On the Porch this Morning

Chickens stealing cat food. How handy that I just happened to have Nick in the house. Nothing like a border collie for removal of unwelcome poultry.

Found old Stormy dead there when I took him out for the first time. Not a tragedy or anything, just one of those things. She was not a pet by any means, just a scruffy old working girl, retired, long, long past her ratting days and it was just time.

In a way it was almost a relief. No one has any idea how old she was, but she wasn't a young cat when the boss's mom passed away and it has been nine years since then. If I had to guess I would say thirteen or fourteen at least. It is a lucky farm cat that avoids milk trucks and foxes and coyotes, owls and clumsy cow feet for that long.

And she had a kind of on and off relationship with good health, and was probably the ugliest cat we ever had. She also had a long history of stealing kittens from her kin, Wild Thing, who vanished this summer. Wild Thing also stole from her so there was never any knowing which one actually owned what kittens. They hardly ever raised any anyhow, being absurdly inbred. I don't think there is a single cat left now from that era. You see, we never knew it until just before he died, but a dog we used to have, a big homely behemoth in black, named Beethoven, used to kill any new cats that came to the farm. Strays or drop offs, I guess they were intruders in his mind.

We NEVER saw him do it, but every now and then we would find a cat corpse in the barn or out in the field. They looked untouched. We worried about disease...but we never knew what was going on until he was gone and suddenly the "disease" was too. Thus our barn cats had no outside blood for at least ten years, and were all grey or black, wild as heck, and dumb as rocks.

He also caught wild turkeys, no small accomplishment for a 120-pound dog. He would start a flock flying, usually downhill as they are heavy birds, run like heck to the bottom and grab one when they landed. He ate the whole thing, feathers and all, which resulted...oh, never mind what it resulted in, trust me you don't want to know. Woodchucks held no fear for him either and he dispatched them with a snap (maybe he thought they were cats.)

He was the guy who held up the road repair job by sitting on the dynamite too, but that story has been told before so I won't go there again. He babysat the kids...wouldn't let them go down the slide until he thought they were old enough, and walked grandma to the barn and back every day, letting her use him as a prop and helping her up if she slipped. A good dog back in his day.

Anyhow, sorry about the ramble......have a good one.