
Another Wisher has moved on. As I looked back at Fannie’s rescue story, it brought back so many memories of the years and years of rescues. Her story made me smile. I’ll include a good bit of that story at the end of this post. Not necessary to read that far, but if you’re still reading here because you love cats/animals, maybe it will bring a smile to you as well.
Fannie had been with me here at Winnie’s Wish for almost 8 years. She was a feral adult with two kittens when I took her in. Sometimes a feral adult cat, with enough time and patience, can come around to a nearly normal existence with humans. Most of the time, they will be OK with only one human. And sometimes, they don’t ever come around. I’ve had only a handful over the years who did not tame. For the last several years, there have been only three feral-start cats at Winnie’s Wish whom I could not touch. One of those was Fannie. Sadly, for just the last few months I’d been able to get one stroke down her back as she moved towards her food dish each morning. Our routine was always the same. She lived in one of the runs converted into a kitty condo. Each day when I walked through the front door, Fannie would race to the front of her run. The run gate is chain link. She would climb up the chain link and balance on the narrow wood ledge. I always pet each of the cats who are out of their runs overnight and then I would go to Fannie’s run and stick my finger through and she would touch my finger with her nose. Four days before her death, she didn’t engage in her normal routine. I thought it odd, but everything else about her seemed normal. The next day, she failed her morning routine again, and I noticed she hadn’t eaten much overnight. Two more days and she was gone.
Fannie had never been sick a single day of the 8 years she was with me. It was a blessing that she was such a healthy girl because medicating her would have been a nightmare (for her and for me) or possibly not doable at all. She was extremely thin when I took her in, but she didn’t come with an upper respiratory condition and she never developed a single health problem in all these years. We don’t know how old she was because Older Daughter could never take a look at those teeth. She was a mom cat when I trapped her. She could have been two years old or ten years old. The blessing for her (and for me) was that she simply passed away. No long illness. No long period of suffering.
When she died, I thought about what her life might have been like as a feral cat these last 8 years. I thought about her dying out there on her own. She was content here. And cared for. And she died safely in her own home. For a feral cat that’s about as good as it gets.
(Below is her rescue story)

Fannie – Farewell.
Before I leave this post, three gifts have come in over the time since I last posted.
Karen – THANK YOU
Heather – THANK YOU
June – THANK YOU
Now here is Fannie’s rescue story if you’re interested.
From the post Life Goes On
Last week on Monday evening, my husband stopped by his brother’s house to drop something off. As he pulled into the driveway, he noticed a cat way in the back of the yard. He and his brother stood outside talking for a bit, and Husband asked BIL about the cat. Can you touch it? BIL said it runs from him. Then Husband saw a second cat. This one looked really small. BIL said these two had been hanging out in his yard for a couple of weeks. The two cats were quite a distance away, but Husband pulled out his phone and snapped a couple of pictures. Then he started walking towards the closer one. It darted away with the other one right behind. Over a fence and they were gone.


My husband did his duty. He came home and reported. He showed me the pictures on his cell phone. We were moving around in the kitchen getting some supper ready. I looked at the pictures and listened about the cats. I thought about how my BIL now lives in a small town where there are lots and lots of cats living feral. There isn’t just a feral COLONY in this little town. There are feral cats ALL OVER the town. There isn’t even the possibility of trying to TNR and do management. It is literally the entire town. It is overrun with feral cats and has been for years.
I thanked Husband for asking questions and taking pictures. I told him how I couldn’t, of course, try to trap those two cats for lots of reasons – the main one being that setting a trap with food in it would draw who knows how many cats. Also – what difference did it make if I could get THOSE two. What about the dozens and dozens and dozens more in that town? It didn’t make sense to try to get two cats. And also, I did not have one single spot for a new Wisher Husband agreed completely and we sat down to eat. It was a quiet meal. Husband said a couple of things. I nodded or mumbled in response. I could NOT stop thinking about the pictures. Those two cats were on property I could legally be on. They were females (calicos). They were living feral with never enough to eat and constant breeding. Then the other side of my brain said – There are millions of cats all over this country in this very predicament. You don’t have a single spot for them. You CANNOT get them.
We cleaned up our supper dishes and shuffled off to our evening chores. He did some weed eating and I watered my flowers on the deck. As I watered, I had more than a couple of conversations with myself. Finally, reason won over and I stopped ruminating. Of course I couldn’t trap those two cats. I simply did not have room. My decision was made.
As Husband and I both headed into the house at the same time, I opened my mouth to tell him that I for sure wouldn’t try for the cats. This is what came out instead – Can you take the trap on your way to work in the morning and set it back by your brother’s fence? First he just stared at me, then he started to say something, then he opened the door and motioned for me to step on in. Sure – he said. I can do that.
I was excited and horrified for the rest of the evening and every time I woke up that night. What if I NEVER got Sunspot and Blue and Binks adopted? The only way for me to have these additional two cats would be if I could get some Wishers adopted. Also – what if I didn’t get either one of these cats and ended up with some of the others in that town. I already KNEW about these two and felt like I had to make sure they were taken care of. If I trapped others first, I’d feel like I had to keep trying until I got THESE two. I was having such mixed emotions. There was a bit of joy at the prospect of getting these two sweeties out of that town. They would be feral and more-than-likely never adoptable. But my problem my whole life has been that once an animal “crosses my path,” I simply cannot turn away. These two kitties were already “real” for me. I had their story and their pictures. How could I not try?
From the post Trapping Day Number One
A week ago on Tuesday morning, as I was posting about my four new feral foster kittens, Husband was on his way to work. He would stop at his brother’s place and set the trap. This small town is halfway between here and the town my husband and daughters work in. So the plan was for each of my daughters to stop and check the trap as each of them headed to work that day. Younger Daughter would only be about half an hour behind Husband. It was extremely unlikely that there would be anything in the trap in such a short span of time. Older would go through a couple of hours later. If there’d been a “catch” I would head that way to collect up my kitty. If there wasn’t a “catch” at that time then I would wait about another hour and drive there myself to check. I wouldn’t be leaving the trap set in the afternoon because of the heat. Wouldn’t want an animal in a trap for even half an hour during the hottest part of the day.
Husband was first and he texted that the trap was set in a shady spot in the backyard. Younger texted next that there was nothing in the trap. I knew about what time Older would be going through that town. I was working and waiting . . . waiting for her text. Instead, my cell phone rang. I don’t have enough signal out here to receive a call. Most of the time, my phone doesn’t even ring. But if it does and I try to pick up, the call drops immediately. So I ran to the house and called her from the land line. And she said – Well, you better head this way. You’ve definitely got somebody in your trap. In fact, you’ve got TWO somebodies.
I dropped everything and jumped in my vehicle. Fifteen minutes later I was pulling into the driveway. My heart was racing. Would it be the two I had pictures of? I had enlarged and cropped those pictures over and over and it appeared that one was an adult dilute calico, and the smaller one was a standard calico. I got to the backyard and spotted the trap. Nope. It sure wasn’t the TWO from the picture. But I was pretty sure it was ONE of them. And the bonus kitty was without a doubt a sibling. I had a calico kitten and a tabby kitten in my trap.
My heart swelled with joy. Two youngsters. Too old to tame enough to be adoptable (not good), but still young enough that they had not yet reproduced. This was wonderful – two kitties who would NEVER be part of the nightmare cycle of reproduction. They were horrified when they saw me and started beating around in the trap. I put a towel over the whole thing and walked them back to my vehicle. On the way home, I realized that I would need to trap again. The larger one from the picture was probably mom to these two. Also, could there be more kittens from this litter? Oh, dear. Two was turning into more than two. And even just two was two too many for Winnie’s Wish. I thought all the way home about how desperately I needed some adoptions. Oh, well. I was already knee-deep in this thing now. Two kitten siblings. I needed to get any other possible survivors from this litter, and I needed to get the mom cat, too. I would send Husband back with the trap the next morning. I made a spot for two terrified feral kittens in a cage right next to the cage of four feral foster kittens that I wrote about a week ago.

From the post Trapping Day Number Two
On Wednesday morning of last week, we repeated what we’d done on Tuesday. Husband set the trap in BIL’s yard on his way to work. Younger checked the trap half an hour later on her way to work. Then Older checked the trap two hours later when she headed to work. And just as on the previous morning, I received a call from Older Daughter. This time I was in the house by the phone. I snatched it up. You’ve got another one, Mom. I asked if it was another kitten and she said no. This one’s an adult – dilute calico. I had the mom! I was thrilled. I jumped in my vehicle and headed that way. When I got there and walked into the backyard this poor gal went nuts. I hurriedly threw a towel over the trap and raced to my vehicle. As soon as I set the trap in the backseat and climbed in to drive home, she settled down. And I had the next fifteen minutes to think about all of this. I got the calico kitten (from the picture) the previous morning. I got a sibling to the calico kitten at the same time. Now I had the mom – the adult dilute calico from the picture. Unless there were more siblings, I was done. In just two mornings of trapping I had the kitties I had so hoped to save. I was feeling pretty great.

When I got home, I put mom into the cage with her kittens and the kittens went right to her.

Mom was horrified and froze solid. But the kittens climbed all over her anyway. I was so glad to have them here, safe, and all together. I shot off a text to BIL to be on the lookout for any other siblings. But I was pretty sure this was going to be it. Mom was terribly skinny under that long fur. With no readily available food to eat while she was pregnant with this litter, it was unlikely that all were born alive. Then if she had managed to have three, four, five – it was extremely unlikely for all to have lived. The most likely scenario was that mom managed to give birth to and keep alive just these two. But we would make sure before abandoning the effort. We wouldn’t set the trap and chance drawing new cats into BIL’s yard. But he would keep an eye out for any additional kittens. If he spotted any, we would get the trap back to his yard. (There were never any more kittens spotted.)
So that’s Fannie’s story. There are so many feral cats in our country (and the world). Fannie was one of the lucky ones.