Buffy Day 1

[stephbg]

Here’s the first official picture of Buffy at Sector 7 on Day 1.

Here she is having a bit of a play with a toy mouse in the bathroom where we have her isolated for the time being. Her tail has grown enormously in the last couple of weeks.

The back of her neck looks a bit soggy because we had to give her flea treatment as soon as she came home. We also gave her a pill to kill the current fleas off straight away, so it’s been a rough day for the little one. So far I’ve picked 6 dead fleas out of her fur. A bit disappointed about the fleas but the breeder’s house is full (but not excessively so) of cats, dogs and kids, so while she did treat for fleas I suppose it’s not surprising a few got through. Apart from a bit of scratching that gave it away she doesn’t seem to have suffered from an excess of bites. I’m feeling a bit paranoid about every little tickle I can feel though.

Her eyes are a little but runny and have been since we first saw her at age six weeks, but I’ve regularly cleaned the eyes of all of my cats so I’m used to keeping an eye on the eyes.

Check out those whiskers!

She is a lovely little—so little!—thing, smoochy, gentle, playful, confident, and curious. Even when she wriggles while I’m picking through her fur she still purrs. She cried only a little in the car but settled herself pretty well. I sat next to her and stuck my fingers through the cage and she spent most of the time with them, even resting her chin on me. She did get more upset when I took my hand away, so I spent almost all of the one hour trip with my hand in the cage with the wild beast.

Introductions to Cally and Princess did not go as expected. When we came home we left her in the cage and brought the oldies in to the room, thinking they might sniff and maybe hiss through the bars. Instead both cats seemed uninterested and wandered/slunk away without getting particularly close. I later realised they were probably afraid of the cage itself and failed to notice the kitten inside. Whoops.

She’s a challenge to photograph and we may well have to resort to video. Husband caught this shot of her in action with the attacking paw blurred to invisibility:

We have a lot of blurry shots of Buffy.

Contact attempt #2 went far more according to plan, with a strictly supervised brief sniff opportunity on open ground in the kitchen. Buffy walked boldly up to Cally, and Cally finally reacted as I thought she might, hissing a bit and backing away. Buffy’s ears went back a bit in reaction but there was no attempt at biffo. (Why does my spellchecker not recognise “biffo” or “smoochy”? What kind of soulless animal compiled that thing?) Cally has retreated to her preferred shelter spot under a cabinet.

The first nose-to-nose with Princess went surprisingly well. No hissing at all, and Princess had a good sniff of Buffy from nose to tail before backing away. She’s back now on her usual spot on the couch.

Buffy’s back in the bathroom now and coping well with being alone. She ate with some enthusiasm earlier this afternoon and I’m sure she recognises the nearest litter tray for what it is. It begins!

Comments

[catundra.livejournal.com]

So cute! Watch the eyes though - discharge can be conjunctivitis caused by feline chlamydia which is rife in pure bred cat breeders. Our Burmese came home with this as a kitten. The breeder said it was nothing and just a bit of allergy but when it continued I took him to our vet who told me the truth. Easily fixed with some antibiotics but don't let it go on...

[ozdragonlady.livejournal.com]

What catundra says ... maybe get her checked out anyway, before she has any major contact with the others. A kitten with fleas may have other issues as well.

[alias_sqbr]

So cute!

[transcendancing.livejournal.com]

Kittum is adorabubble!!!

(oh kitties, how you reduce me to nonsense words...)