Feline and human look-alike poll. It is amazing how much a cat or dog can look like the human who love and care for them.
Whatever the complicated theories may be as to the "why and where" is not important, all that matter is the love between owner and pet.

It has been a long time that I was so frustrated with a blog. All I wanted was a poll for fun - a few photos and a poll script.... It was easy enough on the web site, but it does not fit into this blog. If anybody knows where I could get a horizontal poll please let me know. The vertical poll takes up way too much space and then it skips a large open space as well. I spent the afternoon searching for a script, but I just do not find the right one.

I have the poll on my blog web site for anybody who would like to play.
Which feline and human " look alike" photo do you like best.

A Andree with Tashe

B Yan with Créme

C Anne with Son

D Gail with Paitoon

E Gernes with Kruloor

F Ian with LittleStar

G Julia with Luneo

H Petro with Toyger

I Else with Sanda Not a cat! Says who?

The miracle of life

Come quick, come quick", their mother said "The time is getting near"

She feels that when the kittens come the children should be here.

She told them that a big orange Tom took "Kitty" as his wife

"It's wonderful, a gift from God, the miracle of life"

At half a year young "Kitty" feels too painful and too scared

to appreciate six miracles, blind-eyed and yellow haired.

But she knows these lives depend on her and nature tells her how

and as she cleans them, children ask "Mom, can we go now?"

But now and then for six more weeks the children visit her

to play with six new magic toys made of life and fur.

The six weeks pass, the newness gone and new homes yet unfound,

Mom bundles up six miracles and takes them to the pound,

Where lovingly, with gentle hands and no tears left to cry,

the shelter workers kiss them once and take them off to die.

And "Momma Kitty" now shes called mourns her loss and then,

she's put outside, and of course, she's pregnant once again.

Dad tells "Kitty" STOP THIS NOW or you wont live here long!

but deep inside of Momma Cat, this time something is wrong.

Too young, too small, too often bred now nature's gone awry,

Momma Kitty feels it too and she crawls off to die.

She too is freed from this cruel world, and from her time of strife.

How harsh the truth, how high the price this "Miracle of Life"

-By Barry Taylor, DVM

Where is the pudding?

A balanced diet is always important. The right food is even more vital for fast growing kittens. Mom would have brought a mouse, grasshopper or bird, but we are far away from natural foods for our pets.

We do not feed dried foods to the kittens. At least they get a chance to eat some fresh foods before their taste buds are jazzed up by taste enhanced foods with added this-that and some more. I have been feeding "fresh only" after the last scare with pets dying from dried food, but with summer heat and flies coming up, I will have to put down some dried food during the day for the cat mom and feed the main fresh meal in the late evening when it is cooler. Fortunately we can buy a South African brand with SA ingredients.

Where is the pudding?

'I did not get any pudding'.

' I told you I can not eat three portions of food and have space for pudding. I
promised to help Lovely first.'

'Can I have pudding now please, my plate is empty.'

Are cats and dogs our prisoners

On average: - Cats can come and go as they please, excluding large cities where it would be cruel to let cats out in the traffic. Yet a cat will opt to stay in any home unless treatment is extremely bad and provided a better home with another human is not available. Fact is the cat will prefer
another home with humans rather than without us.

This relationship started thousands of years ago. At first the cats had a loose relationship making use of the shelter and hunting mice. The humans saw the advantage of the cats removing vermin and started to encourage the cats to stay. Except in that dim time in the history when people spread the lie that cats were witches and had them killed. The result was an explosion in the rat population and the plague followed killing about 25% of the European population. Looking at that 300 year long episode of history baffles me. It was so absolutely idiotic to think that even the church joined in condemning the cats and had them killed. The plague came repeatedly as well as poisoning by rat droppings, not to mention food loss. That was dark ages for sure.

Different animals living together where both benefit is nothing new in nature. We did not tresspass against nature by adopting the cat in any way. There are many examples of other animals living together, but I am not going to list them. From my own experience I had the luck to see a gobby (fish) and a pistol shrimp living together in a tide pool near Durban. The claws of this shrimp species are formed so that it can give a loud click easy to hear above water. If I did not know about it I would not have believed the loud snapping sound came from that little shrimp underwater. It would certainly frighten enemies and I read it will also stun or confuse prey long enough for the shrimp to catch it. I watched these two creatures for a few days - they are roughly the same size.. They made a hole under a stone and took turns to clean it with one of them always on watch at the entrance. The loose sand and waves gave them no rest. It was odd to see creatures that differ so much working as a team. The gobby on the photo above was not the one I saw not even the same species, it is just to show a gobby. We took the photo and let the little guy go again.

Many animals and birds are joining our cities much in the same way that cat and dog did thousands of years ago. It will be interesting to see how the relationships develope after 2-3 thousand years from now. -- If the human race still exist and hoping that people who twist information and the meaning of "animal rights" do not create another dim time in history.

cattitude, catonal, catroscious and catonic

are fit names and descriptions for most cats.

I can add catavism, cattune, cattire, cattempt and catribute.

What is better than an electric blanket with automatic snooze music?

There are more photos on my website

cattitude goes with all cats, but the Siamese cat have developed it into a fine art. Other cats may tell you to "Leave a message and I will get back to you.." but a Siamese do not bother to read nor listen to their messages.

The Siamese temperament tend to be either - loving, social, intelligent and hyperactive
or neurotic, independent, intelligent and hyperactive.
Few Siamese are overly social, but if they are they end up being "stolen" under the misunderstanding that the cat is lost and looking for a home. People are usually put off by an extremely skittish or shy Siamese kitten, but they are not really a problem. The kitten will form a very tight bond with only one person and never wander away. In fact that kitten will never get lost, run over in traffic or killed by the neighbor's dog. However those kittens are very sensitive and if you can not bond with the little one, both you and the kitten will be unhappy.

By the way - those ears are for private use by the kitten only. They seldom listen to anything they do not want to hear.

Do you think you could cram any more attitude into one photograph? Mr. in the front as you can see is fit and healthy. Mrs. behind standing in her usual authoritative manner.

Steve

Photo and mail from Steve who adopted these two a year ago.

Thank you Steve for the update and photo. Eurica

There are more photos on my website

A wedding party for Mr. andMrs. Feline.

This is one of the happy ever after weddings.
Come to think of it, I have not seen a feline wedding which had a bad ending.

There are more photos and on my website.

The groom with his exquisite bride

The caterers deliver the refreshments. Only the best.

The baby-sitter arrived and everybody is ready to go except Grandma who can not remember where she put her jewels.

The feline party

The CoolCat brothers' band with non-stop entertainment and dancing

..and you put your left foot out... dim the lights ...yeaah ..

The next morning

Switch off that sun.. How did I get here? Where is my car.

quiet pleassse ..... I do not do mornings.

There are more photos on my website

Real live toys - There is nothing that the cats and kittens enjoy more than to get real live children to play with. We enjoy it too, when the grand children fill the house with laughter.

This is fun!!!

Two kids to win, that is better than one, ready... steady ....

Three kids ... the fun does not end.

The American Curl cat is a new breed with healthy "survival of the fittest" genes and therefore the American Curl kittens have a strong immune system. It is up to the humans to select healthy cats as breeders to keep the American Curl breed strong.

Breeding for perfect American Curl ears and show quality cats are very difficult. Exactly how the curl ear is inherited is not clear. Supreme America Curl parents may give pet quality kittens and a cat with a bad American Curl ear may give supreme kittens.

The American Curl cat may have short , medium or long hair. These felines are
easy to groom, healthy, friendly and not neurotic.

This tortoiseshell-tabbypoint girl is gorgeous. Her sire is Grand International Champion Samoa Gem's El Donna Evita Kenzo. She enjoys a life in Namaqualand running through the dirt and climbing trees - she would be a doll bathed and brushed sitting on a pillow, but her answer was " ".

The American Curl cat on the photo above right is a medium hair girl Siriuksen Candy, bred in Finland by the Siriuksen cattery (photo by her owner Pirkko-Liisa Tarvonen). Our stud Grand Champion Samoa Gem's Sarcenet Enigma on the photo left is the sire of her parent.

Photo above: Thank you to Pirkko-Liisa Tarvonen. This is Siriuksen Candy's liter.

Stunning kittens!

Our American Curl cats are not afraid of water and they do not hunt. Those are concepts that they do not understand at all. They love all creaturers including bugs but especialy humans, other cats and


a dog is the best pal.

Note how the kitten plays without nails showing.

for more photos see the Samoa Gems web site

A very special reminder to myself and fellow American Curl breeders - Breeding out to unregistered cats while it is still permitted is very important, as healthy lines for the future depends on what breeders do now.

CH SAMOA GEM’S VAGABOND OF PETITSPAWS
has achieved a National Breed/Race Award for the 2006-2007 Show Season in Canada.
Thank you to Aleida of the Petitspaws cattery for taking such good care of him and going that extra length to show him.

cats dreaming What would a city cat dream about if the cat never had the experience of stalking a mouse?

Cats make the best out of life no matter the situation, so here is my guess as to the dreams of cats. That includes farm cats. Stalking mice is not all that exciting to dreaming about.

A horrible nightmare will be stranded in a dark fig tree 1500 cm above ground level.

On the other hand, that ghastly experience creates an opportunity to share the experience with ecstatic fans while entertaining them with some background music.

Now that is a dream worth having.

The Siamese would want a more elaborate dream.

Music lessons with mom - not very exciting

With friends at midnight - now you're talking.

Fine so far girls, but when will the studs arrive.

my fault
For the moment I lost all feeling in my green thumb due to kittens and a
diarrhea crisis. I will do a garden blog entry in a few days - I think.

I will tell about the kitten drama, maybe somebody will pick up a tip or two.

We do not let more than one girl have a litter kittens less than eight weeks apart. Then we have a break of no kittens from June - August for us to do some traveling. Now and then if the girls are on heat exactly the same time and they are friends we will let them raise two litters together. A litter kittens is like a baby and that = attention all the time.

Nothing out of the ordinary then for this litter. It was a litter of seven and mom did not feel up to feeding seven, which I could not blame her. My day was busy between the normal duties with the cats and feeding kittens 15 -20 minutes every 3 hours, mom helped and also cleaned them. Cat milk is twice as strong as cows milk with more protein. I use half a cup of the unsweetened condensed milk with a teaspoon egg yolk. For kittens less than 4 days old I use only the milk without egg.I never had an upset kitten where I fed a little milk to what mom is feeding them.

It is Rudi's fun time with the kittens when they start eating at age five weeks. They climb up his hairy legs, often drawing blood with their tiny but very sharp nails for tidbits like a small piece of raw sheep liver. This time Rudi left to visit in Namibia just as the kittens started leg climbing. To make up for missing him I thought of giving them a real treat - no, I could not have thought that, I was not thinking - I decided to give them a plateful of raw chicken liver. Chicken raw !!! Where was my brain?

They got diarrhea and like with any baby that is bad. Kidney failure is a weak point in cats. I had to drip liquid (glucose and salts mix from the chemist) down their throats day and night for 2 days. They are too small and it is too much stress for them to take them to the vet to rehydrate on a drip. (I tried that years ago, better results at home) Then by the third day it went somewhat better with longer hours on chicken broth. I did not sleep more than two hours at a time and after three days I was starting to feel like a sleepwalker. I could not just take time and sleep, I felt terrible to look at them sitting in a bundle because the tummy hurt and know it is my fault.

I will never complain about time flying again. This was a very l-o-n-g week. Two kittens were skeletons and the rest were eating but fragile. I tried what I could think of with those two. Got all the fancy foods from the vet which not even the adult cats liked. Then I remembered Rescue Remedy. That got them out of depression and eating in less than 24 hours. 8 days since it all started.

The kitten on the photo sits in the my tummy hurts" position. She was one of the stronger kittens.

It is only 10 days since that stupid mistake, but it feels like months. Rudi is back and that is comforting. I still feel like "why do I have to sit with babies?" but I know that feeling will not last and this is not the last sleepless drama.

I think I will have to drink a dose of Rescue Remedy.

Hooligan's bed of roses

Hooligan's bed of roses

Samoa Gem's Hooligan is a lovely sealpoint girl.  She loves her kittens with the patience of a good momcat.

Below is her mother with one of the siblings.

cats sleeping in odd places

cats sleeping in odd places. On the subject of cats sleeping in awkward positions and odd places. Here is some more photos. Cats fall asleep quickly and they wake up in a flash.
This neutered boy is Hooligan, the cat who likes to smell roses. This photo was also taken by his mom Sandra Legg. I have another photo of Hooligan where he pretends to be a meerkat in the South African garden.






















The warm engine of a car is a favourite sleeping place.
 It is essential to expect some slippery drawbacks.

Knot sleeping. Cats can sleep in awkward positions. Here are a few such knot sleepers.

Cats can sleep any time if it is warm, soft and cozy - or even if it is not warm etc. Rumor has it that they sleep longer than they are awake. I have never bothered to time them, but as I find them more often asleep than awake, it could be true for daytime, at night I do not know.

This Cornish Rex neuter boy knotting with himself. If you happened to notice the difference in his coat, there are a few months between the photos, the coat difference is summer and winter.

When two cats bond it is for life. The bond is usually between friends, nothing to do with the sexes. On the photo above are two Siamese neutered brothers, a sealpoint and a chocolatepoint.

An American Curl and a calico pet enjoying sleeping  together.

The cat and dog works out very well.

They are not siblings but they made friends for a lifetime.

For the busy moms it is not sleeping and not knot sleeping.The moms like to raise the kids together. It has advantages in nature as there will always be a mom with the kittens. When the kittens are small the two moms (can be more) lie on both sides with the kittens protected in the middle. This is more a family bond as the females live together even after the kittens are raised but they sleep in a group not quite so knotted together - their concern is for the kids not each other.
On the photo is an American Curl momcat above left and the sealpoint Siamese momcat in
the middle with nine kittens between them.

Eat your heart out Garfield