Lucy is Loved
Lucy, the namesake of the gardens, is quite a loved chiots. Her cousins (our nieces & nephew) think she’s the greatest dog in the world. They love it when we take her to grandma & grandpa’s (my parents) for a family get together.
The kids have always had Lucy around, Hannah, our oldest niece was just a baby when we got Lucy. They’re almost the same age.
When Lucy got injured, she wasn’t able to visit the kids very much and she still doesn’t go with us every time we visit like she used to. They miss her and she misses them. Every time I talk to one of the kids they ask about Lucy and how she’s doing. Last week when we were at my parents our niece Heidi gave me this note to give to Lucy. How sweet is this? We hung it on the fridge at Lucy’s level so she could see it.
Lucy is a great dog around kids, gentle and fun. She lets them dress her up and she has a great time playing with them. How fun it must be to grow up with a dog like Lucy!
I have fond memories of all of our pets growing up, and I’m sure the kids will always have fond memories of Lucy.
Do you have any fond memories of specific family pets?
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Soft Kitty, Warm Kitty, Little Ball of Fur
Yesterday morning Mr Chiots and I went kitten hunting in our garage. We wanted to figure out how many we were dealing with and to make sure we had anything off the ground they might get caught up in or injured on. We made up a box as a house for them, although we’re thinking it needs to be smaller and more nest like, so another will be made this week. We managed to catch 4 kittens, 2 gray ones and 2 blackish ones. They’re skittish around people since they’re feral. Two of them were a little calmer, so I held them for a few minutes. We’ll be trying to socialize them with people as often as we can.
The mom is coming around as well. I’ve been trying to stick around when I feed her and she’s now letting me pet her a bit. Yesterday she even rubbed on my legs once. This means she’s feeling much more comfortable around us and hopefully she’ll teach her kittens that we’re OK. This should make her much easier to catch her when it’s time to take her in for spaying.
I called the vet yesterday and they recommended not bringing in mom until the kittens are weaned, which we think will be in 2-3 weeks. We’re guessing the kittens are 5-6 weeks old because of their size and they still have their baby blue eyes (which usually change around 7 wks). By then the kittens will be ready for their first round of shots as well. I’ll talk to the vet since some offices will spay/neuter at 8 weeks and others wait until 4-6 months.
For a while we’re going to have a few more furry friends at Chiot’s Run and we’ll be doing our part by spaying & neutering all of these cats and hopefully finding good homes for a few of them. If these cats hadn’t moves into our garage they would continue to breed at an alarming rate. A female cat can have up to 3 litters of kittens each year giving birth to 2-9 kittens each time. Any female kittens can start having litters as early as 6 months. You can imagine that it doesn’t take long for things to get out of hand. Please take this as a reminder to spay and neuter your pet.
Have you ever had to spay/neuter a stray animal?
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The Word is Out
I guess the word around the neighborhood is that Chiot’s Run is a feline friendly establishment. Remember when I mentioned that we had a feral cat show up last winter? The cat lived somewhere across the road because I would see it heading over there all the time.
We were going to trap it and take it to the vet, but that proved to be difficult. We rarely saw it and it was very scared of us and would run whenever it saw us. This spring we noticed it coming around again and it looked a little chubby. I wondered if it was pregnant. Pretty soon one day it was skinnier than usual, so I figured it had kittens. We decided to wait 6 weeks or so until the kittens would be older then try to trap her to get her fixed. I tried following her a few times looking for her kittens so we could get them fixed as well, but I never was able to find them. I checked all the neighbor sheds and under their porches. Yesterday I came home from the post office and noticed the cat running out of the garage. Then I heard a tiny meow in the garage. I looked around and saw a tiny kitten in our garage. She decided that Chiot’s Run would be a great place for her babies, so she moved them into our garage yesterday. They look to be about 6 weeks old.
We saw them a little later outside with mom as she was taking them for a stroll. I managed to get a few photos from inside. We think there are 3 kittens but we’re not for sure. We’re going to make up a small house in a box for them and hopefully this will make them easier to take them to the vet, which hopefully will happen early next week if we can catch them.
Looks like we’re going to have a few garden/garage cats to help with the chipmunk/mice/mole population around here.
Any new and exciting pets at your place?
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Inspired to Take a Break
Our cat Soafie inspired me to take a day off (well from blogging anyway, we’ve got a big job today – see 2nd Mile Productions tomorrow to see what we spent today working on). I’ve been super busy the last few weeks with work, gardening and blogging. I’ve been spending a lot of time working on the Seed Starting 101 posts, which takes away from the time I have to write regular daily posts. So today I’m leaving you with a photo of Soafie, hope she inspires you to take some time to relax and enjoy the day!
Cheers, and happy relaxing from all of us at Chiot’s Run!
I’m planning to start the Seed Starting 101 posts on Monday, so be sure to come, read and comment!
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How’s That Chiots?
It’s been a while since I’ve given an update on Lucy the garden namesake, I thought you might be interested in one. For those of you who are new, a little over a year ago she tore her ACL and wasn’t able to use one of her legs. We chose to take the least invasive method for treatment. No surgery, only therapy and dietary supplements.
She’s slowly gotten better and better and seems to be almost back to normal. She still can’t do really long walks, but she loves shorter ones. She’s also finally able to run a little bit this spring. She’s really enjoying the freedom of being able to follow me around the gardens again. Last summer she was still on limited mobility so she was only allowed to be outside if she was chained. This spring she’s been following me around as I work and is have a great time chewing on sticks and sleeping in the flowerbeds.
She just turned 8, so she’s far from the ornery little 10 pound chiots we brought home in a box from the pound so long ago. I remember her digging up all my plants, ripping out my clematis vines and running around the gardens like a crazy dog for several years. When she hit 2 she decided she was all grown up and became the best dog ever.
She isn’t destructive in the gardens any more, except for the occasional use of a flowerbed as an actual bed. She’s quite a nice gardening companion.
Do you have any gardening companions human or of the animal kingdom?
