Remember the feral cats I was just introducing yesterday?

Well, I got home yesterday evening and discovered these on my porch:

Little wet babies

Yes, Magic Chef decided to have her kittens on a slatted porch three feet off the ground.

One of the kittens had fallen off when I found them and was laying on the ground, crying, so I picked it back up and set it with Mama. In other news, Magic Chef can now be called Magic, because she not only let me handle her newborn kittens, but she also walked up to me and asked to be pet. I guess the hormones have made her no longer a jerk!

I stood by the edge of the porch for a while and watched the babies to make sure they didn't fall off. She dried and cleaned one of them really well, but the one that had fallen was still soaked.

So defenseless

I was worried, and I still am a little, because this is her first litter. But, she purred and talked to them, so hopefully instinct will take over.

You can do it!

Eventually I went inside to change out of my heels from work and into my boots, and when I came back out, Magic and one of her kittens were gone. I waited a few minutes, and she came back and carried off the other one. I later discovered that she had stashed them in the insulation up under my house, which is pretty clever if you ask me. Although that probably needs to be fixed when the kittens are no longer using it.

She seems to be keeping an eye on them- I walked over with a flashlight to peer up into the hole and see if I could see them, and she walked over to see what I was doing- and she got in with them while I was standing there because one was crying. They are just so tiny! I want to intervene and bring them inside where they are protected, but I know that she is the best thing for them. It's hard to stand back and let nature take its course.

Before Magic moved them, Romeo discovered them when walking back from his bathroom break. He was so concerned; he could hear them crying and was trying to reach where they were so he could see and smell them. I obliged him by letting him jump up so I could hold him and let him see, but he couldn't get to them.

"Are these mine?"

The female cats love him so much that they didn't care at all that he was so close, not even when he got up on the porch and walked as close as he could get to them.

Hopefully in a few weeks the kittens will reemerge as healthy, playful babies. And hopefully, since their moms trust us, we can win them over quickly and then maybe find them homes when they are of age. And then, if everything goes according to plan, we'll be able to get Magic and Lexi spayed and hopefully have no more kittens. Maybe Juan Pablo, as well. There are so many generations living at my landlord's house across the pond that it's only a matter of time before another cat works its way over.