Meet Fiddle

So this happened yesterday:

After much discussion, we decided that we would really like a house cat in addition to a barn cat. Smithy has become increasingly aloof this spring since we went on our April vacation. He only comes around at night for his food, and sometimes he’ll go a few days without coming around at all. I even tried enticing him with catnip and caught him in a Have-a-Heart trap to give him his tick meds, and though he stuck around on the patio and ate breakfast that day, he wouldn’t come up for a pat. He may change his tune when it gets colder again and he remembers the treats in my warm office, but he seems content to come and go as a barn cat should.

Trouble is, we kind of got used to the ultra-friendly barn cats of the past, so we decided we should have a house cat to dispatch the errant mouse and curl up on laps. 

So this is Fiddle. He’s an eight-month-old boy who was found in a feral colony, but who the rescuers thought was young enough and sweet enough to be socialized. They think he was probably born to an un-spade pet and left to fend for himself once he was weaned. 

He is pretty sweet and seemed keen on petting and treats in the shelter, though he hasn’t come out from under the benches in the piano room yet today. He has taken a lick of some chicken baby food off a spoon, which they said he especially likes, but that’s about it. We will continue to entice time with toys and treats until he warms up, but it could be a while.