When Monty Met Molly

It was the photo which did it: a small, cross-eyed ginger cat in a cage stole our hearts, looking quizzically up in the air as Michelle took his picture. He'd been rescued from the Sheng Shui AFCD wearing a collar, but apart from that, Montgomery's story remains a mystery. We suspect, however, that he was a ninja in a previous life -- there is nothing he enjoys more than a good ambush (our legs and arms still bear the scars) and playing 'hunter'. This is when you hide and he hides and you peer round the corner and he peers round the corner then you hide again... until one of you cracks. So far, even when Monty loses, he wins -- there is little more terrifying than a ginger ninja hurtling towards you at full throttle!

Monty has made our lives a little crazier and a lot more fun; it took him nearly six months before he would snuggle up on our laps for a cuddle... but when he did, it was a glorious moment. As happy as he was to have a forever family and a safe, warm place to live that was full of love, we knew something was missing. The look of utter distress in his eyes when we left for work in the mornings, knowing he'd have a long day of lonely hours before we got back home to cuddle and play with him, broke our hearts.

Then, a little miracle was born. Well, five little miracles -- Indiana, a pregnant cat who Michelle had taken in, gave birth to five glorious little bundles of fluff in late November 09. Through Michelle's photos on Facebook, we saw the wonderful moment they entered the world, watched them grow from blind, nubby little things into gorgeous little heartbreakers, and we knew that one of them was destined to be Monty's BFF (best friend forever).

http://hkalleycatwatch.blogspot.com/2009/11/indiana-and-her-little-indians.html

And that is how Molly came into our lives. We brought her home on Saturday, January 16, 2010.

She was petrified and shivering all the way back; it was her first time outside Michelle's place, where she was born and where she had her mum and all her sisters and brother for company and comfort.But she settled down after a few hours of love and attention from four humans... and Monty! He hissed a couple of times to ensure she knew he was boss, and then all was well. By bedtime, they were playing catch; Molly all boofed up and hopping sideways at him, Monty all flirty and chirupping at her to chase him.

Now, they truly adore each other, and our little family is complete.

Petronella's Adoption

A lovely message from Petronella's new family:

It's been three weeks since we adopted Petronella. I never thought I would have a pet in the house before. Both my daughter and I are afraid of dogs and none of us was keen on having an animal in our house, let alone the fact that both of us were allergic to cats.

We spent last Christmas in NY with a dear friend who has a cat. We suffered allergies for 2 days and had to take antihistamines. We were then ok for the rest of our stay. My friend's cat was 14 years old and it wasn't very active. Nevertheless, it was a lovely cat.

When we came back to HK, we started to think seriously about having a cat. Luckily, we found the HKAlleyCatWatch website.....and there we are....our life has changed! Thanks to Michelle, we were able to take Petronella home the first time we met her.

I wasn't too sure about Petronella in the beginning because she looked a bit too skinny and fragile to me. We took petronella home and started to toilet train her. She did a pee on our sofa twice but then quickly learnt to use the kitty litter box. Things went really well after that and now Petronella has bonded with me. She also loves to play with my daughter. Petronella now climbs onto my bed and sleeps with me every night. And guess what? I really like it! Petronella wants lots of attention and does cheeky things at times. She doesn't like me spending time on the computer.

Every time I try to go on the internet, she would jump and sit on my laptop!!! We're absolutely falling in love with this cat. You might think Petronella is lucky but let me tell you the truth, I'm the lucky one! Po Rippon 26/1/2010

Candy's Adoption

Since our cat brought from Canada passed away in March, 2009, our cat (Lang) has been lonely. No one fights with him any more, no one squeezes into the same bed with him any more, and no one lets him play with the tail any more. Lang is sleeping too much due to not much challenge in life.

We started to think about getting a companion cat for Lang who is now 6 years old. We wanted to get a girl cat who is also a British short hair background because Lang is a Scottish fold. We thought a kitten a bit too young for Lang, so we aimed at finding an adult cat of a few years old. We visited a few SPCA centers and also looked around on various websites, but did not find any suitable cat.

Eventually we found a very suitable candidate cat on the Hong Kong Alleycat website. That’s how we found Candy, who is a blue-gray British hair girl. We’ve had Candy for less than one month and things will get more smooth as time goes. Lang is less hostile towards Candy. Sometimes they still hiss and slap at each other when bumping into each other, but they seem to find their own space to hang around. Hopefully one day Lang and Candy will hang around and sunbathe together.

For us as Candy’s new parents, we are happy with her so far. A very playful and smart cat who can eat a lot. She put on more than one pounds already within one week after coming to our home. We want to see Candy get fatter, ideal weight around 10 pounds for a girl. Then she will have enough muscles and weight to fight with Lang for playing time. We thank Hong Kong Alleycat for connecting us to Candy. Someone was stupid enough to abandon Candy at AFCD, shame on them!! After a few years, we will bring the two cats to Canada when we are ready to move back there. We encourage people to contact Hong Kong Alleycat’s Michelle for adopting cats and we are sure Michelle will be able to help out a lot.

Since our cat brought from Canada passed away in March, 2009, our cat (Lang) has been lonely. No one fights with him any more, no one squeezes into the same bed with him any more, and no one lets him play with the tail any more. Lang is sleeping too much due to not much challenge in life. We started to think about getting a companion cat for Lang who is now 6 years old. We wanted to get a girl cat who is also a British short hair background because Lang is a Scottish fold. We thought a kitten a bit too young for Lang, so we aimed at finding an adult cat of a few years old. We visited a few SPCA centers and also looked around on various websites, but did not find any suitable cat.

Eventually we found a very suitable candidate cat on the Hong Kong Alleycat website. That’s how we found Candy, who is a blue-gray British hair girl. We’ve had Candy for less than one month and things will get more smooth as time goes. Lang is less hostile towards Candy. Sometimes they still hiss and slap at each other when bumping into each other, but they seem to find their own space to hang around. Hopefully one day Lang and Candy will hang around and sunbathe together.

For us as Candy’s new parents, we are happy with her so far. A very playful and smart cat who can eat a lot. She put on more than one pounds already within one week after coming to our home. We want to see Candy get fatter, ideal weight around 10 pounds for a girl. Then she will have enough muscles and weight to fight with Lang for playing time. We thank Hong Kong Alleycat for connecting us to Candy. Someone was stupid enough to abandon Candy at AFCD, shame on them!! After a few years, we will bring the two cats to Canada when we are ready to move back there. We encourage people to contact Hong Kong Alleycat’s Michelle for adopting cats and we are sure Michelle will be able to help out a lot.

Creating your own masterpiece - Canvas Art

As I have an obscene amount of photos at home, I thought I could start putting some of them to good decorative use (particularly the animal ones). I never get bored at looking of my animal photos (or anyone's) and spend most of the day looking at them on my phone anyway.

After seeing on TV how easy it is to turn your favourite photos into wall art (don't you just love home edition makeover), that I thought that it might be a good idea to generate some extra funding for the pussycats.

I will be posting more details and samples of some canvas art that I am having made myself for you to have a look at shortly once they arrive (so watch this space).

If you would be interested in having some of your favourite photos turned into fabulous canvased wall art, then please get in touch with me to start ordering.

All you need to do is send over a high res image over to me with the dimensions that you are looking to have printed and your delivery address which will take approximately 1 week to process.

If you are like me and can't afford to spend thousands on any type of art, then this is really a personalised inexpensive way to showcase your photos and give some life to your bare office & home walls.

I've also realised that with the digital camera age rife nowadays, who really prints out any of their photos? All your fabulous photos end up getting lost on your hard drive, or you use all your computer memory. So hopefully this will encourage people to have a look through their albums and get some of their favourite photos on display, and don't forget the proceeds will go towards the hefty medical expenses that are ongoing in order to help more abandoned animals in need.






If none of your photos jump out at you enough in order to get them printed, don't worry as I will be providing an album link with photos for you to choose from (coming soon!).

For more information how to order the canvas and size dimensions, please contact canvasart@hkalleycatwatch.com or call 93100744.

If you have an image that you would like to process immediately, you can upload the image to this link:


QUICK IMAGE UPLOAD, CLICK HERE

Pricing Guideline:

Dimensions/ Prices
12x16 - HKD400
16x24 - HKD600
20x30 - HKD800
24x36 - HKD1000
30x40 - HKD1,200

* $50 delivery (within Hong Kong).

Please note the quality will depend on the resolution of your digital file.

Your Digital Camera
2 Mega Pixel 8x12"
4 Mega Pixel 12x16"
5 Mega Pixel 16x21"
6 Mega Pixel 20x26"
7 Mega Pixel 24x32"
10 Mega Pixel even larger...

Place your orders now and help us with our ongoing medical expenses!

http://hkalleycatwatch.com/

Adoption Drive for this Weekend

Our Adoption flyers for this weekend, please help us circulate and distribute to your animal loving friends. See you on Sunday, 24 January 2010!

Herbie

I decided to dedicate this blog to Herbie. My Herpes virus kitten, I call him kitten but he is now 10 months plus old. He is such a love, he bounds around the flat, sneezing everywhere. His sneezes aren't snotty, but they are pretty loud!

He came to me in March, he was about 4 weeks old, he looked fine, I should have known better. I had a nursing mum, Jazz at home and I thought she would be able to cope with one more, as she had only given birth to 3 kittens of her own.




Herbie at his worst around 6 weeks old. I've never seen as much puss and blood spurt out of a kittens eye. Even the vet was completed shocked. I was extremely surprised his eyes were still there after seeing projectile puss & blood coming out.


Unfortunately within a week all the kittens and mum came down with herpes. Herbie seemed to be affected the worst, so the vet and I assumed that he was the carrier. It's hard to say, i hate to place blame. Of all the litters of kittens I had, I really should have known better than to introduce him straight away. I'm not sure what possessed me, but I did (which was the wrong call). Either way, he could have ended up in the same condition (but wouldn't have passed it on), so I feel slightly responsible as Jazz and her kittens would have been fine if I hadn't of introduced him straight away without quarantining him. Anyway to cut a long story short, I had one fatality, another orphan who came in who was much smaller, he was the 5th kitten. The rest all survived included Jazz and apart from sneezing they are fine. Herbie unfortunately is another story, I'm having to keep a close eye on his "eyes". I've been to the clinic and it had seemed at that time his eye had possibly ruptured, so I discussed with the vet about having his eye removed, which would stop it weeping and perhaps make him more aesthetically pleasing for rehoming. I wish I wasn't so cynical sometimes, I don't pretend to know about medicine or more than a vet. I just know cats, I spend enough time with them, day in and day out. I am optimisitic for Herbie, and I do believe that he has sight in both eyes at the moment, however limited and fingers-crossed he's not at the eyeball removal stage just yet.

I didn't want to make such hasty decision with his eyes, which I may have done in the past (i.e one of my permanent foster cats Callie). I know he has some vision and really just wanted to wait. The following week his eyes seemed to be a little better, so I'm actually relieved I didn't get his eye taken out straight away. I just personally think that removing an animals eye or anyone's eye is huge decision that shouldn't be taken so lightly ...god gave us one set of eyes, it's something that you can never replace once they are gone. Sight and smell to any being is so important. Although blind cats can adjust well as they still have a keen sense of smell, but taking out a cat's eye to me is something that curls my stomach.

So we'll continue treating him with anti-viral medicine and drops, which at $400 a bottle for the anti-viral turns out to be an expense medication. It would be okay if it actually showed some results, but at this moment, I've not noticed that it really has made much of a difference. He's on lysine from Nature's Health & the Olive Leaf extract. He's easy to give pills to, but doesn't seem to like eating canned food as much, so we're sprinkling the lysine & Olive leaf extract into the general bowl of biscuits so all cats will be getting a dose.

Me and Herbs are holding out that there is someone special out there who will see that beyond all this caffufle is an extremely loving, hilarious one of a kind kitty and he is worth all of this. I just wish he didn't have to go through this. But honestly if Herbie could talk, he would tell us that he's the happiest of kitties. The fact that it hasn't affected his appetite leads me to believe this is true. As unhappy kitties will stop eating if they are in pain or discomfort. That's generally a tell-tale sign.



If someone decides they would like to adopt Herbie, I will be over the moon, but to be honest they would have to do alot of convincing that they could love Herbie as much as we do!!

Success Stories

Some of our favourite animal photos sent in by their new families. Lucky animals finding homes and many more still needing homes..

We first set eyes on our black ball of fur with white socks at the Little Princess adoption day. Tuxedo was the first cat we saw that day, and the one we eventually left with. He was so sweet and docile, he really was the only choice. And the adorable drawing of him done by Hayley, his previous owner, helped, and it now hangs on our fridge!

We brought him home and he immediately ran for cover under the bed. We didn't expect to see him for the next few days but, to our surprise, he was roaming the flat a few hours later. It only took a few days for him to get affectionate and a few days more before he started cuddling us to sleep.

Now we can't imagine being without him, not being welcomed home by him after a long day at the office or having him to warm up the bed on cold winter nights.
****

Michelle & David (Andy) Knight (罗安祖)

Brandy

George

Monty

Lizzie

Lizzie is a true sweetheart and such a personality. She is so lovable and such a fighter, even after major surgery she has fought through and her personality shines. She wakes up enthusiastic every morning and she follows me everywhere I go. She is a very vocal cat and will talk to anyone whether following you round the house or sitting on your lap. She loves to have cuddles and kisses and will sit on your lap upon request if you sit on the sofa she will be on your knee in a matter of seconds. If you give her any kind of fuss she will be happy to return the favour and will begin grooming anything in sight and enjoys to play fetch like a dog. She is a truly special little cat.