It’s been three days since I “raised the bar” and so far, Daffodil has not escaped.
This morning, I did not hear any sound of the polycarb hitting against the gate, so I assume Daffodil has not tried again.
She also did not go to Stargate2 to look (longingly or otherwise).
Our worry was (and still is) that Daffodil is already 17 years old and all this climbing and jumping (and failing to jump) isn’t good for her age. So we dearly hope she will stop trying and just be happy staying indoors though we know this will not be easy.
Daffodil was born on the streets, had lived on the streets for 10 years before we moved here and she came to us. We got her spayed, gave her total freedom to reside in our house, but she also had the freedom to come and go as she pleases. This would have been an ideal way of life for a community cat, but some people do not think so and have the means to harm community animals, so it became necessary for us to keep our community cats confined now.
For those of you who have been following our updates, you will be pleased to know that ever since I raised the bar, Daffodil has not been able to jump out.
So far.
Daffodil has migrated back upstairs to the blanket on the bed (like she used to, months before Rosie got sick). Ginger is the happiest, because Daffodil is around now. The thing is, Ginger doesn’t need to “see” Daffodil, he just needs to know she is in the house. Ginger would sleep in his orange basket downstairs while Daffodil is upstairs in our bedroom, and all is well. But if Daffodil escapes and even if she is only in the porch, Ginger would be mewing at Stargate2 or at the front door. It’s sad to see him like that. But now that Daffodil is indoors, we can see how happy Ginger is already.
 
But now, I have another problem – it’s Heidi.
Heidi is also a dame. Pretty old, but we don’t know how old as she was found waiting for me at our house gate many years ago. It looked like someone had left her there and she was smart enough to wait.
Now, Heidi is a real character. She is very strong-willed too. She does what she wants, but when she first came, all she asked was to be allowed to stay in our kitchen and be a “kitchen cat”.
Of course we let her stay. Note: Heidi has been previously spayed too (probably was someone’s pet, but she had a hernia when she first came – it healed by itself after a few weeks).
Now, Heidi loves to follow us to the playground for taiji. It’s her trademark, “the taiji cat”. The trouble is, she won’t follow us back when we are done. She’ll lounge in the park until SHE decides she wants to come home. Once, she lost her direction and went to the opposite house (180 degrees from ours, which was really far). The gate of that house looked like ours (but wait, don’t cats operate with their sense of smell?). We went all over looking for her (after she failed to return for lunch). Finally, we found her peeping out from that gate! She was so happy, she came running back to us!
So yes, cats can mess up too, at times. No one is perfect. Yups, not even cats.
Now, continuing our story, Heidi loves to eat a certain weed from the playground. And she always goes to that one particular spot at the playground to eat this weed.
When we were having “problems” with Daffodil’s escapes, I did not let Heidi out at all. It was difficult enough trying to keep Daffodil in and with her out-witting us repeatedly, I just couldn’t handle Heidi as well, so I didn’t let her out for days.
Then, Heidi’s appetite went down.
Oh no!!
Oh dear…
She ate only a little each time.
Then, she started vomiting.
It was bile as well as some food.
It looked like a case of hairball. A little more serious, perhaps, but it was still hairball.
Before this, even last week, I had already taken some of the grass (from another spot at the playground) and attempted to plant it in a pot. Please see below.
This is the grass (weed) that Heidi likes. It grew!
But of course, she doesn’t want to eat from my pot. She only wants to eat from THAT particular spot at the playground. Sigh…
I had to let her out yesterday. If anything, it’s for the hairball problem.
So Heidi went for a happy romp for 45 minutes and ate her grass, from HER spot.
Then, she refused to come back.
We had play “catch” all over the playground after which I managed to make her chase me towards the direction of our house.
I even managed to scoop her up after that and carried her towards the house.
Then..it happened. She kicked off from me. Ouch!! And ran into the neighbour’s compound (under renovation, so to a cat, that would be a “playground” of planks, buckets, cement, sand, etc. – what joy!).
Then, I called, like a mad woman, but she was no where to be seen.
I had to go off to work. Worried like mad.
When I came home, she was in the porch.
But I’m not ready to come back yet…
It took about an hour before she was ready.
I know, she also misses her tyre scratching post.
I’m getting a wooden scratching post made for all of them already, to be installed at the patio area. I hope that works for Heidi.
The things we have to do to keep them safe and reasonably happy!
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