Today, Life With The Cat, Year 2.

The Cat and Ana were becoming accustomed to having humans around at feeding time and, although they were both still very feral in their behaviour, they were not as wary as they had been. They knew there was a routine to their feeds and this is something that remained important throughout the time we were looking after the cats.

Ana was maturing into a fine young man and had a strong bond with his mother; he was making his mark in the neighbourhood and working his way up the alpha-male ladder.

When The Cat had a litter of kittens in the field, Ana became their protector, in particular looking after Blackie (who was the runt of the litter), and making sure s/he got a fair share of the food.

The kittens were never around when The Cat and Ana were fed, but we were able to watch them in the field, and later in the garden when The Cat brought them for weaning.

The availability of food and water made the garden more interesting to the local feral cats and we started to see a few more passing through. The very first photo we took of a Visiting Cat was from this year – a solidly-built tabby cat with big paws who spent some time in the garden and looked completely at ease. The Cat seemed unbothered by his presence (we assumed it was a male) so maybe it was someone she had met out in the fields.

Slowly we were all getting used to each other and The Cat was realising that humans meant food.