Monty and Mimi are our ‘special strays’. Mimi is the daughter of my cat Saidi and the mother of Xabi our latest kitten rescue. She is now about 18 months, and we have known her since she was about 8 weeks! She runs towards me when I walk down with their afternoon meal but she STILL doesn’t like to be touched, and last time I nearly caught her she bit me!

Monty is about 2 and we have also been feeding him since he was a kitten of 3 months. In the last year he has become increasingly friendly and I now think could be a tame cat. He purrs and loves to be stroked. We caught him last year for castration but at that time he reacted really badly to being at the cat rescue and we decided to free him again.

Of course if I had had the contacts, knowledge and involvement with the strays that I now have much earlier, then both these beautiful animals would have been rescued as kittens and would no longer be wild.

As I have posted before, I don’t want them to be reliant on food that we put out on an empty building plot for the rest of their lives. I want them to be in a safer environment where they are loved and wanted. Now thanks to the efforts of Kerstin in Germany I may have found the solution. They have a home waiting for them, as you can see form Kerstin’s email, and it sounds just right.

“The adoptant will be a woman… has some rabbits, birds and so on in her garden… so, she has 3 cats that do not like to be touched, too… all 3 cats are from another organisation and all 3 up to now are in the house because she does not like to let them out if they are not to be touched… if it will be better for Monty & Mimi that will be no problem to leave them out… they can go out if they want, too.. she has some friends met her and brought with them some green food for the rabbits yesterday, too.. all love the animals there… the house, she has is around a bigger village but there it is very natural and like in a village, very quiet the controller wrote that… the room are all with blankets and houses and scrathing wood for the cats… a very lovely home for animals and cats the controller wrote me yesterday evening… and ideal place for Monty and Mimi…”

Now I need to work out how we get these 2 ready to travel, hopefully in July. I have asked if just one lot of vaccinations will be ok, certainly for Mimi as this will mean we only have to take her in for 2 weeks before she travels. I think this would be much better, because it is likely that we will have to keep her in a cage. I do not think she will be easy to re-catch once we have her, and it will not be worth trying to be-friend her more before she goes.

I have been reading a good article on feral cats which says in effect that if you spend the time taming one, you really need to keep it, as feral cats find it very hard to then re-trust another human.

SOoo project Mimi and Monty will start for me next week. First I need to hear from Kerstin final thoughts re. vaccinations and then I need the next transport date from Jos and confirmation that I have boxes for them. I think it is going to be an interesting few weeks!

My Almerimar Strays week starts today with the bank to change out coins from the very successful book sale on Saturday; Pam raise another 160€ for our stray cats. Well done! I’m then off to see Begona our vet to finalise appointments, passports and money for this week.

We have 3 cats going on the transport on Friday (Kasper, Greta & Harvey), which will be another 6am wake-up call for Pam and I, and today I need to make sure all the final bits are in place, including hopefully taking some better photos of the last 2.

Tommy also needs his final jab so that if a home is finalised for him this week, he will be ready to travel to Germany by plane with Erika next week. Our 5 baby kittens (including Xabi) are now old enough at just 2 months for their first injections, so they too need an appointment. They will then get their final jabs, their Rabia vaccinations and their blood tests at 3 months.

The next couple of days could be a little busy for me, as Xabi also needs worming today, and we have boxes to prepare for Friday, but we have no plans for any sterilisations this week; we’re just focusing on our current foster kids, and getting our next 3 off to Germany, where Kasper already has a new ‘forever’ home.

Next focus will be the litter of 5 more smaller kittens, who are still with their mother outside!

As planned a quiet week, although we have been trying to help a very sick feral cat. So far no progress as he won’t come near enough for us to help or catch him, and yesterday was showing no interest in food. We will keep trying but I don’t hold out much hope as yet.

On the better news front, both Caesar (now Kasper) and Tommy, our current foster cats, are doing well.

Kasper’s stomach is finally in better shape, after a food free day yesterday. Now he is eating again but only dry food. Pam reports that he is a lovely boy with “not a nasty bone in his body” … SWEET! Next week when his coat is looking a little better, I hope to take some new photos and video to send to Germany.

Tommy meanwhile continues to adjust well to living inside. He is sleeping on sofas and beds and on Nicola’s knee when she is at her computer. When I visited yesterday he was talking a lot, including asking for MORE food! He does however seem to like peace and quiet and tends to retreat upstairs when the apartment gets too noisy for him. He will be a lovely cat for an older person (being around 8, so no spring chicken himself), so we continue to hope that the Germans will find him a home soon.

Today Bono has set off for Switzerland with his new Mum, Sabine, and her partner, Thomas. We are sad to see him go, and Pam, John, and Rufus dog will all miss him (not so sure about Pam¡s cats!). We are however happy that we have found him the best possible home.

For anyone who hasn’t read about Bono before on this blog, he is our biggest save ever. We rescued him at the beginning of January, only to find that he was unable to open his mouth to eat! 6 weeks of syringe feeding followed before he could finally eat on his own. Now he manages slowly very soft mousse and mushy tuna and rice. We hope he will improve further as he grows, but Sabine accepts him and loves him as he is.

Please click on the tag cloud ‘Bono’ if you want to see all the videos, posts and pictures of this little chap’s progress.

I’m convinced that Sabine and Thomas will give Bono a brilliant home. They have just flown from Zurich to collect him, have an 11 month old female kitten, Desdemona, waiting to be his friend, and ,being both medical people, will do everything possible to help his little mouth improve further.

Enjoy the photos, and thanks to Pam and John for giving him such a loving home for the last 10 weeks, and for Mary’s help with all those smoothie feeds!

Happy Life Bono (now Jonathan) from all of us here in Almerimar!

These are Gila from the cat rescue’s latest kittens.

This ia actually a difficult one. Gila is not meant to be taking in any more cats because of her health problems and is no longer working with the girls in Germany. However understandably she finds it hard to walk past a cat in need.

She found this lovely female abandoned in Almeria and hoped to get her to the vet before she gave birth. That however was not meant to be, and however much people tell her the sensible thing would have been to have them put down at birth, Gila was never going to do that. I have to admit that having seen these tiny little kittens, I would find it hard to do as well.

SO now Gila is looking or anyone who can help, and what is really needed is a foster home away from the other cats at the cat rescue, so that these little babies have the best chance of survival, and of course some sponsorship. Their mother meanwhile is a beautiful tame cat, who also deserves a better life.

There are 3 ginger boys, 2 of which I have already posted a picture of. In addition there are 3 beautiful dark tabby females. If anyone can help, please let me know.