Monthly Avatar Theme For April: Your Favorite Animal!

I will have to switch out avatars partway thru the month or Jewels will think I am playing favorites!



GG

Goosegirl wrote:Here is Panther, my Sleepy Boy!

GG

GG...I keep staring at your avatar...WHAT is it? A blue blanket and a grey ____?

This is Zar who thinks he is a lap dog.

AvaDGardner wrote:

Goosegirl wrote:Here is Panther, my Sleepy Boy!

GG

GG...I keep staring at your avatar...WHAT is it? A blue blanket and a grey ____?

My Sphynx Cat. Panther is my sleepy Blue Boy, Jewels is my Bi-color Girl. He plays with seed packets, she eats my seedlings!



They are truly the Royal Pair: Prince Panther and Princess Jewels (curled up in King Daddy's Throne Recliner)! That fuzzy blue blanket is one of 3 we got to cover our furniture because they love those soft fuzzy plush blankies!

GG

Hey that's cool. Finally something that has less hair than I do

this is Gospel the Cat. She is inherently evil. Yes, ironic right? Cuddly but evil. She was born to the litter of one of the feral cat pack I am currently engaged in total warfare with in the neighborhood now that I've moved back to my childhood home. We call her "gozzy" for short...Makes me think of the metal band Fugazi... a little more fitting for her personality.

My sister and I lived in a 2nd floor apartment for a few years and we had a cat(she has the cat now). Her name was Josie. She was so much like a dog. She'd hear my car pull up out front and she'd hop up on the window to see me. As soon as I would open up the door, there was Josie...waiting for me at the top of the steps. She'd run down the steps and would flop on her back and I'd have to rub her belly before going any further.

She was awesome.

LOL...maybe our male parakeet (George) thought he was a dog. The DH would pull into the garage from work at 12:15am, and the squalking would go into high gear! Gracie just kept quiet.

Our pooch... He's the bomb...

This would be my girl, Clancy. She and her brother as oldsters now, but still going strong.

Wow Joyce, so is that orange tabby a female? I read somewhere only 20% of orange tabbies are female. Sounds like she's pretty special.

This is my friend Lobo, we miss him tremendously. He passed in May of 10. Best dog I ever had, just loved us so much. He came to me one winter from a neighbor in Pa. She couldnt keep him in the house and it was freezing winter cold. His water was frozen. He fit right in with us
I have so many more rescues to share but he will be my first

UnderTheBlackWalnut wrote:Wow Joyce, so is that orange tabby a female? I read somewhere only 20% of orange tabbies are female. Sounds like she's pretty special.

That's not actually a picture of Clancy, but she looks just like that. Her brother, Cosmo, is long-hair, with very similar markings where he is orange, but he has a white muzzle, chest-belly, and lower legs. On one back leg the arrangement of orange and white makes him look like he's wearing a white garter. Very cute to notice when he's walking away.

Edit: I just noticed that your avatar is an orange tabby as well. Is it (he/she) yours?

Yes - He is mine. Like ha-v-v, I have a string of rescues (dog, cat, and guinea pig). That is Garfield, he was born in a faux fireplace on a neighbor's front porch. His feral mama had gotten down inside one of the hollow "legs" that held up the mantel. He's 7 years old this Spring. His sister is a calico and his other sister is a gray and peach colored dilute calico type cat. Despite his feral birth, he's a people cat and wants to see what you are up to. His claim to fame is the softest coat I've ever felt on a cat!

Stay tuned, though, as my avatar is going to be changing, yet again...

This is one of my cats....FluffyKins.

I used to leave back porch door open in the summer to keep the apartment cool....and then one day a stay cat I was friendly with and feeding outside came in a brought her litter of kittens with her!

Fluffykins was one of those kittens.

She most famous for the weird thing she does with her tail.....she doesn't carry it like a normal cat....she fluffs it up and throws it forward over her body like a squirrel.

There is a story to go with the new avatar - Pepper - she is 10 years old. In this picture, she clearly knows she isn't supposed to be up on my husband's chair, but...she's trying to get away with it. She must be part shepherd because she likes to run/herd. Her story goes like this:

Summer 2001 - Adopted as small puppy from county animal shelter by my son's stepmom.

2005 - My son's stepmom leaves state and can't take Pepper, so Pepper is cared for by friends of hers for 9 months until they decide their lack of a fenced yard just won't work. Rather than see her taken to the animal shelter, we take her in.

July 2009 - My husband and I are out of town for the day. Kids do not close gate tightly and dogs escape. Pepper is not found. We do EVERYTHING - adds, online sites, contact local shelters and the microchip company, drive around whistling for her....to no avail. As time passes into Fall, we finally give up, hoping someone kind has taken her in and given her a good home, but we fear the worst.

December 2010 - YES, you read that right - SEVENTEEN (17) MONTHS LATER, I get a phone call from a local veterinarian who tells me they have a dog brought in microchipped in my name. It is Pepper. For the past 3 months she'd been with a young couple that lived 3 blocks down the street from me, but they only found her dirty and ragged wondering up on their porch in September 2010. (We will probably never know the story of those 14 previous months.)

At the time of this post - She is happy and healthy. When my young adult son offers her a treat, she still tilts her head at him and catches the treat in the air, just like she did when he was a young boy.

This is my beloved Princess, adopted 06/29/2001, deceased 05/30/2009 of lung cancer. She was my heart!

One day as I returned from the laundry room in my condo complex, I saw her sitting between the sidewalk and my second bedroom. I put the laundry basket down, slowly approached her with my hand extended to allow her to sniff me, and said, "You beautiful thing! Would you like to come live with me?"

She stood up, and with tail held high as if to say "later," she sauntered away.

I saw her several times near my unit, and she would rub up against my ankles. One day, I looked at her tag, which was engraved with her name. I was surprised (because of her size) to see a feminine name, and figured either she was a female or that her human had a bizarre sense of humor. I was reluctant to call the number on the tag to say, "I want your cat," so I let things lie.

One day, as I returned from work to find several of my neighbors arguing about the new paint colors, I inadvertently left the front door open. When I returned, Princess was just letting herself out, after having given herself a preliminary tour.

A couple of weeks later, I was on the walkway on the third floor, and a neigbor I'd never met (who was on the "cat committee") started a conversation. I looked down into a neighbor's yard and said, "There's my cat!" The neighbor said, "That's not your cat, she belongs to Melanie."

Just then, a stranger appeared, and I was introduced to Melanie. I gulped and said, "If you ever decide to give up your cat, I'll take her!"

Melanie scowled and said something like "Fat chance!"

The following Friday evening, I heard a knock on my door. It was Melanie's roommate, asking if I still wanted the cat. As a children's social worker, I responded that there should be some pre-placement visits (to address my allergies).

A week later, the adoption was finalized, and Princess rapidly adjusted to my liberal rules (yes, you can jump on the bed). Nevertheless, there was an adjustment period. After a time, Princess began snuggling with me nearly every night, and ultimately she developed a habit of wrapping her large, tufted, Maine Coon kitty paws around my finger, as if holding my hand.

To this day, I miss her painfully, but have adopted two more cats. One lesson I learned is that "when the human is ready, the cat appears."

Love my llamas yet my constant indoor companion is Daisy, she is a cuddly sweetheart. I've had cats before, but when I pick up this one she actually hugs and tucks her head into my neck and wraps her tail around my arm. 14 yrs. old this year. In 1998 she was a homeless kitten at the shelter and was found in a box on the side of the road. She is often on my lap when I visit this forum. When I play the organ she sits on the bench and puts her paws on the keys, not as well as YouTube's "Nora" but it cracks me up just the same.

Here's Scamper. It's shedding season.....hmmmm can you compost dog fur?

What a FUN forum this is! I just joined--ya'll are awesome!

annamagpie wrote:Here's Scamper. It's shedding season.....hmmmm can you compost dog fur?

Dog and cat fur can be composted

Hi annamagpie!


Here is our cat...Stubbs...my dad works at the grain elevator and people bring cats there and leave them all the time, they let them stay to keep the mice away, my dad sorta takes care of them, a lady brought Stubbs there, and she said he had a natural bob tail, my dad liked Stubbs a lot so he brought her home.

Josh, your cat is beautiful! Manx cats have the naturally bobbed tail and large hindquarters that your cat seem to have.

PS - would your family adopt me? I really, really, like them! (And it would be so much fun to have a younger brother to tease, um, I mean, be really nice to!)

shannon1 wrote:I just love kitties I picked this one because I do not have a photo of my own cat and this one looks just like her.LOL I have three and the black one is great 99.999% of the time them she just snaps. My Mom's cat specialist thinks it is a brain lesion. Poor thing she just can't help it. Picked her up as a stray 2yrs ago and was going to rehome her until the sudden biting thing became apparent and sadly no medical treatment or behavior therapy can cure her. I'll just keep continue to warn visitors and keep my reflexes quick. She really is such a love most of the time, really.

Things that make you go "Hmmmmm....." Our (also black) cat Lily is sweet and loving and gentle - but she bites. She bites when she is happy and she bites when she is mad. Sometimes when she bites when she is happy, she takes the skin on your forehead, or the tip of your nose, and pulls.


(Who is more out of their minds? Her for biting, or me for loving her?) But, like so many of the animals talked about here, she was a rescue, so I just blame it on her past, and hope she keeps the blood-drawing bites to a minimum. (She bit my cheek once and drew blood. I had been sleeping.....!)


So many wonderful stories here. And photos!

Lily, the biting cat.

annamagpie wrote:Here's Scamper. It's shedding season.....hmmmm can you compost dog fur?

What a FUN forum this is! I just joined--ya'll are awesome!

Is that a German Shedder?

Beth