Last week I was trimming a tree for a friend, and next to her is an empty lot that the owners never take care of....about once a year I pick the lot up and clear off any small trees, so the city worker can get a clear path with the bush hog. I often use the lot to pile brush I clear off from around town, then I burn it whenever a good time presents itself. This year I hadn't gotten to it yet, so another neighbor picked up most of the lot, then burnt off the tall grass. He left a spot smaller than 20 x 20....there was some large limbs laying it in, and I guess he didn't want to catch them on fire.
In that 20 x 20 area, I found 5 baby bunnies, two adult doves....who refused to leave the area, never did see their nest, but didn't try to hard...didn't want to disturb them...and one garter snake....the snake did not survive the encounter. I would assume there was prob a mouse or two living in the area as well, just didn't see any.
I live in a very small town, that is surrounded by vast areas of open farmland, with a tree line every so often, so wildlife is sparce....more live in town that out by far. I thought it was neat though that so much life existed in that tiny patch of grass that was less than a foot high.
This week, I found a litter of kittens in my shed....the mother had died, so my wife took them and she has been bottle feeding them. They are just now opening thier eyes, so they were just a few days old when I found them. If you have never done this...bottle feeding kittens....there are generally two problems, getting the hole in the nipple just the right size, and getting them to go to the bathroom afterwards. She has done this a few times, and this time was no different....at first we could not get the milk flow adjusted right, but after a solid nights frustrating attempts, things in the "in" department started to take off....it's pretty cute when they are that small...when they finally latch on and get some milk...their ears will twitch like crazy, I suppose mainly from the jaw motions, but it appears like they are doing it out of sheer happyness.
The "out" dept did not go so well, mothers will lick the bellies to induce the stool, our best way to duplicate this is with a wet cotton ball...usually does the trick but isn't very clean. Luckily this morning, one of our little rat terriers, decided that they were her babies, and she has taken over that aspect of the rearing. She has had two litters herself, one, her first was just a single pup...then her second litter was a full 5 pups. She is a very tough little mother, and is treating the kittens just as she did her own babies. All the other dogs are not allowed within two feet of her...it's pretty comical...we are keeping them in a pet taxi, and when my wife feeds them, she just leaves the door open and takes one out at a time....if any dog gets close, the mother flies out of the little box like a cookoo clock....takes care of business, then retreats just as quick as if she were loaded on a spring.
My wife has to put the fed ones into another box, to keep them straight...and once they majority of kittnes are out of the taxi, the mother moves into the box also. My daughter found another kitten, that had a piece of a very tough weed tied around a leg, so we also have that one in the care center as well...he/she is in another box, and one of our male terriers keeps guard over it...but he just licks it's head from time to time and mostly just stares at it.
