Bob the Kitten

April 14, 2017 • 4:36 pm

Gayle Ferguson, a biologist at Massey University who’s hosted me for a day and a half, has fostered twenty-five stray or abandoned kittens, and hasn’t lost a single one: none have died and all have found loving homes. (You may remember her as the rescuer of Jerry Coyne the Cat.)

Her latest acquisition, number 26, is a four-week old male, a tabby, but one nearly lacking stripes. He’s a “pink tabby,” much like Grania’s beloved ex-cat Trinket. Gayle hasn’t named him yet, but I call him “Bob”.

Here are a few photos as we play with him and Gayle feeds him every few hours.

Bob wasn’t expected to live at first, as he was severely underweight, but now he’s doing pretty well and I have high hopes for his survival and adoption. Gayle has lots of experience tending sick and malnourished kittens.

At first he had a special cat formula and was fed from a bottle, but yesterday he graduated to special “kitten meat food” and ate from a syringe.

His first meat!

Bob on my knee:

Self portrait with Bob in a moving car:

Bob and I; I’m unkempt as I just woke up and haven’t had ablutions. This was taken about 15 minutes ago:

Isn’t he adorable? He’s just started playing.

29 thoughts on “Bob the Kitten

  1. My wife tried to rescue a brand new kitten several years ago but failed. A very hard and emotional task.

  2. That face! My heart melts. We lost our beloved Gus just a week ago (he was 18 years old) and I’m … I can’t find a way to finish that sentence.

    Thank you, Gayle.

  3. Cute as a button. Now, you have to do the cliche thing and put him in a tea cup for a formal portrait. 😎

  4. I can’t believe how incredibly tiny he is! How adorable! 🙂 Thank you for sharing and thank you to Gayle for saving such precious little lives.

  5. Please be OK, Bob. Please be OK, Bob. Please be OK, Bob….

    Jerry, you’ll update on us whether Bob makes it, right? Right?

  6. Given Gayle’s track record, number 26 has a nice ring to it. It must be difficult to impossible to come up with unique names. Identifying the cats with a number also takes the pressure off, in case they don’t make it, which Bob seems well on the way to doing so.

    1. I don’t think the animal quarantine regulations coming to the US are nearly as dire as those for going to New Zealand. Otherwise, I’d be tempted to move to NZ with my dogs.

  7. That picture of Bob sitting on a glass table is so cute. Kitty paws squished on a glass surface (pictured from underneath of course ) needs to become an art form of it’s own for real!!

    Anyway, I hope that adorable baby finds a loving forever home!!

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