“He came as a feral barn cat. He wasn’t handleable AT ALL. Even if you offered him wet food, he would attack you. The vet had to vaccinate him through the wires of a kennel. We kept him in a large kennel area so we could get him used to living with people. We’re on an acreage so we didn’t want him to just run away. It took about a year or 14 months for anyone to actually be able to pet him. Never mind anything more. And only certain people could pet him. We just kept working with him. Eventually we let him out to be an outdoor cat.
We learned he’s not very intelligent when it comes to dogs. There are coyotes around here and dogs that we board that don’t necessarily like cats, but he would go into puppy classes and just watch. He’d approach any dog. For his safety we decided he should be indoors and outdoors.
Picking him up was still impossible. But I was determined, so I started picking him up so his legs were far away from me. I’d hold him under his armpits and scratch behind his neck. It didn’t take long, he would literally start to relax, fall asleep, let his shoulders relax so much that I was almost dropping him. Then I started to cradle him like a baby. Now I can toss him up in the air and catch him like you do with a baby. It’s just mind-blowing how far some feral animals can come over time.”
Scratchy aka Scratchington, Mr. Scratch, Scwatchy
Our Quirky Critters 