Let it Bee...

"When I find myself in times of trouble,

Mother Mary comes to me,

Speaking words of Wisdom,

Let it be"

- The Beatles

Back in my 20's, I was fatally controlling of my life and all the happenings in it. I experienced a lot of heartbreak over things not happening "right now" no matter how hard I worked at them. It took me many hard knocks to overcome my need to try and force things into the timeline I expected. Ironically, it was also in this time of my life that I came across a particular piece of literature that touched me in a way very few pieces have and it was even more ironic that the topic of said piece was centered around the concepts of letting go and living with questions rather than forcing their answers. I was a college student and in my junior year of a Writing degree at the University of Evansville. I was taking a Creative Nonfiction class, the text for which was a collection of excerpts and essays. The first piece we studied was an excerpt by a woman named Sue Hubbell, a nature writer, from her book "A Country Year: Living the Questions." The excerpt chosen spoke to something in my heart and soul that I couldn't describe and I must have reread it several times throughout that semester for no reason other than to read it again. Something about the tone of that excerpt sounded so familiar to me...as if my own voice could be speaking, a voice deep inside that found peace and comfort in the idea of not controlling anything, but rather finding joy in watching the pattern of something beautiful and completely outside human control take place. I finally ordered the entire book and read it all in one day. I have read that book repeatedly and have fallen into a habit of reading it at least once a year now. I have gifted so many copies to friends and family, I have lost count on how many copies I have purchased.

"A Country Year: Living the Questions" by Sue Hubbell is a collection of stories written over the course of a year and its seasons in the Ozarks. Sue Hubbell was a writer and a beekeeper. She wrote this book of nature pieces centered around her farm, her beekeeping, and her relationship with the nature of that environment following her divorce. Its beautiful in its simplicity and told with such a frank, honest, and relatable voice, you can almost forget you're not the one experiencing the happenings documented in that book.The title page of the book features a quote by Rilke

“Be patient toward all that is unsolved in your heart and try to live the questions themselves, like locked rooms and like books that are now written in a very foreign tongue. Do not now seek the answers, which cannot be given you because you would not be able to live them. And the point is, to live everything. Live the questions now. Perhaps you will then gradually, without noticing it, live along some distant day into the answer.” Reading this book and that quote did two things for me in particular. I discovered a new desire to keep bees at some point in my life and I learned that the truth this book expresses through everyday living amongst nature and its wild inhabitants is what my soul needed. At the age of 38, I can now say that the activity of beekeeping is now part of my life on my own little farm and that that activity and all those centered around Crow's Croft Farm have enabled me to live some of those questions and, by consequence, some of the answers. 

There are many things in nature that cannot be controlled by human will or action. A swarm of honeybees is an excellent example of that. I grew up with a father and a grandfather who were both (and still are) terrified of bees. I have only ever been stung by a yellow jacket or a wasp and so I do find myself behaving much the same way as my relatives when those two insects come around. There is usually much flailing and dancing about before running away. I have gotten better about this with yellow jackets and wasps as I've gotten older, but my fear of honeybees and bumblebees waned in childhood. Since stinging ends their life, it seemed ridiculously silly in my young mind to assume a honeybee or a bumblebee would sting unprovoked. This mindset and the confirmation of it by my mother who held even the same attitude about wasps and yellow jackets made me unafraid of honeybees altogether. I count this a very good thing considering the story I am about to tell in regards to starting my first beehive here at Crow's Croft Farm.

Two years ago for Christmas, my husband gave me a gift that made me so happy, I cried with joy. It was a beehive kit complete with a deep brood box already painted, 9 frames, an inner cover, a hive top, a bee smoker, and hive tool. He had known from our first date my desire to someday keep bees and knew what this gift meant to me. Alas, finances and demands currently on the farm did not allow for me to start the hive the following spring, so I waited until this spring (2018) to make my arrangements. I ordered a package of bees rather than a nucleus hive and decided on, after much research, Italian honeybees for their disposition and honey production. Phil and I picked a spot out in the young orchard we'd planted to setup the hive and built up a base of cinderblocks to keep it up off the ground. Phil then drove some T-posts and fenced it with a remnant piece of no climb horse fence to give it some protection from the dogs and other animals that may disturb it. I waited impatiently for April 26th to roll around and distracted myself with reading up and researching all I could on beekeeping. I had been studying the topic for years, but it seemed to be the only thing that curbed my anticipation of installing my bees in the hive.

I had ordered my package of bees from Urban Bee Co. in Burien, WA. A 3lb package of bees comes with about 10,000 bees and a queen. The packages are installed with a can of sugar water stoppered with a piece of cloth. This provides food for the bees. Installed next to the can is a small queen cage with the queen bee inside. The queen cage is screened on all sides and has an opening on one end stoppered with a cork. The bees in the package all hang together in one giant cluster on the feeding can and around the queen cage. She is not queen yet and they are not a collective hive. They are listless and dispassionate, though they cling to each other for warmth and safety. The package itself is made of screen and quarter inch thick wood. I watched over and over again videos of hive installations and read up on how and where to attach the queen in her cage leading up to the day I could pick up my bees and bring them home.

Me being a multi-tasker, I scheduled on the same day an appointment with a man in Arlington, WA, who raises ducks. Winter and early spring 2018 at Crow's Croft Farm carried sadness with it. Three of the five ducks passed away. Doris was carried off by a predator and Roslyn and Mrs. Hudson fell ill and were peacefully seen across the Rainbow Bridge. Beatrice and Benedict were the only two left and Benedict needed more than just one hen. This gentleman had a large selection and a fair price. We still weren't setup for ducklings, so adult ducks were the only answer and so I had arranged to bring home four new duck hens from that farm in Arlington. On the way home, I would stop in at Burien and collect my package of bees since it was on the way. Lo and behold, the truck got a screw in its tire which left me with only Phil's BMW coup to carry out these errands.

Finally, the day came and I took a few hour road trip to gather both ducks and bees. The bee package was covered in stray bees clinging to the outside and I watched as the young woman dispensing the packages brushed them gently away with a bee brush. She wore no protective gear, no gloves, and the bees settled in her hair and on her shoulders. She carried my package of bees to the car and placed it on the floorboors of the passenger side. "Nice ducks," she commented hearing the quacks from the two kennels in the back seat. "So," she said, "it's very common that a few stray bees may still be on the outside and I didn't get them all, so there may be one or two floating about the car." She handed me two small marshmallows, "these are for when you install the queen. Replace the cork with marshmallows." Then she was gone...off to attend the next customer. I still called "thank you," and settled back into the car. The hum and buzz from the package on the passenger floorboards punctuated by the occasional quack of one of the four duck hens in the backseat made me smile as I turned back onto the interstate and started the hour long drive back home.

Sure enough, about five or six bees buzzed around the car and I just opened the sun roof and allowed them to escape. I didn't think much of it and just focused on the road, running through the lists in my head of things that needed to be done after the hive was installed. A few more bees buzzed about the car and I felt a nagging wonder as to where they had come from....I had let out the ones that were on the outside of the package already....then movement caught my eye...movement in the passenger seat. A small tornado of honeybees were swirling up from the floorboards and filling the space in the passenger seat. That was more than a few bees! I opened a window at first..thinking that was the best idea...but the airflow made them agitated and they spread throughout the entire car. I estimated at least several hundred of the bees were loose in the car and felt a momentarily panic hit me. My old need to control rose up and reared its ugly head and I felt myself getting very anxious at the lack of control of this current situation. The ducks fell quiet and traffic slowed on the highway. I shut the vents on the dash to prevent the bees from crawling into the air vents and closed the sunroof and windows except for a small crack to allow some airflow, but not alot. Still trying to focus on the road, I ran all possibilities through my mind on how I could gain control of this situation. Out of the chaos swirling around my brain, a comment from Sue Hubbell's book floated up out of my memory. "I often find that the bees know more what they need than I do." I took a deep breath and willed myself to calm down.

Looking at the situation logically, I knew I had only one choice. I still had about a hour to go thanks to the traffic and there was no feasible way to put the bees back in the package. More bees were crawling out through a seam in the package that had widened just enough for them to escape, but the majority were still in the package. Pulling over and getting out of the car would do no good, not unless I wanted to remove the package and leave it on the side of the highway and, even then, I had no bee suit or tools with me and no way to get the loose bees out of the car. So, the only thing to do was to continue driving and deal with the situation at hand. I took several deep breaths and willed myself to remain calm. Bees settled onto my hands, my arms, in my hair, on the steering wheel and started clustering on the dashboard. I became very conscious of where my hands were and my movements became very slow and steady. A bee's vision is based on movement and sudden movements may cause alarm. Had they been a cohesive hive with a queen they loved and protected, it may have been entirely different, but the bees were still listless and sedate. Traffic was stopped and I took the opportunity to watch one bee crawling along the car window. Her antennae searched the area in front of her and she continued to wander calmly and slowly. There was a steady hum in the car, but it was mild and almost soothing. Nonetheless, I hoped I wouldn't get pulled over for any reason. This would be very hard to explain and a distracted driving ticket was a given for sure.

When I finally arrived back home, I very carefully removed my seat belt checking all the while for any bees that may be on the belt or anywhere near my hands and slid out of the car. A small cloud of bees erupted behind me. They seemed pleased to be out of the car, but hung close to all their sisters. Taking a deep breath, I opened all the doors of the car and pulled out the kennels. Bees were still settled in my hair, but they took flight quickly. I took the ducks to the back yard and turned them loose in the duckyard and then went inside to fetch Phil.

Phil stared at me with eyebrows raised as I told him the whole story. He helped me zip up my bee suit,  secured the veil, and a smile broke across his face at the telling of my tale. Shaking his head, he said, "Well, babe, you handled that well. Not sure I could have done that." We laughed and then I set to work getting the bees to their hive.

I worked clumsily with the bee gloves on my hands. I don't work well with gloves, but I wasn't quite brave enough to carry out this task with my bare hands exposed. The bees loose in the car had clustered on the dashboard or on the side of the package. Gently, I extracted the package from the car and set it down in the driveway. I brushed the cluster off the dash hoping a majority would join the rest clinging to the package and about half of them did.The rest settled back into a cluster on the dashboard of the BMW. I repeated the same action at least four times before deciding it was best to just install the hive. Bees were starting to leave the package and head back to the cluster in the car, so I closed the car door, leaving a window open, and picked up the buzzing bee package and walked slowly and carefully towards the hive setup in the orchard. Small clusters of bees settled on the arms of my bee jacket and on my leather gloved hands. I set it down gingerly on the ground next to the hive and took a moment to open the hive. I had set out a jug of sugar water earlier that morning and I quickly filled the bee feeder in the hive with it. The sugar water would entice the bees to stay and would give them something to eat and get established with once they were in the hive.

It was time to pull the queen cage out of the package and place it in the hive. I pried the metal can in the package up gently with my hive tool and lifted it out of the package. All the bees still inside erupted and set to buzzing, confused and flustered by the disturbance. I pulled the thin metal tab under the can upward and slit out the queen cage, taking a moment to marvel at the beautiful queen bee in her cage. I cursed the gloves on my hands as I clumsily popped out the cork that stoppered the end of her cage and held my gloved finger over it while I collected the small marshmallows they had given me and stuffed them into the opening. Phil had started videotaping me on his phone from several feet away so we could document the first hive being setup. I had thought a simple tack would work to secure her cage to one of the frames in the hive, but it wasn't' and I cursed at my clumsy fingers and at the tack I dropped. I then upset the box of tacks and felt my anger rising. Taking a deep breath, I told Phil I needed something else to secure the queen cage with and he set off to get his carpentry stapler for me. While I waited for him to return, I looked at the queen. Elegant and beautiful, she lounged in her cage, buzzing indignantly and her captivity. If she were exposed to the other bees at this moment, she would be killed instantly. The marshmallows were a temporary, easily consumed substance that the bees would eat through to try and get to her once they were all together in the hive, but by the time they would get to her, they would have accepted her as their own and would start grooming and tending her.

Phil returned with the stapler and I met him over by the garden to collect it since he wasn't in a bee suit. The bees were all swirling about the package, most of them still clinging in a giant cluster on the sugar water can. The queen, I imagine, hurled insults at me as I pinned her queen cage between two frames and stapled it to the top of one frame. Now came the part that seemed instinctively foolish on so many levels.I removed all the frames from the hive except the feeder and the frame with the queen attached and then picked up the package. I could hear Phil narrating the video he was shooting again and I warned him to stand a bit farther away for this step. I took a deep breath and then shook the package sharply downward causing all the clustered bees to fall suddenly in a big, buzzing heap on the bottom and then quickly turned it over, pouring them like beans into the hive. A cloud of bees erupted around me, but most of them just fell and collected on the bottom of the hive. I shook the package again and poured, then again, and again. The sun was shining and all I could hear was the rising hum of the bees upset by the unceremonious gesture of pouring them into the hive. They swarmed around me and the hive, their little gold bodies glinting in the sunlight. I was nervous, but excited at the same time. I carefully set the frames back in the hive, being careful to not crush any bees. They moved out of the way quickly and, before I set the inner cover and lid on the hive, I saw them clustering around the queen cage and starting to work on the marshmallow cap. Some bees still remained in the package and I set it on the lid of the hive on its side with its opening facing towards the entrance.

The cloud of bees not yet in the hive still swirled around me, but in a matter of minutes a cluster started to form on the front of the hive and I smiled as I watched the bees landing on the hive line up and start marching towards the doorway. I had put on the entrance reducer to encourage them to stay. They marched in dutifully as I gathered up the tacks I had spilled and the tools I had brought with me and secured the wire fence that surrounded the hive back in place. I then started walking slowly away. Bees were still clustering on parts of my suit and veil and Phil wandered a ways behind me directing me on where to swipe with the bee brush. A cluster had settled on my hat and I awkwardly brushed at them until they were gone. Phil dodged bees flying off my suit back towards the hive.

"Nice work, babe," he said as we met back by the BMW in the driveway. A good sized cluster covered the dash still, "Now what do we do about that?"

"Well, I said, I will have to make them leave." Since we only had the one suit, I told Phil to go ahead and go back inside. I set the can of sugar water and a bowl for it to drip into by the car in the driveway and opened all the doors again. For three hours, I swiped the cluster of bees off the dashboard every time they settled. In small groups, they gathered on the sugar water or they flew off in search of their lost hive. Several times, I walked the bowl with the sugar water out to the hive and knocked the bees off at the entrance of the hive. As evening came, the number of bees in the car diminished to just a handful and the rest either wandered off or were settled in the hive with their sisters. I was exhausted after hours of trying to remove the bees from the car, but had managed to check my controlling tendencies during the process. After all, bees were wild creatures and they didn't bend to anyone's will but their own. I left a window cracked for those still remaining in the car. in the morning, all the bees were gone save a few that had perished and were lying on the floorboards.

Four days later, I opened the hive to remove the queen cage and do a hive inspection. The cage was empty and the bees were already at work starting to faintly draw out comb on the frame foundations. I did not locate the queen, but saw a good laying pattern of brood in some already completed comb and was satisfied that my hive was on its way and settled. She seemed to be laying eggs after a successful maiden flight and I spotted a drone or two hanging out about the hive still.

I told friends and family about the hive and how excited I was. When I shared the story about transporting the package of bees, the unanimous response was that I was either very insane or incredibly brave. I believe I am just incredibly fortunate. Daily at least, sometimes several times a day, I would walk out to the hive and watch the bees flying in and out, covered in pollen from the spring flowers.

I did my hive inspections, though demands around the farm limited me on doing them as regular as is recommended. I did my best and resolved to let this be a learning experience. Nearly all beekeepers I talked to said they had lost their first hives when starting out and so I tried to adjust my expectations and not let my controlling tendencies take over. I had read that you should give them more room once they had filled four or five frames in their brood box. During an overdue hive inspection, I saw that they had filled six frames front and back with comb. I located the queen, her attendants dutifully grooming her, and carefully set the frame she was on back in the hive. Pulling another up, I muttered curses and chastised myself for not keeping up with a regular hive inspection schedule. A queen cell hung off the bottom of the frame. Different than the brood cells tightly and neatly kept in their perfect geometric comb on the frame, these cells extend and elongate looking like peanuts. A hive builds these for one of two reasons...to prepare for a new queen to be born or to practice for that occasion. From what I could see, all signs pointed to a healthy queen, so raising another could only mean one thing. They didn't think they had enough room to continue the hive grow. In short, this was a clear sign of potential swarming.  I quickly gathered what was needed to put a second brood box on the hive, hoping this would change their  inclinations to swarm and leave the hive in search of better accommodations.

One day, Phil and I set to work taking down the outdoor lights still hung up in the cedar trees around our firepit from our wedding. Phil was up in the trees, perched precariously on the ladder untying or cutting down the ropes that held the lights in place and handing them down to me when he suddenly stopped and, eyes fixed in the direction of the bee hive, said, "uh...Chris...something's going on with the hive." Following his gaze, my heart sank. a spinning tower of bees stretched from the hive entrance to about 20 feet above the hive. Afternoon sun glinting off their gold bodies, it would have been a beautiful site had it not meant they were possibly swarming having raised another queen. Bees marched up the front of the hive in a steady line, taking off to join the tower of their sisters.

"What do we do?" Phil asked.

"Nothing," I responded, "If they swarm, they swarm. There's nothing I can do to stop them at this point. Maybe if they pick an area to rest and swarm before they find another, I can catch them again, but that's about it."

Ten minutes later it was over and all was quiet. I hadn't seen them swarm off in a big buzzing ball as all the videos and research I had done indicated. I was hopeful. The next day, I opened the hive and was surprised to see that not only had they not even remotely started working on the second brood box I had given them, but that there seemed to be far less bees in the hive. I found the queen and she was still going about her duties with her attendants surrounding her. There was healthy brood in the comb and still some capped honey, but not as much as I had seen in the last inspection. The queen cell I had seen was empty. I concluded that the hive may have split on its own. I reinstalled the feeder and fed the hive. If they hadn't started drawing comb in the second brood box in the next two weeks, I would remove it and replace it with the super which was much smaller. Supers are usually placed for honey harvest while brood boxes are usually left in place as a source of food for the hive. With the summer waning and the nectar flow slowing, my concern was they would be left with a much bigger hive than they could feasibly keep warm during the winter months and not enough honey to feed themselves. Opening the hive in the cold months is cruel and almost certainly detrimental to the hive. As it turned out, I ended up replacing the second brood box with a super and I continue to feed them now that summer is on its way out and fall is coming.

Losing half of my first hive has left me slightly discouraged, but not too much. I still go out on my breaks from work with the dogs to watch the hive busily working and I am more diligent with my hive inspections, especially now that the cooler weather is coming and soon I will be unable to inspect. I have taken no honey from the bees this year, but am hoping they will be at a point where I can put a second super on next spring and harvest some honey by next summer. I love seeing my bees as I wander the property or work in my garden and Phil and I have shared many a smile over what we call "our bees". The native woodland bees do an excellent job of pollinating our flowers, berries, fruit trees, and vegetables, but we can easily tell the difference between their fuzzy bodies and the sleek, gold bodies of our Italian honeybees and we often point them out to each other with, "Look, its one of ours!" I have recently acquired a large, motorized honey extractor, several hive bodies and parts, and Phil and I have made plans for a small fenced off area between the horse paddocks we're building for a beeyard. I think it is safe to say, this hobby will be with me for a long time.

My obsession with controlling the situations presented me is still a part of my personality and I struggle with it often. In some aspects of my life, it has been a very strong asset. When it comes to the happenings around this beautiful farm my husband and I continue to build, however, allowing it to run amuck results in missing the entire point of this life I have always wanted and now have. Like the bees, this farm is full of elements not meant to be controlled by human intervention. I can assist and I can provide some necessities or elements that may contribute, but I have no control over the outcomes. The bees will do what they do as will the birds, the deer, the coyotes, eagles, and my own menagerie of domesticated animals to some degree. My role is not to control the situation or to know all the answers, it is to observe, enjoy, and be awed by the beauty and wonder that is this 8.6 acres that I get to call my own and bear witness to all the amazing things that happen here. I am grateful to live these questions everyday and I enjoy the daily quest towards the answers.

Wee, Wee, Wee All the Way Home....

I never in a million years expected I would be the kind of person to love pigs. I never disliked pigs, always thought they were cute, but never figured I would ever be in a situation where pigs would be part of my regular routine and yet, like so many other things that happen here on Crow's Croft Farm, I have been given the opportunity to surprise myself.

My husband, Phil, has always commented on wanting pigs. When we first bought this property, I remember him mentioning it jokingly and I not taking it that seriously. Whenever it came up, I would dismiss it, saying logically that we had no use for a pig and I had absolutely no interest in raising one for meat, so there was no need to entertain the conversation further.  But then I started volunteering for Pony Up Rescue for Equines in Olalla and met two particular pigs that made me consider things a little differently.

Precious and Perfect are their names. Juliana and Kune Kune mixes, they both weigh about 200 lbs each and are the sweetest girls imaginable. New to the operation at the time, I mentioned that my husband (fiance at the time) wanted pigs and Rosemary, the president of the organization and owner of the farm, began informing me about all the things pigs are capable of doing for you and your farm. They are great rototillers for one, are extremely smart, and a great solution for any leftover produce or garden scraps you may have lying about. She offered to adopt them to me and I considered it enough to ask Phil about it.

Precious and Perfect did come live with us for a short time, but we weren't quite setup for them and it became pretty clear early on that they might be better suited back in their large paddock at Pony Up rather than here on our farm with the highway noise and less room to run around. We cared for them and gave them plenty of love, but Rosemary missed them and they missed her. Pigs have memory and are very empathetic creatures. They returned to Pony Up after a few months of fostering with us and are still there happily trotting about their large pigyard with their new sister Maizy, a potbelly pig that was taken in by the rescue last year. I still see these sweet girls during my volunteer shifts and they still enjoy scratches and the bananas I bring them as treats.

So, where am I going with this? Well, Precious and Perfect weren't the only pigs to grace the soil of Crow's Croft Farm. In August of 2016, I went on a business trip to San Diego. Phil was home working and minding the major house project going on at the time. Our roof was being completely redone and restructured. He kept me informed the entire week with pictures of the progress. My favorite was the picture he sent me of the living room with no ceiling other than blue sky above. It was a huge undertaking, but completely necessary. As you can imagine, there were a lot of pictures sent my way during that week in San Diego, so I didn't think twice really when my phone alerted me to a text message from Phil while I was out having dinner with a mutual friend of ours mid-week. My thoughts were centered on "oh, another update on the roof." You can imagine my surprise when this picture was what I found.

Phil and Willard the piglet, August 2016

Our mutual friend laughed for a good five minutes while I stared at the photo after showing it to him and calmly answered the text with, "Um...who is that?"

Phil's response "Meet Willy Freeway Nelson Days!" As you can plainly tell, my husband has a knack for choosing names for our pets.

"He's cute. Where did he come from?" was my response.

Later that night during our evening call, Phil filled me in. A friend of mine was working in Port Orchard at a chiropractic office at the time and some one had stopped in with this little guy asking if anyone knew who he and his siblings belonged to since they were running along the highway. This small male piglet was caught, but the rest were not. My friend, having a farm, was handed the piglet and asked if she could take it to safety. She brought it to our farm. Phil said she pulled up with this piglet snuffling around the cab of her truck and running along the floorboards. She asked him if we could take him, if not, she would have to take him home and she wasn't sure that was a great idea. She knew nothing about pigs.

So, Phil took him, named him, and set him up in a large dog kennel in the basement. He then ran to the feed store and bought a nursing bottle and milk replacement formula. By the time I arrived home from San Diego, Phil and the little pig were best pals. Willy, who we renamed Willard since it seemed to fit his personality more to us, was quite the little character and he LOVED his milk. Pigs live for food in general, so he could be led anywhere with the promise of that bottle. Also typical for a pig, he was adamantly against messing in his kennel - no way was he going to leave a mess where he ate and slept! He would scream and snort and run around the kennel, knocking his little butt against the walls to alert us that he needed to be let outside. Then he would trot out the back door, do his business, and then run over to our feet to scratch his little body against the toes of our boots. Inquiries had been made and posts put up on lost pet sites...no answers.

Caelen bottle feeding Willard the piglet

Here was the trouble - most pigs at young ages are very difficult to identify as far as breed goes. For all we knew, he could be a full grown hog weighing in over 600 pounds when he grew up. I dove into researching pigs, Phil ordered a few books on pigs, and I called up our vet to have him checked out. It was summer, so Phil fenced off another portion of our rapidly dwindling dog yard (the ducks already occupied half of it) and I hung netting over the top to discourage birds of prey. Willard was growing quickly and he was very insistent in his kennel and making a lot of noise. At the time, Phil worked from home and I was in the process of doing so as well and it was distracting. So, we gave him an outdoor pen to play in during the day.

Our vet visited and checked him out. He said he was likely a mini breed of some variety, a pot belly mini was the most likely. He gave him his shots, an experience that introduced me to just how loud a pig can scream in protest, and then taught me some techniques on calming him down, distracting him, and some pointers on feed and habitat.

 We fell in love with his little cute snorts and his very insistent behavior. He had little white socks above his black hooves, and a pink heart on his nose...but the rest of him was black. His brown eyes were so expressive and he quickly demonstrated to both of us how smart pigs can be. He learned how to knock off his water bottle and the more challenging we made it for him, the better he got at it. I caught him several times trying to "unlatch" the clasp that kept his pen door chained so he could get to some fresh grass he wanted instead. He never mastered it, but he KNEW that clasp opened the gate.I bought him a rain jacket and a cute red plaid coat and a leash. I had every intent on training him to be a pet pig, but Willard taught me very quickly that he was not that interested. I have only two photos of him wearing these garments. In under two minutes and with just a turn of my back, I would find him "naked" with his clothes in the middle of his pen, muddy, and stomped on by his four little feet just for good measure. His piglet tantrums were adorable, as irritated as I was by them at times. He learned that I meant food and he would grunt and carry on the minute he heard me moving about the house in the morning. Phil meant playtime and scratches and to this day they have a ritual with this. Phil scratches Willard's back and side and he instantly lays down and rolls so Phil can scratch him more.

Willard in his backyard pen

He began to root and dig. His snout had elongated into quite the effective spade and we marveled at the giant hole he dug in the middle of his pen. We joked he was digging to China and laughed when we would catch him digging, say his name, and he would answer with an indignant "snort" before going back to his work of excavating his backyard pen.

He had his pen during the day, but we brought him in at night to keep him warm. I kept reading up on pigs and found that they liked to be with a companion. I find this to be true of most animals, honestly, so this didn't surprise me. He grew bigger rapidly and in 6 months time was easily three times the size he was when he came to live with us. One day, while I was working away at my job diligently in the living room. Phil was on travel and Ilta was uncommonly alert and whining at the door for no reason I could determine, until I saw a flash of movement. It was a little black, pig behind sauntering across the driveway and through the field...to the big girls pen. Precious and Perfect were, at the time, still fostering with us and a quick glance out the back window showed me he had dug out of his pen and pushed open the back gate. Our little man had decided to go a-courting and he was none too pleased with me chasing after him, picking him up and carrying him back to the house and the backyard. He screamed the entire way in protest and kicked at me until I had no choice but to put him down. He immediately quieted, shook himself, grunted at me, and began sauntering back towards his original destination, intent on wooing the ladies living in the pen across the property. I raced to the backyard to grab a scoop of grain and a bucket and then sprinted back up front and shook it furiously. It appears that the way to a pigs heart is through its stomach and he came running at the sound.

I locked him back in his pen, lined the gate and his pen with cement blocks we had stacked in the back yard, put a horse panel across the dog yard gate to reinforce it, went back inside and promptly scheduled his neutering appointment before returning to my work. Phil and I both hated that day. Our vet and his assistants were great, but the squeals and screams were deafening throughout the house and even Ilta, the lab, hid until it was over. Pain meds were administered, but the holding in place even with sedatives was what Willard protested about loudly. He recovered quickly though and without issue. After a month or two, his manner became slightly more mild, but he seemed curious about company. He touched noses with Ilta through the fence, snorted at the ducks and followed them along the fenceline, and he dug and rooted and played about his pen each day. We bought him an cozy doghouse and finalized his pen for outdoor living. He told me in true pig tantrum fashion that he didn't like that I had positioned his house with the doorway facing away from the house by flipping it over and settling into it and staring at the door, grunting when we came out to look as if to say "see, I fixed it."

He was getting too big for his dog kennel and he didn't like being in it unless it was late at night and it was time to sleep. We talked about getting him a friend, but didn't act on it. If there's anything we've learned since we decided to build this farm, it was that things had a way of coming to us and so, in March of 2017, something did.

Precious and Perfect returned to Pony Up not long after a little white pig was rescued by Rosemary. She was small and was taken out of one of the worse situations I have ever heard about. My research and interaction with Willard had taught me that pigs were not only very smart, but very empathetic and emotional creatures. This pig had been very abused. Rope burns circled her neck and hind legs, she was terrified to be touched, and the pictures Rosemary had seen on Craigslist advertising her for sale or trade were horrifying. Her eyes were sad and she shied away from any touch in fear. Rosemary had taken in a potbelly pig named Maizy at the rescue as well and she had hoped that this little girl would be a good companion for her, but Maizy was much bigger and two minutes in the stall with her resulted in the new resident getting assaulted pretty violently. Rosemary separated them, but didn't know what the next step would be. She set the new pig up in one of the dog yards with a cozy house for her to sleep in and she sent me photos of her. She was slightly bigger than Willard and appeared to be the same breed, or very similar. Rosemary had been told she was a mini potbelly and just barely over a year old. I drove over to meet her, brought her home,  and named her Petunia.

Petunia upon intake at Pony Up

Animals that are abused are not much different than people in their responses. Trust has to be won and even a pig who loves food will remain cautious until she knows you mean her no harm. We had one third of the dog yard still available and with Willard in his pen, we set Petunia loose in the remaining third to check things out. She refused to come out of the kennel at first until we were several steps away, but she finally did. She nibbled the banana I put out for her and then the apples. We talked to her softly and fed her treats. She remained aware of us and nervous, but she relaxed a little when she saw and heard Willard squealing at her from his pen. I minimized contact between them until the vet could see her, but her little tail wagged at the sight of a new friend and Willard paced the fence and called at her too. Petunia needed a bath badly and Phil and I had to resort to dousing her with warm water as she evaded us in the pen to get most of the grime off of her. She then protested loudly when I snuck up on her eating and rubbed her quickly with a towel to take away most of the water and keep her from chilling, but it was then that she gave me the first indication that this was a sweet, loving pig that had known affection at one time and craved it. She shivered with fear, but didn't fight me and the more I rubbed her the more she leaned into the touch. She followed me hesitantly but happily when I led her inside to the large dog kennel Phil had setup for her next to Willard's in my office in the basement. I had a small dish of grain, apples, and carrots and she munched them happily after climbing into her kennel and its fresh, warm blankets. She eventually allowed me to scratch her side and it broke my heart to see fresh tears on her sweet face. I had heard that pigs cried, but had never seen it. I told her tearfully she would never be hurt again and she grunted and snuggled up in her blankets to sleep. Willard was let in and he trotted directly to his kennel next to hers focused on his dinner. Unable to sleep that night, I crept quietly downstairs to check on the two pigs and saw them both sleeping peacefully noses pointed at each other in their kennels. I learned that night that Petunia had a sweet, soft, whistling snore.

Petunia smiling in her sleep

Petunia got more vocal and more trusting over the next few weeks. We had a slight setback when the vet came to take a look at her, vaccinate her, and take blood samples to check her overall health. She was about 11 months old, too late to spay safely, and in need of some good nutrition, but otherwise, healthy. Since Willard was neutered, there was no need to spay her. We introduced her and Willard to each other properly and they were fast friends. She adored him, snuggled with him, and doted on him. She vocalized a lot when in my office and napped frequently, smiling always. I fed her the same high quality grain Willard ate and lots of veggies. In a matter of months, she transformed in to a beautiful little girl pig. We called them our "Ying and Yang Piggies"- Willard all black with his white feet and pink beauty mark, and Petunia with her white fur, pink skin, and one solitary black patch over her eye. Then the day came, we stopped bringing them in at night. They snuggled together in the dog house which rapidly became too small for them. They worked together to "remodel" it by ripping the boards off one side. Petunia also became Willard's partner in crime. He would dig and she would wriggle under the fence. One day I came home to find her wandering my garden. I called to her and she came to me proudly wagging her tail as if to say "see what I did, Mom?" Willard was screaming, running along the fence of the pen, distraught that his lady friend was out and about without him. I reinforced the fence and Phil and I began to make plans for a more permanent solution for them.

Best Friends

And they called it piggy love...

Phil and I had begun groundwork and preparation for the building of our barn and we sketched into the plans a large, proper pig pen with a comfortable, insulated pig house that Phil had built originally for Precious and Perfect. Our excavator finished the pen rapidly, using large retaining cement blocks to build the back half of it to prevent Willard from digging out. We graveled it and fenced it with hog panel. When it was ready, I filled the little house with fresh pine shavings and filled a bucket with grain to lure them into their new home. Phil still loves to tell this story and describe me coming around the back of the house shaking a bucket of grain with two little pigs, one black and one white, trotting dutifully and intently alongside me. They went right into their new pen, ate their prize, and began exploring. They have been living in it ever since. The horse pasture has been built and Charlie and Dolly now live next to them. Dolly has finally accepted the pigs and now knows that though they may smell like it they are NOT bears and I have even on occasion caught her and Petunia touching noses through the fence. Charlie shares his timothy grass with them both during the summer months by pushing it through their mutual fence line so they can help him eat it.

Charlie the horse and the pigs saying hello

Willard and Petunia in their new pen

Willard is still digging to China in the new pen and Petunia still dotes on him. They trot around in their pen happily in the summer, enjoying the shade of their house or their shade sail when its hot, sometimes wallowing in the mud puddles I create with the hose to cool them off. Pigs aren't able to sweat except through their nose which is why they cool themselves down with mud or water. We have a small pool for them too that they like to play in from time to time. Willard likes to take a bath in the water trough, so there are now two troughs and he usually is respectful enough to just use one of them to wallow. They love their fresh veggies and fruits and they greet me every morning with exuberance and tell me they are starving. It's been cold this winter, but they snuggle up together in their little house and keep each other warm. Our vet has commented on how beautiful their coats are and how healthy they look. They have taught me a lot I didn't know about pigs and about myself.

I have learned that pigs are even more empathetic and emotional than I thought. They do cry, they do show their joy, they do smile, and they do have memory. They are incorrigible and they require a lot of activity and a lot of work if you want to train them. They will remember something someone did that hurt them and will react to that fear. They are clever and insistent in their need to just be pigs - they want to root, they want to explore, and they will keep their pen tidy and to their liking. Rearranging something will result in them putting it back the way they wanted it. Petunia has taught me that with enough time, old wounds can heal and trust can be gained. She has taught me forgiveness and that just being kind, loving, and patient can turn a bad past into a beautiful future. I have also learned that their favorite treat is watermelon and pumpkins and they never see to tire of either. 

We have faced more adversity in regards to our pigs than any of our other animals on the farm. I have stopped posting about them on Facebook because I cannot civilly take the bacon jokes that come with those posts. I have become protective and adamant about the fact that these pigs are NOT food. I understand and accept that a majority of people only see pigs as food and I know I will never change that fact about the world. I do, however, have the opportunity to show people what pigs are really like and I do so every chance I get. I look forward to Willard and Petunia greeting me every day when I visit their pen. When I am having a rough day, they can easily make me smile or laugh by just being themselves. They are part of this farm and they will call it home for the rest of their days. I have become a person who loves pigs.

Willard and Petunia - October 2017

One Cat, Two Cat, Three Cat, Four.....

                When I meet new people, I often get asked if I have kids and the response of “no” gets me plenty of odd looks to begin with given my age. Somehow it seems a social imperative that if you are above 35 and don’t have kids, there is something amiss. I am usually met with even more speculation depending on the audience when I say that I have “furry kids” instead. Most people accept this with a smile and ask if I have a dog or a cat. When the full list of the animals is finally shared, some either find it charming or so odd they don’t talk to me again. I accept this..its my life and I choose to live it this way. I wouldn’t trade it.

                Yes, I don’t have kids. I spent most of my younger life proclaiming that I didn’t want them, and then when I found my husband and we decided to share this crazy life, I found that perhaps maybe I did want to give motherhood a try. Alas, some of us are not meant to be mothers in the traditional sense. A good friend told me that she felt my legacy would be left in a different way. I suppose I will never really know, but since this is the life I have and I am not about to waste my time sobbing over things that will never be for me.

                My “furry kids” bring me joy and I treat them with the love and respect they afford me. I have often been asked if I am building an ark given all the creatures that have found their way to our farm. Crow’s Croft Farm is a haven for me and my husband as well as for our menagerie. People stare sometimes when the list gets run off of all that lives there with us, but the cats…that gets the most laughter and comment it seems.

                Somewhere along the way, having more than two cats made you a possible candidate for the term “crazy cat lady”. Back when it was just three cats, I got comments. When I say seven cats…well, you can just imagine.

                How on earth did I end up with seven cats? Well, there’s several stories involved and they all end with a cozy place somewhere in our log house.

                Most exotic of the bunch is Barnaby Jones, Cat Detective. This 18lb ball of fluff and craziness was just a kitten when Phil, my husband, passed him on his walk to work while stationed in Saudi Arabia. The compound up on which Phil lived and worked during his two year assignment there was full of feral cats and Saudi Arabia does not share our love of animals. Roundups and massacre of all ferals caught was a constant practice. In this case, it appeared the mother cat had been caught up leaving her barely weaned kitten behind. I remember Phil sending me an IM before he left his work day (his day ended when mine began back in the United States and we were able to communicate briefly through the company IM System each day). He told me about the kitten and how it had bothered him all day. He had called around, but was told reporting it meant they would catch and kill the kitten and he was sickened by that prospect. He said if he was still there when he went home, he’d find a solution for him that might give him a chance. I knew what that meant. Two hours later, this picture popped into my inbox.

Barnaby as a kitten (Saudi Arabia, 2012)

Barnaby Jones (Gig Harbor, 2014)

                The rest is history. Phil raised Barnaby in his apartment and brought him home when his assignment was over. Barnaby is our Saudi Arabian cat. He’s willful, mouthy, pushy, and despises sharing Phil with anyone, most of all another cat. He’s a bully to the rest of our cats and he will soon be my office cat only. We’ve had to separate him from the others as he is aggressive and outweighs everyone by at least 5 to 6 lbs. Despite all his nonsense and the hassle he creates, we love him and he is our responsibility. We have had moments of discussing whether or not he would be happier in a home where he is the only one, but his personality isn’t his best feature and it would take a very patient and special person to agree to take on what I lovingly refer to as my “monster”. So, he stays with us.

                Barnaby already had trouble adjusting to the company of two other cats when he first arrived. Chuck and Tasha were well established in the household. Chuck is all personality and he’s gorgeous and snuggly. He’s the perfect cat – mild mannered, gets along with others, and puts the dogs in line when they get too close. He can defend himself, he’s an excellent mouser. Tasha was the sweetest cat you’d ever met. Coal black, beautiful, and sweet, she crossed the Rainbow Bridge in February of 2015. Phil had raised her from a kitten. She was diabetic and required insulin shots twice a day. She had her own glucometer and we tested her before each shot to avoid hypoglycemic crashes and seizures. Cancer got her in the end, but she was in no pain and went to sleep peacefully with us holding her. It broke our hearts to lose her, but 18 years is a good long life for a cat, especially one with all her medical complications, and we count ourselves blessed to have been so lucky to have her with us for so long. Both cats accepted Barnaby upon introduction, but he took a little while to adjust to the idea of having to share Phil’s lap with any other feline. He didn’t warm up to me right away either, but now he prefers my office and he has his own chair (so he doesn’t steal mine). 

Chuck

Tasha (crossed the Rainbow Bridge, February 2015)

                 Barnaby Jones has never forgiven us for the other five cats though. I don’t think he ever will either. When he gets to be my only office cat and has his own box, his own kitty tower, toys, and birdfeeder to watch out the big windows in my office, perhaps he will get a little closer to forgiveness.

                How did we end up with five more? Well, remember that neighbor whose ducks ended up with us? Yeah, that guy. Well…the cats are a similar story.

                We were very friendly with this neighbor at first and I won’t say that I think he is a horrible person. I just don’t like how he treats his animals. He made it clear he didn’t care for cats, but when you live in the woods and have poultry, etc., a cat to keep the rodents down is a good idea. Still, this neighbor truly didn’t care for the cat which was evident by the name he gave her. He named her Get Out of Here which he would yell at her any time he caught her lounging in the back room he’d built on to his deck. She was a small cat, white and grey tabby, and very sweet. I used to volunteer in cat rescue and this neighbor knew all the stories of our own cats, so when we were having a campfire one night and talking he sighed and told me he though his cat might be pregnant. I immediately exclaimed “you didn’t get her fixed!”

                This fool went onto tell me how he figured it would be all right since there weren’t other cats around that he’d seen and “I’m not like you two. I don’t spend that kind of money on my animals.”

                “They’re cats. They will find each other and you have to get them fixed or they will just keep having litters.” I told him.

                Well, I checked her out and sure enough, she was pregnant. He fed her cheap cat food and still wouldn’t let her come inside, even when pregnant. She did have that back room though. When he went away for a two week trip, we agreed to look after his animals (the ducks, chickens, cat, and dog). He wanted us to leave his lab at home and just feed him, but we wouldn’t hear of it. Theo, his sweet black lab who liked our dogs and was kind to cats, enjoyed two weeks of luxury napping in a warm house on a bed and, I was informed later, even spent a few nights snuggled up with my goddaughter on her bed in the basement. If I could have taken him, I would have. While the neighbor didn’t care for his cats, he did love his dog, though I think Theo’s care could have been better.

                While the neighbor was away, the cat had her babies, but she hid them. My goddaughter and I spent hours looking for them, crawling under the deck, through the woods, trying to follow her. We never found them. She brought them out when he returned. Six kittens – three pairs of twins. Two that looked like her (grey and white tabbies), two tuxedos, and two black and whites.

                He had Phil over to visit and showed them to him when I was on business travel and Phil told him he should get the cat fixed and take the kittens to the humane society. He said he was going to find homes for them soon. They were barely four weeks old. He told Phil the mother cat had stopped feeding them already and so he wasn’t worried about it. I came home and we walked over to see the kittens. I had a speech planned. The Humane Society would fix his cat for free if he surrendered the kittens and I was bound and determined to talk him out of them and get her fixed. I was even going to just take her myself and the kittens too to have it all settled.

                But, no…he cut me off as I started saying he’d already given away four of them and there was just the Mama Cat and the two grey and white tabby kittens left. He said I could have one kitten, but he was going to keep the other, so he would have two mousers. I tried to argue with him, but my husband gave me a look. I knew what would happen…I had seen this story too many times before volunteering cat rescue in New York. He wouldn’t get them fixed and there would be more. I was sickened over the other four kittens already being taken away to new homes way too young, but knew there was nothing I could do now, except save one kitten. I picked one of the kittens, the boy, and carried him home on my shoulder that day. He liked to burrow in my hair and he was the snugglier of the two. I named him Mycroft. I tried again in vain to talk him out of the other kitten, but he refused. 

Mycroft as a kitten

Mycroft full grown

                Four weeks later as I was preparing to go on yet another business trip, I happened to look up towards the old shop on our property. This building was nearly falling down and has since been removed. At this time though, it held storage we couldn’t fit in the house or garage quite yet and housed my husband’s Jeep and Blazer. It was June and the days were long. We’d heard that our neighbor was gone for a few days. We had found out when Theo heard us around a campfire one night and came running over. We went to take him home and saw that our neighbor was gone. A quick text to his mother told us that he was gone for a few more days. He had not bothered to ask us to take care of Theo or the cats or the birds. I informed his mother Theo would stay with us.

                When I saw Get Out of Here in our shop, my heart skipped a beat and I admit the devious side of my brain starting plotting. My heart leapt when I saw Mycroft’s twin sister with her. If I could catch them both, I could get them to safety. Get Out of Here was very thin, much thinner than she had been last I had seen her. She was ragged and very skittish of us suddenly. I ran inside and told Phil and we tried to catch the cats, but to no avail. They were too quick, so I put out a dish of dry food instead hoping I could entice them to stay and I could try again before I left. Get Out of Here was ravenous and it boiled my blood to see that Mycroft’s sister was still nursing. Mycroft had taken to suckling on my shirt or thumb when being held, kneading his paws into whoever was holding him looking for milk. Our neighbor had lied. He wasn’t weaned and she hadn’t stopped nursing her babies…he had stopped feeding her so she would mouse and she had given any spare she had in fat to her one remaining kitten. That was my assessment anyway. I was partially right.

                Not an hour later, I saw another kitten. It was black and white and snuggled up with Mycroft’s twin in the blackberries next to our old shop. Then I spotted another black and white kitten by my garage. It was meowing for its siblings and Get Out of Here. Get Out of Here had disappeared. I called for Phil and he confirmed angrily that those were two of the kittens from the litter. He had seen them all, I had not. Our neighbor had lied to us. He hadn’t given all of them away.

                Another hour later, a tuxedo kitten joined the furry pile by the blackberry bushes by the shop and I was enraged at this point. I told Phil we were going to catch them and find them homes. “They’re not our cats, Chris.” Was his answer.

                “They are now,” I said, “He’s not caring for them and he clearly doesn’t give a damn if they live or die out here. Between the highway and predators, they won’t make it.”

                Phil didn’t disagree. We agreed that we would be honest if he came looking for them and I was adamant that he would get a piece of my mind if he did. I boarded a plane for my business trip. Phil was going to keep their food bowl full and try to catch them in my absence. If he didn’t have them when I returned, we would catch them together. Further inspection of the shop that night by Phil revealed two things. The mother cat had built a nest for her babies and they had been living in his Jeep for at least a week by the looks of things and….the last kitten joined the litter that night. A tiny tuxedo kitten, the runt of the litter. I received that text as I landed in Atlanta and muttered expletives under my breath for a good five minutes.

                Phil watched over the kittens that week and said there was no sign of the Mama Cat (Get Out of Here) for most of the week. The kittens played and snuggled up in the carrier we had filled with old towels and placed in the shop and they scarfed down the food he put out for them. In the middle of the week. Mama Cat returned and she took the kittens somewhere else for a day or two. The neighbor returned, picked up his dog, and never mentioned the cats. Mama Cat returned two days later (the night before I came home) with her litter and settled back into the Jeep in the shop. They were all ravenous again and the big bowl of food Phil put out when he saw them distracted them long enough to allow him to catch all of the kittens and put them in the garage. Mama Cat (we refused to call her by the name she had been given at this point) put up more of a fight, but he got her into the carrier and put her in the garage with her babies. He gave them fresh water, a litter box, and food.

                Our veterinarian and his wife are dear friends of ours and when he was informed of the situation by Phil, he offered to adopt two kittens and fix, worm, and give shots to the rest (including Mama Cat). A few days after I arrived home, our vet, his wife, and their daughters came over to pick out their kittens. They chose one of the black and white kittens and Mycroft’s twin. Catching them in our garage was no small feat, but we managed and those kittens went to their new home. We caught them all and took them in for deworming and their first round of shots. The kittens had never been handled, especially the runt, and were very skittish and distrusting. Mama Cat was only five pounds and in desperate need of nourishment. We free fed her dry food and wet food, got her shots, dewormed her, and gave her flea meds. She had a tick too which was removed. I scheduled her spay appointment. Her examination placed her at about one to two years old.

                Mama Cat and I started to bond. I had taken to having my coffee in the garage each morning and talking to the cats in the hopes that they would become a bit more socialized. Mama Cat was the first to respond which I was happy to see. She had been so sweet before and had been so affectionate, it was nice to see parts of that return to her personality. One morning, I was sitting crossed legged on the garage floor sipping my coffee and talking to her. She walked up and asked for a pet which I happily gave her. She quickly climbed into my lap and started purring, asking for more and more affection. I fell in love with her, which Phil immediately saw. I named her Miss Addler and asked if I could keep her. Phil laughed and said of course, but he wanted to keep the tuxedo male kitten with the white dot on his face. He named him Cosmo. Cosmo had taken to Phil rather quickly and had the loudest purr of all the kittens.

                That left the other two – a black and white male and the runt tuxedo female. We would get them fixed and find them good homes, I said. Right….we named them. Domino and Tink. They have never left our home. They are all still very skittish, Tink most of all, and Barnaby’s assaults on Addler were so severe, we put her in our bedroom to protect her until we can finish building my office to secure Barnaby. Addler is the most affectionate cat in the house aside from Chuck. Chuck has recently joined her in the bedroom. Being the old man of the house, he dislikes being pounced on by the other kittens and would rather just nap on our bed or sit in the window and watch birds. He and Addler play occasionally still and I have caught them snuggling together while napping.

                Domino, Cosmo, and Mycroft run around the house each night and early morning playing and tumbling about. Mycroft, having been the first and extremely socialized, has taught his brothers that the humans are not so bad. Cosmo prefers Phil to this day and they have a morning “appointment” every day in Phil’s office – the appointment consists of Cosmo coming in and meowing at Phil, then jumping into his lap and purring loudly while he gets his morning loves and snuggles. Domino has started asking for pets and affection, though he still dislikes being picked up and he is still rather skittish. All of the kittens disappear into hiding when they hear a voice they don’t recognize and I have several friends who are not certain I truly have these cats because they have never seen them.

                Tink is another story. Still very feral and terrified of people, I had to trap her for her spay appointment and then again recently for her booster shots. She yowls in terror when I do this and it breaks my heart. She doesn’t like us and doesn’t trust us, but she has put her total trust in Ilta, our dog, who she rubs on and scent marks to the degree Ilta will tolerate. After her booster shot appointment, I put her in our bedroom hoping she would bond again with Addler and Addler could show her that we aren’t so bad. Also, having her in close quarters with us would force some level of socialization, but there are still plenty of places to hide in our bedroom, so she would feel somewhat safe.

                We have had these kittens for almost two years now. Tink has been in the bedroom for the last two months and Phil informed me just this week (I am on business travel again) that Tink allowed him to pet her. She had stopped running from us when we brought in food before I left, but he said she didn’t run away when he came in the room and found her laying on the bed. She liked the petting, but took off as soon as Addler interjected and demanded his attention. Its slow, but its progress.

                In these two years since Addler brought her kittens to us, our neighbor has never asked about them. He never looked for them or talked about them when we did see him. He has moved away and we have inherited his ducks as a result.

                So, that is how we came to have seven cats in the house. They have their quirks and we continue to work with them. We love them all and we give them the best care possible. Yes, people think we are crazy and we get some commentary on the subject, but I wouldn’t trade it. They are safe, loved, and in good health. Oh…and it is an added bonus that no self respecting mouse sets foot in our house. Any that have dared, have been brought to us as a gift or been seen in the jaws of the proud cat flaunting his/her accomplishment to us and the other cats. The house is big enough for all of them and while we have to make special concessions for some of them, it’s the price we happily pay for their company, their affection, and the joy they bring us – just like all of our furry babies at Crow’s Croft Farm. 

Top left to right: Tink, Cosmo, Domino and Addler

 

Miss Addler (formerly "Get Out of Here")

Domino and Cosmo