atlanta cat behavior

Mr. Wallace (OG-Wally)

Wallace looking terrified during the professional photo shoot.

Mr. Wallace came to us under some pretty challenging circumstances. This story is a delicate one to tell.

I will start by saying that not everyone in this profession is capable of rescuing and managing a lot of cats/animals. I sit here and share all of these animals with you, boasting about how many we cared for at one time and how great their lives were, how clean our home was and still is, how great the medical care that they have all received has been. And it is all true, we practice what we preach here. But the fact of the matter is, not everyone is capable. Many people do not have the time (or won’t make the time), many do not have any help and are just one person and, over time, caring for double digits of pets can become physically and emotionally exhausting, and some people just check out. They might decide to travel, they may rehome their pets, they may just stop upholding the standards of care the pets had been accustomed to, they may just check out altogether, which is what Wally’s human did.

Wally’s story began when I was asked to pet sit for a co-worker. This was 20+ years ago now, so things were a bit “looser”. I was handed a key and a note with a few scribbled down instructions. That’s it! The end (You should see my pet sitting notes-I am like a crazy person). After work one October night, off I went for my first visit to this house. Upon arrival, nothing super crazy, unkempt yard, dingy carport type area, an old bungalow that needed fixing up. Inside was a different and much more alarming situation, no working lights, none, zero. It was dark, mind you. I had never been there before, I had no idea where anything was, I was completely at a loss. This was long before cell phone flashlights. I had to keep the refrigerator door open for light. It was a bit frightening to say the least, it felt like I was in a scary Halloween movie, and I would soon be fighting for my life. Seriously.

There was no food in the fridge, the oven was full of picture frames and prints, there were stacks of unopened gifts on the dining room table, and many other strange details I will not disclose. Most sadly, when I made it out to an area, I’m not quite sure what to call it, kind of like a finished carport recreation room, there was some light from the streetlights coming through the windows. I saw a 20-pound bag Science Diet Light dry cat food; the bottom corner of the bag had been chewed through and there were only a few pieces of kibble scattered around on the floor. There was some food in the few bowls I could locate but clearly, I needed to come back with supplies. I could not find any other food; I could not find a can opener or where the litter boxes where. I called Jake in tears, I was horrified, this was a colleague for Christ’s sake. I filled the water bowls that I was able to locate and left to come back the next day, with some light bulbs!!!!!

So handsome!

Multiple staff accompanied me back to the house the next day. It was really something to see the home in daylight. It did not really look as if anyone lived there, but 15 cats did, and they needed our help. Little did I know when I took this pet sitting gig that this would basically my first hoarding case. We scooped all the boxes and gave food and water and tried to put eyes on everyone, but the cats were so terrified that all of these strangers were in their home, they were tough to locate.

On the third day, we made the decision to confiscate the cats and bring them back to the vet clinic to provide medical care and safe haven while we figured out what the hell we were going to do. Upon arrival at the clinic we set everyone up in boarding cages, cats that we knew were friends we boarded together so they could have that comfort and we went through the list of patients in the medical record to be sure we got everyone. But someone was missing…we had turned that house all kinds of upside down catching these cats, but we had to go back. Wally was the missing cat, we finally found him up inside a box spring in what was possibly a guest bedroom. Needless to say, the whole ordeal was traumatic for all involved and went on far beyond the scope of this story.

Cat's cats NEED to live with other cats!

Wally grew up with dogs and liked them too!

So, long story long, Wally, became Mr. Wallace to us! And he lived under furniture in our home for YEARS. He loved the other cats, Charcoal was his absolute best friend, he even liked the dogs. For years we never saw him use a litter box, almost never saw him eat, we rarely touched him except for monthly heartworm prevention and nail trims. This was fine with us, he was safe.

Wally was clearly a very shy, poorly socialized cat. He was a cat’s cat and not interested in humans so much. Eventually these cats were all released from their boarding cages and lived in the clinic until they found homes, Wally lived under the cages. He was never seen and impossible to show to adopters. Jake came to meet him and well, he looked at a white blob of fur under the cages. There were a few reasons I was drawn to Wally. First, it is no secret I adore “the Meezers” (Siamese cats for those unfamiliar with the term), we didn’t have a flame point after all, Wally was like completing our set! Ha! But obviously, it was his story and his trauma that really tugged at me. Having been to the house and helped to rescue him myself really connected us, at least as a human, I do realize that Wally could’ve cared less about me. I felt that even if he got adopted, he would likely be adopted because he was pretty and then returned because he was so timid. See how I could twist and justify how they needed me? Many of you are not at all blind to this, I know it! We had a house full of cats, we did not “need” another cat, but he would be happy there, have feline friends and zero expectation from us to be something he was not.

He had a lot of friends!

Naughty, naughty! Someone found the fireplace.

Oh, dear, Mr. Wallace.

There is no miraculous “and then one day…” tale to tell. The day he found the fireplace proved stressful as that resulted in a surprise bath, further reinforcing his idea to steer clear of humans! He just very gradually came out of his shell and learned to trust us. He eventually even made his way to the sofa! It was AWESOME. Sadly, we waited many years for this so we didn’t get to cuddle and enjoy each other for as long as we would have liked.

At the surgeons to see what was wrong.

He developed a very rare and weird kidney issue. One day I saw him urinate on the floor and it looked like he peed dried coffee grounds!!! Turns out, it was dried blood coming from his kidneys. These particles were clumping together and obstructing his ability to urinate. It was super weird. We have never seen anything like it before or since, but Wallace could not pee! At the age of 17 he ended up having a perineal urethrostomy, (a P/U surgery), which basically means he had his penis removed and was turned into a lady so he could pee! He surprisingly held steady for quite some time post op, kidney disease and subsequent anemia finally got him.

His urine with the dried blood!

Lip Lickin' good!

Best friends, Charcoal was with him in his last moments.

Fiercely hunting catnip stuffed mice.

Doing tricks!

Mr. Wallace often looked like he should have top hat and cane. To us, he looked like Mr. Peanut from the Planters nuts commercial. He was just precious. He was so very sophisticated looking. He was also a very polite beggar. He even started to allow guests to interact with him in his senior years and would gently pull their arm towards him requesting a bit of cheese! Just like Wallace from Wallace and Grommit, Wally liked cheese! So cute.

I am very grateful that Jake and I are capable and able bodied to do what we have done and to have saved all of those we have saved. Together we have fulfilled one of my lifelong dreams which is not something everyone gets to say.

Politely begging for cheese!

Mr. Wallace

Wally and Simon, surprise cuddle session under the foot stool.

Kodiak Bears

A thoughtful pose taken during our professional photo shoot!

Kodiak was brought into the practice where I was employed at the time. His original name was Issac. He had been abandoned outside of an apartment complex and brought in by a local cat rescue. He was a stunning cat, but Kodiak had some baggage. He was all four-paw declawed (AND LEFT OUTSIDE!) We performed our usual intake protocol getting him ready for adoption, but in doing so we discovered how mutilated his little feet were. Nonetheless, we put him in our adoption room in hopes of finding him a new family. He was marveled at and inquired about daily; he was super handsome after all.

We learned quite quickly that Kodiak was a biter, likely why he was left outside where he was defenseless having no claws. We began warning people not to touch or pet him too much. It is a bit challenging to adopt out a cat when you have to tell people not to interact with him. He was so soliciting of affection and good looking making him a bit hard to resist. Finally, we had a taker. A cat savvy parent that understood he was a bite risk but wanted to take on the challenge anyway. We adopted Kodiak to her with specific instructions on managing the behavior. Fingers crossed off he went to home number two.

A few weeks later Kodiak was returned for biting. It happened a few too many times and a bit too hard, so the family decided it was not the right fit. So, does declawing keep cats in their homes? The answer is vehemently no.

We decided to look a little further into Kodiak’s aggression by x-raying his feet and discovered he had some bone remnants from his declaw. Since the cells for the nail come from the bone, if the entire P3 bone is not completely removed, you get regrowth of nail under the skin. We decided to do surgery to “fix” this, which basically involved re-declawing him. We did not offer declawing at this feline only practice so it was my first experience with the procedure. I was horrified and sobbing upon his bloody recovery from anesthesia. I will liken it to slaughtering your own cow for a steak dinner. For the majority of people, if they had to kill it to eat it, probably wouldn’t. If clients could watch a video of a declaw surgery and the cat’s recovery post op before electing to do it to their beloved cat, they wouldn’t. Sheltering clients from the gruesome facts is an enormous part of the “cover up” that is happening in veterinary medicine.

Photo taken during the Cats101 filming on Animal Planet!

More before smartphones photos.

Kodiak could no longer be trusted in the adoption room. He was a liability, so he lived in the back of the hospital where I became extremely attached to and empathetic for him. I’ll never forget the day I saw him scratch on one of the posts at the clinic, it made me choked up that he knew just what to do, remember cats also scratch to scent mark so even without claws the behavior is performed. So I took him home and Jake and I became home number three that I know of, and this would be his last stop because we do not give up on animals, no matter what. The baggage was still there, and we learned to recognize and work with him but you ALWAYS had to watch yourself around Kody Bears. He proceeded to have more re-growths on different toes at different stages of his life. Kodiak was declawed initially and then re-declawed 3 subsequent times. We know more now and we know better; we should have opened up all four feet and just corrected his botched declaw from the start, perhaps two feet at a time, but hindsight is 20/20. Kodiak developed one last regrowth in his senior years but I couldn’t do it to him again. I chose to medically manage him and treat him for chronic pain instead.

Italiano Bears on the counter, "helping".

Shadow and Kodiak.

Fireside Bears.

Kody had another good friend at the clinic, Charcoal. Honestly, I was having a hard time choosing between which of the two I would adopt. One Saturday when I was off from work, I got a call from one of the other techs asking me to choose because a family was interested in both of them but only wanted one cat. I was in tears, I couldn’t! I know I picked one, I think it was Charcoal, but I honestly cannot remember. I was nauseous when I arrived that next Monday morning wondering who was going to still be there waiting for me. They were both there! We adopted them as a pair. You will meet the stunning Charcoal next month.

Kodias Bears! So many nicknames for this one, OMG! Bears was also quite the chef, he assisted Jake in the kitchen nightly and ate most everything offered that was of course non-toxic. We used to call him “Italiano Bears!” His dream was to go to Italy and have bruschetta, boy oh boy did he love cheese. No matter what we called him, his name always ended on the plural and that carried over to pretty much everybody, we don’t know why, it’s just what we do! He also enjoyed sparkly puff balls and regularly did the “calling” behavior that I so adore.

Bears, Wiccas and Charcoal.

Charcoal and Bears cuddling with Grant below.

Being a "real artic bear" in he snow.

Trying out my new stethoscope.

I LOVE this pic! Eleven on the bed at once is our record.

This cat remained unmanageable at the vet for the rest of his life. I would bring him up for his annual visits and we would examine and vaccinate him in the car. The vet’s office was associated with horrific pain. Another result of these procedures is that cats often miss out on veterinary care due their temperament, or they must be sedated for appointments due to their increased aggression.

One morning I woke up and found him deceased in the red room/extra bedroom. I yelled to Jake who came running out of bed, he and Jake were super tight. It was ok, for Bears this was the best way for him to leave us. I hate not being able to say goodbye, I much prefer to nurse and spoil them. I know everyone is different, but I personally loathe it when they are ripped away from me, but for Bears this was for the best. He hated the vet and the last thing I would’ve wanted was a struggle at the time of euthanasia.

His "school boy" photo.

Living at the clinic post housefire.

Beached whale Bears.

If you must alter a species to the extent of a 10-toe amputation (or worse, all 18 toes) just to be able to live with them, then I ask, why have you chosen this species with which to share your home? Scratching is an innate feline behavior; it would be like asking a dog not to bark or a bird not to fly.

I leave you with a quote from Jeremy Bentham, “The question is not “Can they reason?” nor, “Can they talk?” but, “Can they suffer?“

The answer? Yes, indeed cats can suffer and they do so at the hands of their doctors every day in this country. It is time to end the suffering. I hope this story has moved you to join the crusade to end declawing in the United States. Please consider joining or donating to the Paw Project and help us end this madness.

On behalf of the memory of Kodiak Bears please stop the suffering.

Freyja

Probably about 16 or 17 years old here!

Freyja was honestly one of the kittens that drew the urge to keep the whole litter, I just thought she was so scrumptious. She grew up to be, what I think, was our most beautiful cat we have ever had. She lived up the goddess’s name we bestowed her. Our best friends nicknamed her Sasquatch! They would pet sit for us and leave us notes (remember, she was around before smartphones) or send texts that they had a “Sasquatch sighting!” I always thought this was hilarious but also tells you how elusive she was. She had no shortage of nicknames that is for sure. One that stuck the most, was “Bloomies” or “Bloomers”. You see, I have a thing for calling everyone some variation of “pants”, Leftypants, tortiepants, you name it. Freyja was too classy for pants, she wore bloomers! She also shopped at Bloomingdales (she told me), “Bloomingdale Blooms” was not a rare thing to hear me shouting around the house! I do realize that I am mildly insane, but hey, it’s fun to have nicknames!

Our dear Freyja. Her name means the goddess of love and beauty in Norse mythology. If you have not gathered by now, I’m of Swedish and Norwegian heritage so we have a bit of Scandinavian flare with some of the names we have chosen over the years. Freyja is the last kitten to feature in the “Mammas and her babies” category. I am sharing everyone in the order that we adopted them!

Freyja was a shy kitten and remained a shy cat for most of her life. This is a good life lesson for all of us. You cannot necessarily make a cat be who you want them to be. I adopted these kittens at barely 4 weeks old and they were all so different, every single one of them! Loads of commonality too, so much so that I do think there was only one father, plus the color patterns makes sense, and lead to just the one dad. Still, so much personality variation and I raised them all the same, offering the same experiences. I think it is important to learn to love your cats for who they are and the unique qualities each one offers.

You had to sneak up on her for good pics!

Full blown Sasquatch mode right here! Look at that lush coat.

She was a screamer like her siblings, the whole family was so vocal. I can recall all of the typical young cat naughtiness she embraced like getting in the fireplace, shy, skittish, super fun to bathe! If you even made eye contact with her downstairs she would bolt, you definitely could not bend over and pet her or pick her up! No way! However, she did always seem to know that when you were on the toilet, fresh out of the shower or horizontal in bed and that meant you were safe. She would get on our chests and embrace shoulder scratches and drool little drool drops right into our mouths if we weren’t careful! Such a wonderful purr and cooing, it was a special gift. I was the only one who could medicate her and trim her nails her whole life!

Chillin' in her condo. Look but do not touch!

Captured a pic of her playing! A rare photo indeed.

Some pics are not the best because so elusive!

It was as a senior that we really got to know and appreciate her. She gradually started to lose her hearing and it was actually a good thing! We had a new cat! She was far less noise phobic, she started to come downstairs to “meds time” wondering what all the fuss was about, she started to allow us to handle her and once in a while she would grace us with her presence of the sofa. If Freyja came to see you , you did not dare to breathe or move a muscle, it was a special gift and you embraced it! I even trained her to a leash and harness at 18 years of age and she enjoyed our “supervised yard fun” time. It was amazing!

So many words! "You're doing it wrong!" Is what I'm sure she is saying!

Waiting for our bi-cavity ultrasound at the internist's office!

At the vet for lab work recheck.

She lived almost exclusively upstairs at the top of the “treehouse” (the vertical space treehouse we built in our master bedroom) until she lost her hearing. Then she decided she needed a change of scenery and decided to join the family. It was awesome. She pretty much set up shop on a cat condo right in-between the kitchen and living room, she was in the heart of the action for her last 4-5 years of life. She would bark orders at us from the top of the condo, it was glorious! She demanded a lot of room service and we obliged, we were a very dedicated staff. This also led to us missing her more than we ever thought because she blossomed into such a big personality!

Enjoying meds time with a syringe of yummy food.

A "Mommy and Me" day at the office!

Still puzzlin'! Foraging right up until the end.

"Did someone say sparkly puff?"

This cat played with interactive wand toys and foraged for food up until a few weeks before she died. She was also a fierce hunter of sparkly puff balls and “called” while carrying through the house. This is a behavior that we sorely miss and loved the sound of her “calling” us to a meal with her prey. She also truly loved our dogs, groomed them, and even herded them! It was pretty hilarious to watch 20 year old, 7# Freyja, tell 100# Sebastian that he needs to move, “no, over here, never mind go over there!” And he would go! She had a lot of opinions! Her quality of life was outstanding. Even at 21 years of age, the top of a six-foot-tall cat condo (complete with heating pad) was where she lived. Needless to say, I start joint support very early in life, she started around age 12, and never showed a single symptom of arthritis or stiffness.

Freyja loved all of her doggies. She groomed them and taught them well!

Freyja blooms knew every single animal that I have cared for in my adult life. She was strong, survived so much, including our housefire, and had great quality of life well into her geriatric years. She is dearly missed, but we hold no regrets with this one. Others have left us feeling robbed and heartbroken. Some we did so much for and still lost them so young. Twenty-one years, 5 months and 10 days is a pretty good run that we can accept. She will always be our beautiful goddess.

Her last day with us, since 4 weeks old. We had a good run. She was finally tired.

How lucky are we to have these amazing and gorgeous animals that someone else just threw away?

A Food Puzzle Tutorial: How to get the most out of our food puzzles, their interconnecting qualities and how to combine with commercial toys for increased challenge!

This video details how to best utilize the foraging toys made here at Fundamentally Feline. We offer toys for beginners all the way to the master forager. Our toys also nicely compliment commercially available food puzzles and this video will show you how to do just that! Our toys can be purchased at https://www.fundamentallyfeline.com/s…

Beyond the Nip! Honeysuckle Scent Enrichment

Tartarian honeysuckle is a scent that some cats respond to in the same euphoric way they do catnip. Not all cats respond to all scents so it is worthwhile to try them all.

Zinnia

The very first Fundamentally Feline profile pic was this beautiful girl!

Professional photo shoot was a challenge because she was shy.

She freaked out in the trap! Hardcore. Again, not knowing then what I do now, Jake and I were freaked out too. She thrashed around in the trap, bloodied her nose, we were afraid to open it because she was like a wild animal. But we couldn’t possible leave her in that trap all night, or could we? No. So we let her out in a bathroom, instinctually I have always been super paranoid about disease and fleas, etc. (perhaps a precursor sign that I was born to work in feline medicine!) She bolted around in there, but calmed down considerably quickly. Insanely, I gave her a bath, because that seemed like a swell idea at the time! We made an appointment at what was soon to be my future employer and brought her up to be tested for the communicable feline disease, treated for fleas, spayed etc.

Zinnia is the reason I am here, or Z, as we have affectionately called her for years. She started it all. Sure, I had cats before Zinnia came along, but she is what gave me my start. She presented challenges that forced me to learn more about cats and their behavior; she provided circumstances I had never dealt with before, she got me my job at my first feline veterinary practice, she was the first face of Fundamentally Feline and here is her story.

We were still living in our apartment at the time we started seeing her outside our window. All too commonly people move and just leave their cats behind. It was always dark when we would see her and we were novices, so we though she was huge, likely male and maybe even a long hair. I called the vet practice where we already took our 4 cats and they allowed us to borrow a humane trap. They taught us how to use it, suggested what to bait it with, and emphasized patience, that apparently some cats are “trap smart” and it could take weeks to catch her. Well, turns out she was pretty hungry because we laid a trail of canned food and had her in 15minutes!

I got the call that she was all done, got through surgery fine and was ready for pick up. When I go to pick up I was informed that she was pregnant but not too far along, so they spayed her anyway. Given my beliefs and the homeless pet population, I was fine with this. I was surprised at how very routine it was to do so, and how nonchalant everyone was about it though. I later learned how commonplace pregnant spays were and how necessary.

As I was returning the trap, discussing post op protocols and her follow up vaccines visit, the office manager turns to me and says, “you want a job?” I said, “are you kidding I have wanted to work here for years!” I had no experience and was about to graduate from art school, and here I am considering a job as a vet tech. So, we set up an observation day so I could see what I was getting myself into and I guess the rest is history! (I met cat #6 on my observation day, but that is another story!)

Kitchen and dining area was her headquarters.

Supervised outside time towards the end of life.

So then it was integration time. We had 4 male cats already, two pairs of brothers. So Zinnia was the “odd man out”. She was pretty “pissy” but all and all the intro went ok. Knowing what I know now I feel certain that Zinnia was likely someone’s only kitten, and was what we call poorly socialized. She likely grew up isolated from her our species and did not understand all of the social cues that most kittens learn from their litter mates in the first few formative weeks of life. I have always been a believer in adopting in pairs, just because it seemed like the right thing to do, but Z confirmed this! So she coped.

Then we moved. Shortly after Zinnia settled in we bought our first house, our only house thus far, and the house that has landed us on Animal Planet and in magazines for the feline accommodations we have made for it. It was good at first, more space for successful avoidance with the boys. When #6 came along that wasn’t so bad either, that was Peaches and she loved everyone. But by now I had started my job at the clinic; in fact, I started there the day after we moved into the house. The influx of stray and down on their luck cats in need of homes, blew me away. I set out to save the world, and well, adopted way too many cats too quickly.

So, within two months we went from 4 cats to 5, to 6 to eleven! In came Mamma and her babies. Our first foster failures and Zinnia was pissed. I do not know if there was any psychological impact on her having recently aborted her kittens, or if I just had a few too many bitchy females. Regardless, I had two females that hated each other (Mammas and Z) and some males that were happy to join in the fun, and some kittens who were about to grow up to be little hoodlums! Well, actually, they were amazing, but Zinnia never did take too kindly to them. The trouble shooting began.

As time passed by I somehow thought it was a good idea to have even more cats. And, well, it was! In fact, it was the best experience of our lives, except for poor Zinnia. You see, she was really the only one that wasn’t having a good time. It became imperative that food, water, litter, vertical space was provided in every room of the house, but most especially in Z’s favorite places. Everyone would come to use everything, but it had to be right for her. You see, successful avoidance became the goal. I didn’t need her to be cuddled up on an armchair grooming one of the kittens, but I needed her to be able to get to all of her basic needs without being attacked in the litter box, kicked off the top of a cat condo, etc. I think that is the big take home message. When you have cats that do not love each other, why do we make it so hard for them? They should not have to share a food dish in the kitchen or one hooded litter box in the laundry room, through a cat flap! It is ridiculous the obstacles we humans make these cats cope with and then we get upset when they don’t comply!

Zinnia, taught me about what I now call Tarzan syndrome or only child syndrome. Cats learn the majority of their social skills with other cats by 9-12 weeks of age and if not around other cats during that formative time, they tend to be aggressive with their own species. Zinnia was defensively aggressive towards the other cats and often provoked the fights she was in due to her lack of confidence around them. She taught me that sometimes you have to adopt cats for your cats and not cats just because YOU want them. She taught me about providing an environment of plenty so we make successful avoidance feasible. Z is extremely senior now and my number one priority. No other animals will come into this house to stress her out. I am rooting for her to outlive just as many as she can so she can enjoy herself. She is a happy cat, but I think she could have been happier had I known then what I know now. Hindsight is always 20/20 isn’t it? I am better for it now and better equipped to help others with cats just like Zinnia who have found themselves in this situation. Thank you Z.

I quickly had to take a much deeper interest into how to properly meet the needs of a multi-cat household. This wasn’t about filling the food bowls and scooping boxes anymore. Thanks to Zinnia’s poor feline socialization skills and my overzealous need to save every cat on earth I developed a profound interest in environmental enrichment. This wasn’t really what I was hearing it be called at the time. Life became all about increasing the vertical space in our home to increase square footage and giving the cats lots of cool stuff to do. I later learned that was all called EE or Environmental enrichment!

A very senior lady, about 17, enjoying the fire.