coming. And worse than that, there are tomcats everywhere.…

After consulting a local cat genealogist and historian, we believe that Mabel was a single kitten birthed by by a stray named Maude and possibly sired by a green-eyed, soft gray tabby named, Bobby Flay. She is probably under a year old.

Indications are that Maude’s next litter was so cute that they all got accepted into an adoption program and are hopefully now living happy lives of domesticated leisure. Bobby Flay is rarely seen.

Mabel has been living outside and independently and does the best that she can. But, for a feral feline on her own, it can be a big, cold, stressful world.

So, a few weeks ago I contacted a non-profit who helps those who help strays and got on the list to be seen by a vet and to arrange the operation to get the kitten–making mechanism shut off before we added any more hungry mouths and poop machines to our neighborhood.
My plan was to Trap, Neuter, Spay and Return.
And, I’ve been considering designs for a weatherized, insulated cat-house warmed in the winter by a heating pad.…

But as is often the case, life was marching on while I was still making plans.…

The other day when Mabel came out for dinner, she paused and turned back as if something was following her….

To be continued….

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