Thank You, Ben M., for Your Continued Support!

Ben M. surprised me this week with another generous donation. This time it was a holiday gift for his friend Jason T. who asked Ben to make a donation in his name to his favorite charity.

 I’m floored. Thank you again.

Then we also figured out that we lived close to each other. In fact, Ben lives right in the middle of a few of my TNR’d colonies. When I mentioned that to him, he said he wondered why he’s only seen a few stray cats in his neighborhood.

That made my day. Yes! TNR works!!!

This is just one of the colonies right near him that I call the Eleanor Rigby Colony. You may recognize the photo from Tree House’s TNR handouts in their clinic.

Starting in 2008, I TNR’d, pulled, fostered and adopted 18 cats total from this address. There is only one cat left outside at this point. This photo shows a few of them, all of them TNR’d at first, and I’ve written about most of them. Starting from left to right:

Fluffy, the long-haired brown and white tabby was TNR’d, and then hit by a car a year later. Neighbors found her and took her to the ERl. She was euthanized because her back was broken. I found this out because the vet traced her microchip to me and called to let me know.

Patches is the short-haired brown and white tabby. She was TNReturned by me, and adopted indoors by another neighbor last year.

The only one currently left outside is the small black cat, who left the colony after her TNR and is being fed and cared for exclusively by another feeder. They named her Joker and she has shelter and full reign of their yard.

The long-haired black and white cat, is Dusty. He is the only male and was in charge of this “harem.” A few years after his TNR, a neighbor brought him to Animal Control, who traced his microchip to me. I was able to rescue him from animal control, and a friend of a friend adopted him from me. Since then, I’ve become great friends with his adopter, Greer. She has her own cat sitting business, Mama Bear Pet Care, and she regularly cat sits for me.

The other long-haired brown and white tabby is Clover. She had kittens before I could TNR her. I fostered and admitted the kittens to a shelter, and I TNR’d Clover after the kittens were weaned. Last year another neighbor adopted her indoors.

The grey cat is Gracie. Two years ago, she disappeared for awhile, and then a neighbor found her body in the alley underneath the train tracks. We don’t know what happened to her, but I suspected rat poison, since she was a great hunter and the city baits under the tracks all of the time. At least she had a good four years of being fed and cared for after her initial TNR, and she was definitely a neighborhood favorite.