He thought about giving the cat some of the cat food he had on hand. He had it because he’d include some of it as part of the morning meal he put out for the crows in the neighborhood. The cat was very skittish though, and the sound of the sliding door opening drove it off.
He decided he’d leave the cat alone, and just let it rest in the backyard when it came by after that. Eventually, he determined it was a male cat. He still wasn’t sure if he was a pet, or he’d escaped being a pet and was now, more or less, feral. His skittishness seemed to indicate he had a real fear of humans, and a desire for freedom.
The cat looked to be fairly mature. He gave the man the impression that, even though he had a collar, he knew how to survive in the wild on his own. That seemed a bit strange to the man, but since he didn’t know a lot about cats, he wasn’t that concerned. Cats were never his type of animal.
As time went on, the man didn’t see the cat again for quite some time. Then, one morning when he was taking the food out for the crows, he saw the cat again. The cat looked like he was expecting the food the man would put into a big bowl the crows ate from. This told the man the cat had been scaring the crows and eating their food.
The man filled the bowl with the cat food and put it where the cat saw it but away from the crow feeding area. He waited until he saw the cat go to the bowl and start eating, and then filled the crows’ bowl with their breakfast.
The man reasoned that the cat must have also liked his owners' home quite a bit, since he would obviously return home after being free for a day or two, until he needed some freedom again. Maybe it was a working relationship where the owners wouldn’t mind that the cat spent time out of their home occasionally.
He’d determined the cat had been neutered, so what harm could come from letting him go when he wanted to be free? He couldn’t create liters of new kittens. The man looked for an answer online, and found that when older male cats are neutered, some still like to go “catting around,” even if they can’t reproduce any longer.
So, the man decided that each day when he’d take the food out for the crows, he’d bring the extra bowl and the cat food with him, so if the cat appeared, he could give him food so he wouldn’t be trying to get the food in the crows’ bowl. “Problem solved,” the man thought.
The next morning the cat was there again, and the man did the same thing. The next several days went by without any visits from the cat. The man thought this was an even more clear indication the cat had returned to his home, as usual. He figured what the heck; an occasional bowl of cat food wasn’t going to break him, so he didn’t mind that the cat may come by again.
There was one thing about the cat that the man wondered about though – the cat wasn’t overweight at all. He figured the owners must be very conscious of how much their cat should eat and strictly controlled his food consumption appropriately, as he certainly didn’t look to be malnourished either.
In other words, the cat looked to be big, strong and feral, if it wasn’t for that damned collar! It just didn’t make sense, the man thought. If the owners were so good at everything, surely they must have known the cat they allowed to go free would eat stuff that wouldn’t likely earn their approval.
After more than two weeks had gone by and the cat still had not returned, either to get a free meal or to lounge in the back yard, the man thought that if the cat was feral and not a recurring escapee from his home, he wouldn’t stay away for more than half of a month.
The man forgot about the cat eventually, as the days, weeks and months went by with no sightings of him. He thought that either the cat’s owners had decided to make sure he couldn’t get out anymore, or he really was feral and had died somehow.
Close to six months had gone by, when one day, the man had to repair part of his fence that had been damaged after a storm had dropped a broken tree branch on it. He had gotten the debris all cleaned up and was finishing nailing the last board to complete the repairs, when he heard a weird screech behind him.
The man backed away from the action, as he knew that cats actually own snakes, and they generally like to be a real pain in the ass to them. A cat will “play” with a snake but usually won’t kill it. The man had a hard time convincing himself he’d simply been lucky that the cat had come by when it did.
As he watched, at some point the cat seemed to become bored of playing with the snake. As he walked off, he stopped to turn and look at the man for a moment then continued onto wherever he was going. Once he was out of sight, the man never saw him again, and he never learned whether the cat really had a home or not. But one thing was certain - he was free once again.
Cat Unexplained © free-reign 2019
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Paw Prints: Image by Petra Ohmer from Pixabay
Sleeping: Image by Леонид Любимов from Pixabay
Cat On a Rock: Image by Marc Pascual from Pixabay
Rattlesnake: Image by Yinan Chen from Pixabay
Sleeping: Image by Леонид Любимов from Pixabay
Cat On a Rock: Image by Marc Pascual from Pixabay
Rattlesnake: Image by Yinan Chen from Pixabay
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STOPTo support your work, I also upvoted your post!
I have the one boy that leaves for long periods and comes back for a few days in a row to sleep during the day. It is expensive here to fix them so I just check that they are always able to get in. To a degree even if the kitties run amok they always come home .
Shame I wonder if the snake bit him or if he just decided to stay home finally. !tipuvote 1
Well, this is fiction that's partially based on a real happening. I do feed crows (and other birds) in the mornings, and this big cat did appear and I could tell he'd gotten used to eating the cat food in the crow's bowl, and I have given him his own food in a smaller bowl a few times so far. All the rest is fiction, so I can tell you for sure that he didn't get bit. :) Whether he went home or not, I can't say. He may have gone somewhere other than "home."
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Great caturday discord free write love it
Thank you @brittandjosie, I'm glad you enjoyed it. You inspired me to write it, and I'm glad you did! :)
Loved the story @free-reign. Being kind to animals can have unexplained great results. 🐱
Thank you @redheadpei, you are so right. I've always had a soft spot in my heart for animals, and I believe that at the least, we have a duty to love and protect those we've domesticated and respect those in the wild.
As per usual, I never know where your stories are going. Which is okay. I also am on the fence at times as I bounce back and forth from reading it in your real voice and trying to read it from a neutral voice - or my own. I wonder sometimes if that takes away or adds to your stories...still figuring that out.
You did a good job of pulling me in as the reader, especially in the first chunk of the story. I somewhat felt like you didn't know where you wanted to go with it towards the end, but I'm not sure about that.
I've grown to like cats much more, I didn't like them when I was really young. My step-mother loves cats so that broke me in, and my father had (and may still have) multiple cats that come to their house for some reason and hang around the exterior - sometimes sitting on the outside of the window sill. They had two cats for years and now have one.
Wish I could have a pet in my apartment! Need to move for that reason alone. Thanks for the write up
Hmm, I always hear my inner reading voice with everything that I read. Let me know if you ever come to a conclusion on that. :)
I think that maybe because I was writing fiction that included a real event that I experienced, I may have given you that impression, when actually I've now gotten into the habit of scoping things out in an outline before I start writing a story. I had mentioned to another PHC person about the cat and my giving it food so it wouldn't bother the crows, and she suggested that I write a story based on the cat. I may have been a bit awkward in how I fit the real stuff in with the fiction.
I like cats that other people have, but it wouldn't be fair to the cat if I had one, as I wouldn't have the time to spend with it that it would need. It's also why I don't have a dog, which is my favorite pet-type animal. I'm happy with the wild birds I feed as my pets.
I'm currently feeding a feral un-neutered male cat and trying to get him used to me. I wonder many of these same things about him. I feel a bit sad he never returned. A guard cat would be a nice thing to have around.
The real-life cat's description matches the cat in the story. I haven't seen him now for nearly two weeks. I'm hoping he'll show up again. When I give him the food, I can tell he's been gaining trust in me, a bit more each time.
The story does have kind of a sad ending. But I like to leave a door open in case. :)
I've been working on mine for a month, maybe two since I first noticed him hanging around. He'll now let me stroke his back while he is eating a morsel at my feet, but hisses at me when the bite is gone. I've never tried to tame a feral cat before. It's interesting. I sure do not need another creature to care for though.
Haha! Howdy sir free-reign! That was a great story! Is it a true one?
Hi @janton, and thanks! It's both. Most of the story is fiction, but there is a big cat (with a collar) that's been coming by and eating the cat food that I feed to the crows in the morning. Since I caught onto him I've also been feeding him his own serving when he shows up so the crows can eat in peace. :)
Oh, very interesting! And as far as the crows, they show up every morning for food? I read an article about a girl who fed them and they always bring a shiny object or trinket to her in exchange for food.
Yep, I've been feeding them every morning for about 4 years now. They still haven't brought me anything yet, but they do gather around me on my roof and the overhead wires and talk in their crow language, which they just started doing this past year. So that's kind of nice. I wonder what they are saying about me sometimes, LOL.
lol! A bunch of crows will make you self conscious! The articles that I've read about them is totally amazing, how well they communicate and how intelligent they are.