Yesterday, I had one of my worst nightmares.
The story is quite long.
It was around 1pm when we came home from Jia-Wen’s house and it was raining. I saw a neighbour putting up netting on their gate in the pouring rain. And I know Gerald has been going to sit in the porch of this house quite a bit.
How can I ask Gerald not to go? I don’t know how. He is a free-roaming CNRM cat. He might even have a home on the street at the back. But he comes over for food many times a day. Of course I feed him, along with Samantha and Creamy. Gerald and Creamy have been neutered with ear-notches. Samantha, not yet, as she is pregnant.
We went out again to buy some things, and it was still raining but I saw that the netting was already up and Gerald was inside their porch. Oh no… But their fence is quite low, so it should not be a problem at all for Gerald to jump out. Instinctively, I wanted to stop the car and ring the doorbell to explain that Gerald has already been neutered, is a community cat and if they don’t like cats, they can always use their water hose to spray water in their direction when cats enter their house compound. I did not as we were rushing out to buy things. I thought I’d do it after we come home.
But I had a most uneasy feeling.
So the moment we came home, I was going to go over but surprisingly, the netting had already been taken down and this neighbour’s car was no longer in their porch.
Gerald, who is almost always lazing around in our porch was also not there.
Gerald was missing.
Horrors of horrors! The worst case scenario came to my mind. Creamy and Samantha were both there in our porch.
I wasted no time. I texted PAWS with Gerald’s photo to ask if anyone had surrendered Gerald to the shelter. No, they said there was no cat surrendered on that day.
Gerald is a friendly cat and practically anybody can carry him.
PAWS will keep a look out for me. Their staff was alerted with Gerald’s photo.
The pound is closed on Sundays, I know.
I went around our house calling for Gerald. Gerald is usually around whenever I am home. If I’m upstairs in Riley’s room, he will be on the back neighbour’s roof mewing (talking) to me. If I’m at the catio, he will be on the side-neighbour’s roof, again, mewing to me. Gerald is very vocal and always around.
I did not know if I should text the neighbour to ask if they had seen Gerald. There was a bit of a language problem as they are not Malaysians.
I finally plucked up courage and went over with some CNY goodies, and also armed with translated messages in the neighbour’s language (thank you, Google Translate) to explain that Gerald is a community cat who has been neutered.
The neighbour was very nice. He said he hadn’t seen Gerald but he says two cats frequent his garden and there is cat poo on his grass. His spouse is very afraid of animals.
I sympathise, I really do. Not everyone has affinity with animals.
I suspect the two cats could be Gerald and Samantha. Creamy only goes to the park.
So I explained, as best I could, with the help of Google Translate, that these are community cats and that Gerald and Creamy are already neutered and will not breed anymore. And I also explained that I feed them in my porch so that they have food and will not rummage garbage bins to forage for food. And if they (the neighbours) do not want cats coming into their garden to defecate, they could just use the water hose to frighten the cats away.
The neighbour was very understanding.
I did ask why the netting was taken down and he said his spouse did not want it after putting it up.
We went home, but there was still no sign of Gerald. I remained worried.
The minutes ticked away….the seconds….it was terrible.
It was only after 3 hours, when it was almost 5pm that I finally heard that familiar mew in our porch.
It was Gerald!!! It had to be.
I leapt to the front door and YES, it was Gerald!!
He is back!!!!! I quickly informed PAWS that Gerald was back. Also, the Chief Guard in our neighbourhood as I had asked him to look out for Gerald as well.
Gerald is back!!!
I decided to put a litter box in our porch with the hope that Samantha, Gerald and Creamy might use it. Although I know that street cats normally prefer the soil and grass. Our Monsters refuse to use the litter box when I transferred them from the upstairs quarantine rooms (where they had obediently used the litter boxes) to the catio. Our Super Seniors also refuse to the use the litter box. They all prefer the natural soil. Only Tabs and Riley use the litter boxes.
This is this morning’s photo. Creamy is now the alpha of this pack. Imagine that….mild-mannered scaredy Creamy is the alpha now. WHY do all our males end up becoming alphas, I do not know. Hubby says it is because I sayang them too much.
Anyway, good news…
Someone used the litter box!! There are well-formed faeces and a small urine ball in it. I don’t know who used it, though, but I suspect it is not Creamy. Maybe Samantha? I hope in time to come everyone will use it so that they do not have to defecate anywhere else. But old habits die hard, I know.
Later I went for my morning walk and guess who followed closely, trotting behind me as my bodyguard?
Creamy!
So I had to change my route and walk up to the park so that Creamy followed me there. He is very familiar with the park and it’s safer there for him.
But, there was an episode yesterday involving a dog which I will write about afterwards. Let me finish this story first.
So I showed the photos of the litter box to the neighbour and guess what….
He says he will set up litter boxes too!
Using the soft approach helps, doesn’t it?
Now, the dog episode yesterday.
A big friendly dog followed me back to our house yesterday. It’s a local dog but has some pedigree in her. She looked like a wolf, with a long snout and long hair. Sorry, I’m totally hopeless with breeds as we almost always only deal with Ah Wongs and kucing kampungs. “Ah Wong” is the Cantonese term for local dog. It means “Yellow One”, referring to the common light brown colour of the Malaysian local dog.
So this dog, who was incredibly friendly, followed me all the way home, went into our porch and started lapping up water like she hadn’t drunk in a day or so. But Creamy was there, and she chased Creamy. Creamy went up the pillar to safety.
Samantha, being a Calico and under our car, thought she’d be safe, but the dog also postured and gave chase. Gerald was also there. Both of them ran for cover, jumped up the pillar and onwards to the neighbour’s roof for safety. Samantha, being heavy, just barely made it. I could not restrain the dog as there was no leash at all. She was a big dog too. Samantha, Gerald and Creamy were all safe from the dog as they had gone off to the neighbour’s roof.
We definitely could not keep the dog in our porch as she then went for the Monsters who were safe behind Stargate. Either she is not cat friendly or she just wanted to play but a dog that size, if pounced upon a cat, would cause considerable harm to a cat.
Later, my friend who owns the cafe, Medifoods, many roads away told me that a similar looking dog also went to their shop and to the hostel of their staff. Luckily all his staff love cats and dogs so they fed the dog.
Hopefully, it’s someone’s pet and she has gone home now.
This is why all dogs must be on a leash with the owner when they are out of the house. And yet, I do see pet dogs being let out freely without the owner.
There is, however, a very responsible neighbour who walks her dogs daily. Not only are her dogs on leash, they also have a muzzle on. This is to ensure they will not accidentally bite anyone or any animal.
Responsible pet ownership goes a long way towards creating better tolerance and acceptance of pet animals.
The law is the law. We cannot argue with that.
We have to do our part too.
P.S. The dog episode happened in the morning while Gerald’s “disappearance” happened in the afternoon and I saw Gerald before his disappearance so it had nothing to do with the dog at all. Anyway, Gerald came back after 3 hours!