Best Grass on the Dock

Two or three hundred feet up the dock from us, there's a dinghy. It's a sad, half-deflated rigid bottom inflatable tucked between the bow of its center cockpit sailboat and the dock. Until last fall, it hung on the dinghy davits off the back of the abandoned sailboat. A pair of seagulls had been using the dinghy as their nesting platform (and causing all kinds of havoc when anyone tried to pass by in the waterway behind the boat). The port finally called the owner and asked him to move the dinghy.

He did. He put it right there against the dock. Without cleaning out the accumulation of nesting material and guano.

As you can see, that dinghy grew a bumper crop of grass. How Hatshepsut found this so far from our boat is a mystery to me. And perhaps it's better that way. I have enough gray hair. Maybe she simply smelled the ripening odor of aging seagull poop and followed her nose. Whatever it was, we were outside on the docks one day and she led me down to this dinghy. She gingerly climbed inside and began eating the grass. This has gone on one each day it hasn't been raining. Mind you, I buy this cat grass from the local health food store. Wheat grass. Lush. Green. Fresh. She appreciates it. We go through a ritual when I come home with groceries. She sticks her nose in each of the bags looking while I sing "Hatshepsut, look! I brought you a treat!" I put down her container of live grass and she proceeds to mince up blades of grass and scatter them all over the white cockpit.

The grass in the dinghy is different. Sure, she pulls it out, too, but that grass she actually eats. Consumes it as if it nourishes her in some fashion that the wheat grass simply can't.

I know it's blurry, but your eyes do not deceive you. Those are bones. What this means is that my youngest feline prefers to eat only grass nourished by the corpses of dead baby seagulls.

Meanwhile...

You've noticed we're behind in posting. We really aren't still in the San Juan Islands. No, we cleared into Canada some time ago and have been cruising, taking photos and problem solving since. We're at a pause for the next week while I go to New York to attend the RWA National Conference. Keith and the cats are in Victoria, BC docked right in front of the Empress Hotel. They'll hold there until I get back.

The problem solving involved felines. Hatshepsut came down with a urinary tract infection. We found a fabulous vet clinic in Nanaimo - the Clinic for Cats - a short cab ride from the marina. They diagnosed her and gave us Clavamox pills. Woo hoo, done deal right? We sail away from Nanaimo, anchor at a marine park. Hatshepsut promptly has a reaction to her meds. She was miserable and we were in the middle of no where. We pulled up anchor and hurried into port. We were too far south at this point to return to Nanaimo. We called the Clinic for Cats, explained what was happening and told them where we were (Sydney, BC). They said, "Give us five minutes, we'll call you right back." They did. They'd found a hospital near us, sent all the records, told them to expect us, called us back and told us the hospital was waiting for us - they'd give Hatshepsut a shot and all would be well. Sure enough. The Sydney Animal Hospital gave Hatshepsut a long acting antibiotic shot called Convenia. No more need for the Clavamox that had been making her feel so horrible.

Okay. Everything's fine, now, right? We haul the girl back to the boat, sit down, and notice that Cuillean isn't acting right. Uh oh. From watching her, I figured she had an impacted anal gland. This means another vet visit. Those things will rupture and you don't want that. Except that it wasn't. I'd gotten it wrong. I knew this when I saw the blood on my cat. She had an abscess and had pulled the scab off. She was bleeding. All over the boat. It wasn't dangerous, and once she'd opened the abscess, she felt much better, but it still required a trip to the clinic. So first thing Saturday morning, we were back in a cab headed to the Sydney Animal Hospital with another cat. Cuillean was dehydrated, needed a bit of minor surgery to finish draining the wound, and she needed antibiotics. They took very good care of her and we had her back aboard that afternoon. She's healing well, now, and we're hoping that's the end of the feline veterinary adventures.

We do have more photos to post and stories to tell about river otters using the boat as a jungle gym in the middle of the night. We'll get those posted. Eventually. I swear.

Another Hurdle Cleared

Houston, we have cat food.

Yeah. I know. Not the most titillating subject for a post, is it? Still. One of the biggest concerns we had about embarking on a five month sailing trip - a trip that includes our feline companions - was how to feed them. Three were easy. They'll eat canned Wellness cat food. The lady to the right, Hatshepsut, will not. She is exceedingly particular. Homemade, raw cat food or hunger strike. Stop rolling your eyes. Yes. My cats are spoiled rotten little brats. I freely admit this. I'm also clear who created and who perpetuates the problem. It's all the DH. :D

Feeding raw is easy when you live in a house with a real refrigerator and freezer (and when you have a veterinarian with training in feline nutrition to give you the information you need to keep the food nutritionally balanced). On the boat, with a freezer the size of a loaf of bread, it's much harder. I couldn't make five months of raw food and just stash it in the freezer. There must be some kind of option, right? So off I went to Earth Pet, our local pet store. I stocked up on five months of Wellness (15 cases of 3 ounce cans) and treats. I asked for suggestions about how to handle Hatshepsut's strong dietary preferences. The excellent staff shook their heads and said, "Wow. Let us think on that. She won't eat anything canned, huh?"

It was at our last vet appointment (all the cats had to have health certificates in order to enter Canada), a possible solution presented itself. The clinic carries a package called Wild Kitty (I don't name these things). It's a 'kit' for making cat food. You mix the packet contents with one pound of ground chicken or turkey and voila. Raw cat food that I can make just about anywhere there's a grocery store, and I can make it in small enough batches that my teensy freezer can accommodate it. I bought a pack to try out on the youngest, since she was the gating factor in the whole cat food saga.

When I opened the kit packet, all of the cats thought the contents smelled pretty interesting. I reconstituted the freeze-dried ingredients as instructed, then mixed in the ground chicken. Cuillean hopped up on the counter to help herself to a taste test. I gave her a spoonful. Cuillean approved. I offered Hatshepsut a taste. She tried to bury it. Erie comandeered the sample and licked the plate sparkling clean. I gave her more. She ate that, too. Autolycus, by this time, realized his sisters were getting something he wasn't. I offered him a plate. He had to think about it for a split second, but then he licked his plate clean. Perfect. The three cats who didn't need a raw food option all love it.

The one I needed to have eat it, didn't.

I had to resort to big guns. I added soemthing called 'Healthy Powder' to the mix, stirred it up and offered another taste to Hatshepsut. She actually thought about it trying a bite...and she didn't attempt to bury it. Progress. Clearly, bribery was in order. I adorned her sample with a few kibble. No go. I sprinkled crushed Wildside Salmon treat over the top and...SCORE! She ate it. She *liked* it. She didn't polish her plate, but it was a close thing. Yay!

Now, of course, I have to go buy a five month supply of Wild Kitty cat food kits...and Wildside Salmon treats.

A Weekend Sail

Autolycus

My husband and I live aboard a sailboat with our feline companions. The orange guy in the portal is Autolycus, an eleven year old bobtail male. Cute, ain't he? Great purr. Big personality. Likes to sleep on my head. Very endearing. The down side is that Mr. Congeniality gets sea sick. Really sea sick. Saturday dawned cool and rainy just to piss off all the people tied to the log boom on Lake Washington to watch the Seafair hydro races and the Blue Angels. We got up, went to breakfast, came back, and cleaned up the boat in preparation for guests. This tipped off the cats that something unusual was happening. And by their definition, unusual = bad. Our guests arrived, we showed them around a bit to familiarize them with the boat, then we cast off. The moment the diesel engine started, the hearing cats hid. The deaf girl got up and came out to the cockpit. She *loves* going for a sail. The other cats shun her. We had 12 knots of wind out of the south and increasing rain. I bundled up in my foul weather jacket and my life vest (no going on deck without a PFD). Cleared the deck and then invited our guests forward so I could show them the sail workings. We set the main and then trooped back to the cockpit (and inside the dry, warm enclosure). Keith killed the engine. I helped set the head sail. We fell off and were sailing. Good speed. Easy beam reach and the while there was a little bit of chop, it really was a pleasant sail. Until I went below.

Hatshepsut had deposited her breakfast on one of the sleeping bags - the bag the deaf gal uses as her bed. Erie, our deaf matriarch, was not impressed. It's okay. Really. The bag is washable.

Then a line caught on a hatch. It scared Autolycus, which translates into the cat yakking up his guts. Great. Which set off Hatshepsut. Again. How can she have anything left to throw up?? Then the terror poop began. It isn't like cats poop roses to begin with, but there's no mistaking terror poop. Nose hairs curl in protest. Eyes water. Our youngest guest desperately wanted OFF the boat at that point...except that we were in the middle of Puget Sound. I opened all the windows. I cleaned up. I sat our guests out on the transom where they had fresh air. By the time the rain really began falling, we'd made it most of the way back to the marina, Autolycus had yarfed on both dry-clean only bed covers, and the smell from the terror poop had dissipated.

I shudder to think what sort of impression sailing with us left on our guests. They bundled up and went back to a house with central heating. Keith helped me get the dry cleaning up the dock to the car. We dropped it off then went to grab a burger. (You cannot live with children or animals and remain squeamish.) He brought me back to the boat where I did the washable laundry while he went to a Rush concert. Yeah. Laundry covered in cat barf versus Rush. I got the better end of that deal.