Pardalis Ocicats

Instead of the planned small show last October we joined other cat clubs in the large Stoneleigh venue just for this year, we’re back to our solo show this coming October.  I didn’t think Fizz would do very well at the show as her 6th month old remaining kitten was still enjoying a good suckle and had made her undercarriage really lumpy, I also didn’t think she was in the best of conditions because of it! Obviously the judges thought otherwise as she came 1st in 3 of her 4 entered classes, one being a class of 5.  She earned her 3rd CC so is now a Champion!!

We also took the kitten who got a lot of praise from everyone for her rich golden coat and took 3 firsts and 1 second place in her classes. She won her open class and got Best of Breed and was picked for Best in Show row as Best female kitten winning us a few nice prizes We also came home with a couple of club trophies for Best Tawny and Best Kitten.  Her new owners were there to see her success which was lovely for them, she leaves to live with them next weekend when she’s recovered from being spayed. All in all a very successful day!

Saw a copy of next year’s Club calendar at the weekend, our cats/kittens feature in January, Feb, April and May with a pic of both Lexi and Fizz on the front cover too

January is three of the litter Fizz had in the summer, Feb is Connie and Delphi (Lexi’s from early this year), April is Quincy (Fizz 2009) and May is our Fizz. Very proud of them all!!

http://www.ocicatclubuk.org/CALENDAR.html

We’ve had to make the very sad decision to let Purdy, at the grand old age of 19, to rest in peace.  It’s always very sad to lose a much loved pet, but even though we’ve known it’s been coming for some time, it’s hit us all very hard.

Purdy came to us as a tiny slip of a thing, just weeks old, the last one left from the litter being fostered for an animal charity by our then next door neighbours. She earned the nickname ‘wing nut’ for a while as her ears were enormous compared to her tiny frame and stuck out at a strange angle.

She was a very quiet cat, never naughty, accepting all the changes that happened around her, though the arrival of our dog, Basil, ruffled her fur enough for her to choose to move to the bottom of the garden for a week, refusing to come in!  Luckily it was nice and warm outside at the time.  Other cats and kittens arrived over the years and she took it all in her stride.  She even coped really well with the house move last year despite her eyesight failing.

The house seems empty without her, she may not have moved very much these past few months, but she was always there and now…..she’s not

Rest in peace princess, you were a wonderful friend to us all and will be sadly missed.

We have just one kitten left from Fizz’s June litter.  She’s a lovely tawny, very sweet and affectionate and such a shame she’s not been chosen yet. Just a case of people looking for other colours or boys. She’s the spitting image of her mum and has the nicest temperament and loves nothing better than to be picked up and cuddled. Though she’s 17 weeks old now she’s still quite small and as Ocicats never really grow out of kittenhood, she’s got a lot of growing to do still.  She can jump onto the work surfaces already, though we’ve been trying to talk her out of that!  She’s very vocal and loves a good chat, often only quiet when she’s, eating, sleeping, playing or being cuddled :-)  Hopefully she’ll find her forever loving pet home very soon, until then she’ll remain a valued and very welcome addition to our family.

The garden run is a great hit with the kittens.  Now they’re bigger and have had their first vaccination we can open the cat flap into a small netted off patio area for them to get some fresh air.  The original idea was that the adults would be able to leap up to the first level area and then, with another leap, access the walk over area into a separate secure part of the garden, while the kittens would stay in the part next to the house. What we hadn’t accounted for was the kittens shinning up the wooden post to the higher level!  They did this within 5 minutes of being out there.  Ah well, best laid plans and all that…… We came up with a cunning plan and simply stuffed a cushion into the walkway hole so they at least can’t access the 2nd garden area while they’re still a bit too small!

Lexi earned her 7th merit at the Herts and Middx show yesterday.  She did well in her side classes too, getting a 1st, 2nd and a 3rd, with the 3rd being out of 7 entries.  We’re very proud of her.  It was a noisy venue where the noisy was forever giving out messages nobody could decipher but just spooked the cats, and the lighting wasn’t the best for showing off cats’ colours.  Lexi’s merit write-up was a glowing one yet again, with praise for her ‘wild look’ and her excellent type and coat pattern.

‘Wasters’ isn’t really the right word, as how can time spent watching and playing with adorable kittens ever be wasted?  Fizz’s kittens are now downstairs in the kitten room.  We fully intendedcontaining them in the new kitten pen until they’d started on solids and were using the litter tray confidently.  However, I can’t believe how quickly they’ve changed this past week or so.  All of a sudden they want to be into everything and explore when just a week ago they were warily tottering around the pen. Now it’s all play, play, play!!! So the door to the pen is kept open now.

They are using the litter tray, albeit to sleep in…… No interest has been shown in proper food but they’re all very good weights and still gaining steadily so there’s no rush.  They all drink water out of the bowl so it won’t be long before they decide to give kitten food a try.

Quincy is the handsome lilac silver boy from Fizz’s litter born in May 2009.  We grew very fond of him as a kitten, he was always very affectionate and friendly, being the first to greet visitors.  But we were happy that he had gone to a wonderful home.  He lives in London now and is very well known in the local community.  He wears a collar with a phone number on which is often called to say ‘ did you know your cat regularly visits our pub, and wanders around for a chat with the people there?’ or ‘ Quincy’s just let himself into the local school and is sitting in the classroom with the children’ or even ‘Quincy’s just let himself in and pinched my dinner!’.

Now he needed somewhere to stay while his new family went on holiday.  As this coincided with the time that Fizz would be upstairs with her new babies, we decided that we’d be able to help out on this occasion and have him stay with us.  We were especially keen to see how he’d turned out. Although we’d seen recent photos, we were pleasantly surprised at how much more handsome he is in the fur.  He’s also huge! With enormous paws and very solid muscular body. He’s still a very loving cat, who loves a cuddle and is so very laid back and relaxed.  He settled right in and it was only a few days before he was integrated in the family and playing with our other cats.

We hope he enjoyed his three week stay with us as much as we enjoyed having him here, but we’re sure he’s happy to be back doing his rounds of the locality!

Fizz was fidgety on Wednesday and wouldn’t leave my side so I knew something was about to happen.  We took her up to bed with us and the loud purring started.  She has a very quiet purr normally so this was her ‘ouch’ purr.  I turned the light off and prayed nothing would happen until the morning.

No such luck!  At around 1am I woke up to shuffling in the birth box and a little squeak.  The first born was already nice and dry and suckling and getting lots of attention from mum before I noticed another in the corner still in its sac.  My first thought was it was a still born as Fizz wasn’t paying it any attention.  I grabbed an old flannel and rubbed gently and she gave a sigh.  After quickly wiping the sac from her mouth and tearing the cord, I dried her as best I could and gave her back to mum who was now happy to wash her.  She was a bit slow to suckle and felt a little cold, so I held her in my hands to warm her up a little and after a little while she livened up enough to root for a teat. Two more births followed in the next hour or so and by 4am, with Fizz happily nursing them, I crawled back to bed. The alarm goes off at 6am and we found another kitten had been born bringing the total to five.

We have 3 tawnies, a blue and a chocolate.  They’re all very content and getting lovely round bellies.

We’ve finally finished creating a safe outside space for our cats.  There’s a cat flap from the cat/kitten room going to a meshed off space at the back of the house.  This can be used by kittens too.  With a big jump (too high for kittens) the adults can reach a contained walkway over the patio and down into a sectioned-off piece of our garden.  Loads of bushes to explore and hide in and plenty of shady spots for a sunny day’s snoozing.