An Abandoned Kitten

Yesterday, while on a bike ride with my children, I heard the meowing of a small kitten in a vacant lot on the edge of town. Upon closer inspection, I realized it was an abandoned kitten, with the mommy cat no where in site.

My daughter insisted that we help the kitten, so I picked him up, wrapped him in a small blanket, and set him on the lap of my three year old, who was sitting in the bike trailer. The kitten immediately stopped meowing, and rode contentedly to our home.

Once home, I gave the kitten some water, and opened up a little can of salmon for it to eat. I even ground up the salmon in the baby food grinder so the fish could be eaten easier.

I didn't know if the kitten was a lost cat, so I called the local shelter. They told me they didn't have any reports of a lost kitten, so I started asking other questions. I asked how I could tell how old the cat was. I found out, based on the number of teeth in the kittens mouth, that he is about 8 weeks old. The shelter said the kitten is viable without the momma, so I started considering keeping it as our pet.

He sure was cute, but I soon found out that he was also very annoying. He kept meowing a lot, and he also kept scratching my daughter. She really wanted to hold him, but she wanted me to be right there with him so she wouldn't get scratched. Well, needless to say, I couldn't get housework done, etc., if I was babysitting the kitten with Jader. Towards the end of the day, I just realized that adopting a cat, right now in my life, isn't exactly what I need.

So, I loaded the kitten into a pet taxi, and we drove it to the local shelter. Once there, I had to sign a paper describing where I found the kitten and to verify that it wasn't my pet. There is a $10,000 fine if you drop off your own pet at the shelter and try to pass it off as a stray. I didn't know that.

One thing the lady told me is that the kitten was very dehydrated and probably had been in the field by itself for a couple of days. She said she wasn't sure if he would survive or not, but they would try to do what they could. I told her that he did have some water, and a little bit of food, so hopefully he will fight hard and survive and be adopted by a loving family that has time for the care of such a small animal.

My daughter is already asking where her kitten is. I tried to explain that we were leaving him for another family to love on him, and she even helped me carry him into the shelter. I had her say goodbye to the kitten and I really thought she understood that we weren't keeping him, but a couple of hours after we dropped him off, she started asking where the kitten was.

I've been thinking of the little guy today, and might give the shelter a call later to see if he survived the night. The shelter said they'll keep the cat for five days, so if he gets healthy enough, and one of you want to adopt him, just go down and meet him.