Volunteer Stories

"Tess" Our Cat Mother of the Year

Amazingly enough this story happened on Mother's Day weekend in 1997. Earlier in the week I had received a call from a friend of a friend. This is how a lot of these rescues start. The friend of a friend had a litter of five kittens on her apartment patio. A high stucco wall on three sides and a sliding glass door on the fourth side surrounded the patio. The apartment owner was concerned since she was planning to be away over the next few weeks. The kittens appeared to be about four weeks old and were still too small to jump over the wall. Although the apartment owner had not approached the kittens herself, the kittens could see the family on the other side of the glass door.

With well-gloved hands I picked up the five kittens with only a little hissing and spitting from the one calico, placed them in a carrier and decided I could foster them in my spare room. They were the perfect age to be weaned from the mother and socialize with humans. But feeling the job was left uncompleted, I also asked if I could set a trap on the apartment owner's patio and could they please call if the mother appeared. By Friday the mother, who was later named Tess, was in the trap along with the piece of fabric she had given birth to her kittens on. She had pulled this fabric into the trap herself. So pleased with myself I called her friend Anne to report my success. Before I had a chance to brag, Anne started relaying her rescue of the night before. Some how she and a friend had come across seven orphaned kittens whose mother had been killed. The persons trying to care for them were bottle-feeding regular milk without warming it. Anne decided she couldn't leave the situation so she gathered up all seven kittens, took them home and stayed up most of the night bottle-feeding. She also didn't have a choice but to take them to work with her the next morning.

To come to Anne rescue, I offered her the mother cat I had just picked up in a trap. The mother cat's real kittens were old enough to make it on their own. There was an outside chance that this mother cat would take on a new litter to replace her other one. That night we place the fabric from the trap with the mother cat and the orphaned kittens into a big cage. We gave the kittens a little time to transfer the scent on the fabric to their own fur. Then with great anticipation we raised the door on the trap and showed Tess the kittens. After only a couple of suspense filled moments Tess started licking the kittens and settled down to let them nurse her. Anne and I started crying. Tess proved what a wonderful mother she was nursing this second litter until they could be weaned and adopted. Tess is still looking for that wonderful home she deserves. She wants a loving home where she can be the center of attention. And now she is spayed, of course!