Search Results for: foraging

Foraging 101 Infographic (12″x18″)

Museum-quality posters made on thick matte paper. Add a wonderful accent to your room and office with these posters that are sure to brighten any environment.

• Paper thickness: 10.3 mil
• Paper weight: 189 g/m²
• Opacity: 94%
• ISO brightness: 104%
• Paper is sourced from Japan

This product is made especially for you as soon as you place an order, which is why it takes us a bit longer to deliver it to you. Making products on demand instead of in bulk helps reduce overproduction, so thank you for making thoughtful purchasing decisions!

Foraging-women’s short sleeve t-shirt-blue cat

Your typical 100% cotton t-shirt (except for Heather Grey, Dark Heather Grey, Heather Green, and Heather Blue colors that contain polyester). Pre-shrunk to make sure your size is maintained throughout several washes, and a classic fit.

• 100% combed ringspun cotton
• Heather Grey is 90% combed ringspun cotton and 10% polyester
• Dark Heather Grey, Heather Green, and Heather Blue are 35% combed ringspun cotton and 65% polyester
• Fabric weight: 4.3 oz/yd² (145.8 g/m²)
• 30 singles
• Classic semi-contoured silhouette with side seam
• Tear-away label
• Shoulder-to-shoulder taping
• Seamed collarette
• Double-needle stitched sleeves and bottom hem
• Blank product sourced from Honduras, Haiti, or Nicaragua

Foraging-women’s short sleeve t-shirt-full color cat

Foraging cat sticker-purple

These stickers are printed on durable, high opacity adhesive vinyl which makes them perfect for regular use, as well as for covering other stickers or paint. The high-quality vinyl ensures there are no bubbles when applying the stickers.

• High opacity film that’s impossible to see through
• Fast and easy bubble-free application
• Durable vinyl, perfect for indoor use
• 95µ density

Don’t forget to clean the surface before applying the sticker.

Foraging cat sticker-blue

• High opacity film that’s impossible to see through
• Fast and easy bubble-free application
• Durable vinyl, perfect for indoor use
• 95µ density

Don’t forget to clean the surface before applying the sticker.

Willow

Thrashing Schwillow!

Willow’s tale of rescue is, quite frankly, one of the stupidest things I have ever done in my life. It could’ve gotten me kidnapped, murdered or who knows what. One Saturday morning I was the first to arrive at the practice to open it up. I was in the back and heard a knock at the door. I came up front to meet a strange man. I opened up and asked how I could help him, and he said he worked at the Johnson Ferry Baptist church across the street as a maintenance man, and they found a bunch of kittens. He said they got loose in the church and in the church parking lot, but he caught one. He said it was in the back of his van and acting CRAZY! I tried to ask how big the cat was, etc. but only got unhelpful answers. I promptly went to the back, grabbed a cat carrier, towels and my Bite Buster sleeves and figured I would catch this little bugger myself.

Could she have been more precious?

Little bugger she was. Very little. Wee in fact! The man opens the back of his WINDOWLESS, solid white, serial killer van with NOT A THING inside it except Willow, clinging to the grate that divided the back of the van from the driver’s area. What do I do? Oh, I jump right in without even thinking and then yell at the guy to “Shut the door!!” behind me, ya know, like he was not doing it fast enough and we wouldn’t want her to escape! Hindsight. So, he closed me in said windowless van, and I secured said vicious, CRAZY kitten (barely one pound, pouring green boogers from her eyes and nose), got her in a carrier, knocked, and he let me out. Thankfully, he let me out! In that instant I realized what an unsafe and stupid thing I just did without a soul in sight to know what had happened. But, got the kitten and the rest is history!

The photo I sent to Jake, preparing him for what we were about to "foster".

First carrier and car ride home!

Third eyelids up, she didn't feel her best that day.

I had no intention of keeping her of course. We set traps and tried to help the church capture the rest of the kittens. We tried for over a week with zero luck. That very same week we had a good Samaritan take in a small grey and white kitten. He was the only one left of his family. They had all been living in a sewer pipe in a subdivision and animal control had been called to catch them all, the little grey and white one was too elusive, and they were not successful in capturing him. The complete opposite of Willow who was the only one caught in her group.

Willow and Soren became fast friends.

I used the Hashtag #mustachesandmittens for obvious reasons.

They did everything together. Always best to raise kittens in pairs or the whole family!

I brought Willow home each night to foster until she could be reunited with her siblings. Have I mentioned that we have never successfully fostered anything, ever? Still failing! Hanging onto her for a few days turned into a manic mission to catch the rest of her litter so I could just keep the whole family! Afterall, gotta follow my own advice, I couldn’t bring a single kitten in here with a household of adults and seniors. After a week of completely falling in love with her, and being unsuccessful in trapping the remaining babies, we decided to adopt that elusive grey and white kitten as her new sibling. This, as you may have guessed, became Soren.

I love this photo of them. Two little peas in a pod.

They were fast friends in a matter of minutes, they both desperately needed each other after all. Kittens break all the rules and can often just be plunked together with some supervision and breaks and within days, they’re buddies. This could not have been truer with Schwills and Ren and what sweet pair they made!

Babies first stroller ride.

Mammas’ switch flipped and she went right into “Mamma-mode”, it was remarkable. She would groom, nurture, cuddle and smack and bite them too! All the things they needed. Our “justification” at the time for this adoption was well, obviously the rescue story, I had to keep her after risking my life, but Hitch needed friends. All of his friends and wrestle companions had died. He was so much younger than all of our other cats, so we thought Soren could grow up to be his new bestie, and we were right, but at that moment in time, would you have guessed that Hitch was the MOST fussed up and put out by the babies?! We were blown away, nothing but hissing and spitting at their door. He was NOT the welcoming committee we had anticipated, but at least we had Mother to assist us!

A nurturing Mammas.

Foraging lessons.

Lined up for evening meds time. Take the time to teach them early, meds are delicious!

Mammas cancer has started to grow here but she is still training!

They did integrate beautifully. These were the first babies I had the chance to raise since I had learned so much more about cats. They were clicker trained starting at just a few months of age, they were introduced to foraging from day one, leash and harness training-check! Cat stroller-check! We were going to do this right! I took them with me to work every day so they would learn that cat carriers and car rides are not scary and so they could get handled by multiple people. In fact, in that week before Soren joined us, I even kept Willow in my purse and took her to a doctor’s appointment! She napped the whole time, no one had a clue I had a 1.5 pound bundle of scrumptiousness in my bag!

Pic of her hiding in my purse at the doctor's office!

So inseparable they even used the litter box in unison!

In love.

Some pics are blurry because the little monkey never stopped moving!

I absolutely adore this series of photos!

She looks so over him!

These two became inseparable lights of our lives and Hitch warmed up to them beautifully, eventually, once he got over the fact that he was no longer the baby! I would say they became a gang of three!

Willow and Hitchinson.

Clearly, they became quite close.

She shared her personal catio with her friends!

I don’t even know what to say, Willow had so much freakin’ personality and was a super star! Best clicker trained cat ever, she was riding a skateboard at just a few months of age! She was gorgeous and a supermodel social media star, she LOVED to forage and was excellent at it. One of her cutest traits was her super cute squeak, she chirped more than meowed, and she would give “air butts” from across the room!! She could be six feet away from you sitting on the kitchen table, you’d say her name and she would head butt nothing at all! Just the air! Or she would headbutt you or an object but just b-a-r-e-l-y touch it, an air-butt!

Just learning how to skate.

Sharing the board with Samson.

This girl LOVED her skateboard!

She was also a mighty hunter and a bit “Lassie-like” (“Timmy, er, uh, my gecko fell down the well!”). She would catch these damn geckos and bring them into the house from the catios. On more than one occasion, her prey got away from her. She would COME GET US TO HELP!!!!! No lie, it was amazing. One situation I can recall very distinctly, a gecko was stuck up under the master bathroom vanity. I start walking up the stairs and she comes running out of the bathroom chirping at me, spinning in circles, the fur on the base of her tail all puffed up (this happened when she was very excited) tail whipping from side to side (she expressed a lot of words wither tail) and she led me to the bathroom, one specific corner and sure enough there was her prey. Much to Willow’s dismay, said gecko was saved rather than pulled back out onto the bloodletting field. She did the same thing when one went under the washer dryer! Except this time, we had a guest, so I have a witness who saw that she “asked” us for help. Same thing, chirping, puffy tail, spinning in circles trying to take me over to where she needed me to “get something for her.” Absolutely remarkable.

Could they be any cuter?

Bunk beds!

Cuddling with big brother Simon!

Hanging with old man, Lefty! They spent a lot of time together.

Mammas, Wiccas, Willow and Soren. So many good teachers!

Hitch and Willow.

My biggest regret was hiring a cleaning service when Willow and Soren were about 6-8 months old. I had never done this before and will never do so again. She completely changed and became super wary of guests, nose phobic and overall, just very skittish from this moment forward. I was always home to supervise so no one was nasty to her, but the noise and multiple people coming into the home just those few times changed her forever.

She communicated early on that she would like a catio outside this window.

Her wish was our command.

Did I mention she was also a master forager?

Then a few years later along comes Finn and Tonka. Things were fine until they were not. I have many photos and videos of the introductions going well, I even have video of Willow backing Tonka up on a cat condo and putting him in his place, but at some point, those tables turned, and he forever wanted to hunt her. It was a devasting change I had to cope with, we tried and tried for years to integrate him. Short version, if you are bold and brave and like to play rough, he is fine with you. If you are shy, timid, and easily charged and terrorized then he is a bully. No combination of medication has been able to change this in him, but by this stage we were committed to everyone, and this is why we now have “Willow’s Place” an upstairs catio daddy built just for her! Two cat wheels, one upstairs and one down, because she needed all of her favorite amenities, and she ended up spending the bulk of her days upstairs so we did all we could to ensure she had access to her favorite things in addition to time sharing and rotating cats around the house.

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"My Daddy built this just for me!"

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One of the last tricks I was working on with her shortly before we lost her was to teach her to jump through my arms in the shape of a hoop. She was the first cat I had ever taught to do this, and she did so perfectly and beautifully for the very first time the morning of the day she died. I never had the chance to capture this on camera. Very sad indeed.

Sitting up on the balance beam.

Enjoying Daddy's scoop.

July 19^th, 2021 was like any normal day. Willow would come flying downstairs, hop on her skateboard and ride it until she hit some carpet or a chair leg to stop its roll and then take her morning meds! This morning, however, we practiced our new trick, jump through my arms in a hoop. Best to do these things in the early morning hours when the house was quiet, she was less distracted and wary of life. We did our thing and I left. When I came home that evening I was sitting in the driveway for a bit talking on the phone with a client and answering their cat questions. Little did I know what was happening inside and little did I know if I had just come inside sooner….

Jake more often than not does evening chores, canned food dinner, scoops the litter, does evening meds. He had done all of those things. I went upstairs to use the bathroom after my hellacious commute home to find Willow collapsed on her side in a puddle of urine on the floor. She was warm, right next to her food bowl, she had just eaten some of her dinner, took about 3 steps and died. I did chest compressions, tried to give her CPR, and was frantic. If I had just come inside sooner…I’ll never stop regretting that, not ever. Only just a few minutes and I may have been there if nothing else to hold her as she passed. Willow was only seven years old. She had not even made it to her first senior vet visit. She had no signs or symptoms of anything at all so one can only guess it was the silent killer, heart disease. Needless to say, we were devastated, and still are. I miss her every day, she was so special and so full of personality. She was one of my very bestest girls, trained by Mammas, and now she will not be here to pass the torch to the next generation. I also just hate that her life was so stifled by the addition of Tonka. So many regrets with this one. Some of them all you can think of is how you could have done better.

And it all started with a potentially life-threatening rescue on my part. And I would do it again without a second thought!

We miss you so much Schwillow!

She was precious beyond words.

So pretty in her special vest!

Soren really misses his best friend and sister.

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Foraging cat sticker-full color

• High opacity film that’s impossible to see through
• Fast and easy bubble-free application
• Durable vinyl, perfect for indoor use
• 95µ density

Don’t forget to clean the surface before applying the sticker.

Foraging cat sticker-green

• High opacity film that’s impossible to see through
• Fast and easy bubble-free application
• Durable vinyl, perfect for indoor use
• 95µ density

Don’t forget to clean the surface before applying the sticker.

Samson

Samson came to us at 9 ½ years of age. I had known him since he was only 9months old, when he came to see me for his first grooming appointment. Samson was owned by an elderly couple who had never had a cat before. They purchased him from a breeder in South Georgia, and when they went to pick him up the kittens were living on the front porch, free reign! Probably not much of an actual breeder I would suspect. Nonetheless, Samson, a “purebred Ragdoll” was one of the coolest cats I have ever known. Every time they brought him in for grooming, he was a MUSH! He would willingly lay on his back for his stomach shave, I could comb him out, trim his nails, shave his tush all on my own without needing any assistance. He purred through the whole thing. In fact, most of the time, he brushed himself!

Meeting Soren, just introduced!

Exploring his new digs, first few weeks home!

Guess he was feeling pretty "safe" in his safe room!

His parents and I really got to know each other over the years. After all they came in four times a year for a while you wait grooming appointment and visited us in between for medical visits and food pickups. I made it abundantly clear that if anything ever happened to them that I would gladly take Samson and provide him with safe haven. One day, when Samson was about 8 years old, they broke the news to me that his mom had been diagnosed with stage four stomach cancer. She did not have long to live, took a few trips, visited with dear friends, planned her own funeral, and basically had a goodbye gathering before she started to feel really bad. Samson was by her side, like a good little nurse, once she became bedridden. The story is just so sad, when she passed her husband was lying beside her in bed holding her hand and Samson was right there beside her until her last breath. I wasn’t sure what his dad would do, but he kept Samson and tried to do right by him for a year and a half. Then I got the call.

He was a sloshy guys! A MUSH!

Samson’s human, his dad, called the clinic one day and as soon as I was told that he was on the phone I knew why. He told me that he had had a heart attack a few months back and an ambulance came. The doors to the house were left open and all he could think about was what if Samson got outside? He also said that he thought he missed a woman’s touch and that he wasn’t enough for him. I completely understood and told him to bring him to me. Now, this was a bit of a crapshoot mind you, Samson had lived as a single cat his entire life and had never lived with a dog. We had about 9 cats when we brought him home (I think, maybe 11?) and we had Elsa, the Bernese Mountain Dog. This could have proven to be a recipe for disaster, but did I mention how amazing Samson was? He was cool as a cucumber!

The cat loved hard surfaces, sinks, cardboard, no fuzzy beds for Jams!

As per usual Samson was set up in the “purple bathroom”, the room where all animals start and end life in this house. Soren was the ambassador of happiness and welcomed Sammy Jams with open paws. Samson did not eat wet food, cat treats or human food. He was raised on Hill’s t/d his whole life and that was really all he liked; positive reinforcement was a challenge is my point. Oh, yeah and he also “didn’t play”. And well, he didn’t really play a whole lot, but with time we got him interested in and acknowledging some lure toys, mostly liking the stick end and not the attachment. So, for the introduction to the other cats, we got creative, one thing Samson could not get enough of was brushing, so every time he would see the other cats, he was brushed! We put up these baby gates and would play and offer treats to our guys and brush Samson’s little cheeks! Thankfully, he was incredibly easy going and this worked like a dream. He introduced himself to the household quite quickly. It was eating here that was going to be a challenge!

"Can I get some service in this place!?"

We have fed exclusively out of foraging toys for 17 years now. And remember, he didn’t like wet food or treats. Cats typically will not work for food out of food puzzles that has been free, so filling up a food puzzle full of Hill’s t/d was not exactly going to teach him to forage. So, even though Samson was getting along with everyone way quicker than expected, he went to bed in his own room each night so he could learn how to eat in this house! Boy oh boy did I make it easy for him and all of this became excellent fodder for my foraging lecture!

This is Jams, "ordering drinks at the bar!"

Overstuffed foraging board, SUPER easy!

Same foraging board the next morning! He was getting it!

Attempting to offer wet food and an easy foraging cup-open!

I would put Jams in his room with loads of food puzzles, gushing with kibble. I left my Foraging Cups “open” and laid on their side so he could easily extract food with his paws, I gave him super easy muffin tins with a few balls and mice as obstacles (counted the pieces of kibble in each well to monitor use!) as well as other, overstuffed, stationary foraging boards gushing with novel kibble and some treats, just hoping. I even left a plate of wet food for him each night, just to see if he might take me up on it. He didn’t. I would take photos of the foraging boards the night before and then compare in the am to see if he engaged with them. It is imperative to remember that you absolutely cannot force a cat into eating how and what we want them to eat, that is a great way to make your cat very sick. In as quickly as three days without eating, fat can mobilize to the liver causing hepatic lipidosis, (a.k.a. fatty liver disease), this results in your cat’s skin turning yellow and is very serious. We had to take our time and ensure he ate each day.

Learning to ride a skateboard WITH Willow.!

You start on a rug so it does not roll and they build trust!

His interpretation of balance beam use.

But he got it! Boy, did he get it. In fact, Samson became what I would call a “master forager”, chirping and brrrping and purring all the way! It was so incredibly precious to see him light up, engage and be a cat! Samson became the super star of my Fundamentally Feline YouTube channel; he is still featured in my talks and pics of him doing all kinds of amazing and adorable behaviors are plastered across my social pages. This cat did find ONE wet food he would accept as a treat, Hill’s a/d! He learned to ride a skateboard at the age of ten with a/d as his reward! Once we found this as a tool, we could teach him anything! His repertoire of tricks included go to mat, go to stool, sit, shake, hi-five, give ten, spin in a circle, run through a tunnel, thrash on his skateboard, sit up and we even used clicker training to acclimate him to his asthma inhaler later in life when that developed. No surprise, there is a how-to video for that, starring Jams!

Testing out one of his new daddy's scoops!

This was NOT an unusual scene to come home to. So naughty!

Sammy Jams decided that living on the countertop and the adjacent kitchen table was to be his home base. This was awesome as Jake missed having a Sous Chef after Kodiak Bears passed away and we adored having him front and center. It also meant a bigger hole was left when he was gone. Jams filled the Sous Chef shoes nicely, complete with a set of naughty attention seeking behaviors…he truly enjoyed knocking everything off the counter. This did not start immediately. He let us get good and comfortable. And at first it was little things, soft things, unimportant things. Gradually, overtime he upped his game. He was free to do whatever he wanted, could’ve gotten in our laps while we watched TV, instead, he enjoyed sitting on the counter, glancing over at us innocently, giving us one of his classic Samson, “brrrps” and just ever so slightly pushing the treat jars off, then my water bottle, then he really kicked it up a notch and moved on to full sized canisters of sugar and flour! Keep in mind, he didn’t want the cat treats, wouldn’t eat them if they were free, this was truly attention seeking behavior and we did try to secure items to the countertop so we could more effectively ignore him, but he literally started trying to move the entire coffee maker! One night we came home from being out to dinner and the floor was just littered with stuff, he was busy in our absence! Naughty, naughty Jams!! Not gonna lie, we freakin’ loved it.

Tonka and Jams.

The last straw was Kodiak’s urn, yep, guess Samson decided, “I have replaced you as Sous Chef, you must go”. Yeah, that’s right one of our cat’s urns is on the kitchen counter, what? That was his favorite spot, best place for it! And by last straw, well, I don’t know what I mean, except that we glued what we could back together, got a new urn for Kodiak Bears and literally fixed all canisters to the counter with museum gel! He did try knocking the ENTIRE DISHRACK off the counter a few times but quickly gave up on that.

Soren, the welcoming committee, and Jams.

Strollin' Jams!

Samson's kitchen table set up. Whatever he needed!

I can’t say enough good things about this cat. He got to really be a cat while he was with us. He learned to ride in the stroller and that was pretty bee’s knees, he even came out on his leash and harness and enjoyed a good roll in the bazillion pieces of yard debris leaving his fur in shambles. The only toy his dad told me he liked were sparkly puff balls! We would toss them to him, and he would bat them back to us using both of his precious giant fuzzy mitts! This was a great game and one I wish I had more of on video. He loved the cat tunnel and cardboard boxes were well, his jam. This cat could not get enough, if only he were here to have helped with the CNN piece on cats and cardboard boxes. He would’ve been perfect. Our kitchen table was set up exclusively for Samson, complete with FOUR cardboard boxes on each corner and a Catit Self Grooming station in the center, because he could never get enough cheek scratching sometimes, we had to let him take care of that on his own. I didn’t even give him bedding when I brough him up to the clinic for blood work, he preferred the hard cage floor and a cardboard canned food tray, by far! Damn bedding was just in the way.

At the clinic, we brought his box for exams!

Sparkly puff fun.

Foraging is exhausting!

So many photos of him in this position!

This is how he was most comfortable and he did permit belly rubs!

His dad came to visit him at the clinic twice when he came in for rechecks and one Sunday, he even came all the way down to our house to see Samson in his new habitat! It was sweet that he made the effort to do that and see that he was safe and thriving with us. Samson did not have a dramatic display to these visits. It was a little sad, but it also helped me feel good in that I think Samson was pretty happy here and had truly settled in. His first human dad passed away a few years after he gave Jams to us. I think Samson was about 11 or 12 years old. I used to send him photos and videos of all of Samson’s adventures and he really seemed to enjoy them. Then I stopped getting replies…one day I called, and a friend answered, Samson’s previous human dad had made the right decision in giving him to us when he did. That was the last time I spoke to him, he was in hospice, and passed shortly thereafter. I can only hope that someone will do for me what I did for Samson when it is my turn to leave this world. I hope to time it just right and not leave anyone behind, but that is near impossible to predict.

He was beyond squaeezable!

One of the first ways that you know that something is amiss with your cat is a change in behavior. All of a sudden, Samson started coming upstairs, A LOT, and even started sleeping with us. He never did this the first few years. We loved it, but it gave us pause. We would even say to him, “Jams, you dying? You got a tumor? Why do you love us more all of a sudden”? He would “brrrp” and purr and make his ginormous biscuits on us as his answer. He still engaged in all of his normal behaviors he was just now sleeping in bed with us. Hard to complain, but I now believe this was the start of a problem we never actually diagnosed.

Our cats are weighed every month, I’ve been told I can tell they have lost weight when they have only farted! Samson’s weight was stable. He had developed asthma over the years, and we had that under control, but he had other weird, not descript things happen. Even the asthma diagnosis seemed like we were reaching to fix a cough that was not 100% asthma. He would have really thick mucousy, yellow discharge from one nostril, only the one. I would get it cleared up, but it would recur. In the early stages of weirdness labs were beautiful, X-rays and ultrasound normal. It was hard to be alarmed.

Mommy and Me day! Off to the office.

Part of the Royal Canin photo shoot for the article I authored in their magazine!

He just continued to get weirder. His kidney values started creeping up, ok, no big deal, we can treat that! Then he started having accidents on the bed but we could not pinpoint why, waterproof blankets on the bed it is, we’ve been here before (Vader), nothing we can’t handle! Then he started getting weak, hard time even standing up, this became a little dangerous as he lived on the kitchen counter and table and we didn’t want him to fall, but it was also a good sign that he was still in his routine and wanted to be in these places. Then, what seemed to be neuro issues started. He would try to squeeze himself into weird spaces, he was incredibly lethargic, body temperature having a hard time regulating. We were hospitalizing him at home in the giant breed dog crate, he was on an IV catheter here at the house and I would wake every few hours to check on him and turn him over. I did this for many nights. I would express his bladder to lessen the mess but ultimately, I had to bathe him daily and blow him dry to keep him clean and warm.

We had an appointment at the neurologist, but the morning that I awoke to bring him, his temp was low and he was not stable enough to undergo any diagnostics there. We were frantically trying to treat what was possible acute kidney failure that came on like a bolt of lightning and or some sort of brain tumor that was setting a cascade of other weirdness’s throughout the rest of his little body. We had to call it, he could stand or eat on his own, the dignity was gone. It wasn’t fair. Nor was it fair that we only got to love him from age 9-1/2 to 14 years. We missed out on so much and he was ripped away from us far too soon. He had so much left to do here!

We let Samson go that night, we said goodbye in his favorite spot on the kitchen counter.

We miss you so much, Samson! What did Samson teach us? Do NOT underestimate your cats! Cats CAN be trained, senior cats CAN learn to forage, walk on harnesses, and take stroller rides, sometimes single cats CAN mesh into a multi-pet household and thrive (though he was an exception and not the rule) and you can absolutely train an old cat to learn new tricks.

There are now TWO cat urns on our kitchen counter. As it should be.