Feral Housecats

Tasha is much quicker than I am. This summer the dogs kept racing out the back door to bark at something in a corner of the back yard by the fence. Tasha hypothesized that with such ardor displayed by the dogs, they must be after a cat, and since the cat seemed to be there a lot, she must be attending to a litter of kittens. She went into the area the dogs were barking at and in an old, abandoned dog house I brought to Florida from Virginia (Tasha's company provided excellent moving services), a litter of spotted white kittens was found. Tasha began taking out food and spending time with them. This apparently alarmed the mother, and she moved the kittens next to a fallen log. Tasha found them again and continued to pay attemtion to them. Mother cat moved them again, probably off our property, and Tasha could not find them this time. We wondered what happened to them.
About a month ago, we began to get glimpses of them on the lane. Kando, the Navy Seal, counted three young spotted cats and their mother on the lane one day. But that night I heard the coyotes singing nearby and hoped they weren't celebrating a cat dinner. Several nights later, I saw two spotted young cats and their mother on the lane. They were very wild and disappeared quickly. Tasha bought a bad of Science cat food, and I began putting out food for them. I wouldn't see them, but in the morning the food would be gone. My head lamp had worn out so I bought a new one, an Energizer with one watt power, a much more powerful one, at Walmart. A couple of nights later, I was feeding and watering the horses and goats when my new head lamp serendipitiously picked up three sets of very bright eyes looking at me. I knew it was the cat family. It had been raining, and they were apparently using the ruins of an old shed on our property for shelter. I continue to put out cat food and canned dog food for them. Last night my head lamp picked up their bright eyes on the edge of a big pasture which is situated on the east side of our property. This is where the coyotes roam, and I had heard them singing last night. I picked up only two pairs of cat eyes. About an hour later, a second search was made because I was worried about them, and this time, three pairs of eyes twinkled brightly back at me father up the lane. I was very relieved to see the third cat.
Theodore Roosevelt, a great hunter and conservationist, tells the story of the Confederate General "Red" Jackson of Bellmeade, Tennessee who as a cavalry officer in the Southwest rode a one-eyed Kentucky horse up to a standing grizzly bear. he avoided the blow from the forepaw of the bear somewhow, and then with his sword split the grizzly's skull. This is from Roosevelt's "The Wilderness Hunter, page 126, Elkhorn edition.
I hope you have enjoyed this and will come back for more. Peter "Two-Guns" Nickerson at peternickerson12@yahoo.com.