Our Scary Wildlife Encounter

Four years ago, we bought our house on almost 6 wooded acres. It has absolute heaven for me. I love living among nature and sharing my home with all kinds of wildlife. Until that wildlife endangers my cats. Then, the wildlife needs to find a new place to live. Last summer, we had a sad encounter with a fox with distemper that was hanging around and threatened my cats. This past weekend, it was a mommy coyote and her puppies UNDER the Cat House! It was a very stressful 3 days of our scary wildlife encounter.

Early Clues

I discovered the mommy coyote on Saturday morning, but after thinking back over things that happened over the days prior, I realized that there had been clues that something was up. Clues that I brushed off or didn’t make the connection. On Thursday morning, when I was in the Cat House feeding breakfast, I heard some rustling under the Cat House. The cats that were already on porch came running back inside and up into their loft area. I thought it was my little opossum buddy that had been hanging around and who I had seen going under the Cat House a few nights before.

Friday afternoon, when I went out for the evening feeding, none of the cats were on their screen porch. Which is really unusual. Usually, they are all hanging out and meowing for their dinner. Upon entering, I noticed that not only were they all in their loft area again, but this time, hardly any of their breakfast had been eaten. Sadly, I was not able to investigate the situation any further at that point because I was on my way to teach the trap class for a spay/neuter clinic. I did communicate with them and asked what had them so freaked out. I received an image of a dog as the response. It made sense. We have dogs in the neighborhood, and some have gotten loose on occasion. I did not make the connection at that point.

Sighted Proof

Saturday, I went out to feed breakfast around 8 am. Everything was normal. The cats had eaten all of their previous night’s food. They went onto their porch as I was preparing their breakfast. None of them freaked out, but I did notice that they were looking around and a few seemed a little bit on edge. I left them to do their morning routine and went back into the house to do mine. About an hour later, as I was leaving to run some errands, I noticed the cats were not on their porch. This is highly unusual. They absolutely love being on their porch. As I was pulling around the driveway, I noticed a coyote beside the cat house, as if it had just come out from underneath. At that moment, some pieces of the puzzle started fitting.

It wasn’t until that afternoon before everything began to click into place. When my husband got home, we began working around the Cat House. We slacked this past fall/winter in keeping up the leaves and tree debris from piling up and gathering under the Cat House. This had created a nice bed of leaves. As we worked in blowing out the leaves from under on one side, the coyote came running out from the other side. She had been under there the whole time we were working around the house. And the final piece clicked. She had puppies under the Cat House! Now, how do we remove her and the pups without causing any harm?

Happy Ending

Once we confirmed there were puppies, we started looking for someone who could help us out. Oddly, most wildlife places are closed over the weekends. We were able to connect with someone who was very helpful over the phone being that it was now dark, and he wouldn’t be able to come out to the house until Monday. About 30 minutes after we stopped working, I saw the mommy pacing in the woods behind the Cat House. I communicated with her that I really needed her to move her babies to somewhere that was safer for everyone involved. Once darkness fell, we heard her moving around and I knew she was in the process of moving her pups. Exactly what I wanted her to do.

Sunday went by incident free. The cats were not allowed porch access until I came home from cat clinic, and I could keep a watch on the area around their house. They are only allowed porch access during the day. Once night falls, they are locked securely inside their house. We checked under the house and could not see nor hear any puppies. The man who had helped us over the phone on Saturday evening came by on Monday and confirmed that she had moved on. He checked to ensure that all pups were removed. I appreciate that she considered our home a safe place to have her puppies. However, I am happy and relieved that she made the decision to move them somewhere safer. The joys of sharing your home with wildlife.

“True compassion is showing Kindness towards animals, without expecting anything in return” ― Paul Oxton