Cat Rescue Guy

Chrome was such a cute kitten. This sweet seven-month-old girl escaped from her house and was stuck overnight in a very large Sweetgum tree in her backyard in Baton Rouge, Louisiana. When I climbed up into the tree with her, she was fully relaxed and curious about me. She came to me to investigate and we visited there for a few minutes. I spread the bottom of the cat bag over my lap and began to encourage her to step there. She would place her front legs on my lap, but I could not get her to place all four legs there. I eventually gave up and simply put my hands under her chest and belly and lifted her off the limb and placed her on my lap, and she was perfectly comfortable with that. After a few more gentle pets, I pulled the sides of the bag up around her, secured her inside, and then took her back down to the ground. We released her back inside the house, and all is well in the household again. She was a simple joy to rescue. Like Chrome, the unknown gray tabby kitten that Beth foun...

Whenever there is a long pause between posts here, it's usually because of a slump in rescue activity. That is, I just don't have any rescues to report. This time, however, it's because I have been so busy rescuing cats in trees that I haven't had time to report them. With the arrival of beautiful Fall weather here lately, tree-climbing activity among the cats here has dramatically increased, and I have had to rescue ten cats in seven consecutive days. Plus, I have had several additional calls for rescues that, thankfully, ultimately resolved in other ways without my assistance. I won't likely be able to report on all the kitties who needed rescuing this past week, but, now, while there seems to be a break in the action, I would like to tell you about two of them: Chessie and Goop. Five of the last ten rescues were for unknown cats, and that includes Chessie and Goop who were unknown at the time of the rescue. Both cats were noticed by neighbors who didn't know ...

When Tiffany called me to rescue her cat in a tree in Carriere, Mississippi, I was not concerned about the weather even though hurricane Isaias was due to make landfall that morning. The outer rain bands of the storm were close to Carriere but not expected to get any closer, so I felt it was safe to proceed. When I arrived at the site, the sky was blue, but, of course, conditions were windy. I was still not concerned until I looked up into the tall, skinny Sweetgum tree and saw the sweet nine-month-old cat, named Little Girl, at the top of the tree swaying wildly from side to side in the wind gusts.  Little Girl was roughly 45 feet high and crying loudly in distress as she held tightly to the small limbs where she had settled, and I was having some serious doubts about reaching this little girl safely.  The small stem of the tree rose straight up about 40 feet where it split into two smaller vertical stems, and Little Girl was up higher on one of those smaller stems. Where the...

This is going to be quick and easy. That is what I thought when I first arrived to rescue Wylde, a friendly four-month-old kitty who belongs to Janie in Biloxi, Mississippi. Wylde was pleading desperately to us on the ground to come rescue him after spending four nights in the tree, and there was no reason to expect him to be anything but friendly and cooperative during a rescue. His family had called all the local rescue resources without success, and they even pulled an "elevator' up to Wylde, but that, too, failed. Wylde handled my rope installation well, but when I began to climb up to him, I noticed he had a troubled look on his face. He began to back away as I got closer, so I stopped and expected him to calm down after some sweet talk and reassurance. Wylde, however, was not impressed by my sweet talk. In fact, he seemed more troubled by it, and he turned around and began walking far out the long branch of this Live Oak tree. Silly me. I still naively thought I could lu...

It is very common these days to see videos of people taking their cat on some kind of outdoor adventure whether it is a walk in the park, hiking in the wilderness, camping, boating, cycling or just about any other kind of activity. These videos can be very fun to watch, and I often marvel and delight in the stimulation and experience that the cat is getting. I even feel quite envious and would love to have my own cat accompany me on such outings. At the same time, I cringe and feel very tense at the risk they are taking with their cat, and I want to shout, "NO! Don't do that! And especially don't encourage others to do that!" I understand. It looks like great fun for both you and the cat, but rare is the cat who can go into unfamiliar territory and feel unbothered by it. I know everyone thinks that their cat is that rare one, but it almost certainly is not. Maybe you have done this a few times before without any problem, but, if so, you have been lucky. All cats who a...