The Great Sicilian Cat Rescue (15 page)

‘Cats do this to deposit facial pheromones on people or objects in their environment,’ Dr Meghan Herron, professor of animal behaviour at Ohio State University, is quoted as saying. ‘The head butting is actually something that we call bunting.’

People assume that it’s a sign of affection or acceptance into the feline’s domain but, according to Dr Herron, bunting is a little more complicated.

‘Rather than territorial marking or “claiming” someone, as is commonly thought, cats do this to mark something as safe… leaving a signal of comfort and safety; so you could think of it as a sign that they are “trusting” that person or environment.’

When your cat comes face-to-face with you and bunts or rubs, enjoy it! It’s the next best thing to a kiss on the cheek.

If only we humans could be so unaware of time passing, of this enjoyment of the moment without the knowledge that life will end.

That afternoon I turned away in tears and went out into the sunshine feeling helpless that I could not save that dog. It brought home the terrible cruelty of some people towards animals and underlined why we were there.

When I related the incident to Guy, later on, he agreed with Dorothea that it had been the only outcome.

‘We have to learn to differentiate between companion animals whose owners are prepared to nurse and medicate them,’ he explained. ‘It’s harsh, but true that unless a feral animal has a problem that can be treated with first aid they can’t be helped with anything more serious. The criteria has to be quality of life and that may come down to putting them to sleep.’

Our only other casualty was a cat, which escaped and went under a car. Less serious but annoying, someone stole one of Dorothea’s traps and one of my expensive crush cages.

I was finding these sessions very stressful. The incident with the dog preyed on my mind and I saw again and again that ghastly sight; I was also having difficulty dealing with the team. According to both Dorothea and the German couple, every animal, no matter how young, must be neutered. It upset me when I saw tiny kittens being given an anaesthetic. Surely they were not sufficiently formed to withstand it? When I was out on a cat-catching trip, I deliberately didn’t bring in these little ones. One day I went into a rickety old building and found a mother cat with kittens. They were right next to a road, where cars passed all the time. The
German couple managed to catch them and I argued with them and so a coolness developed between us.

When the spaymobile and its team left once more for the ferry, although grateful to them for volunteering their time, I waved them off with a tinge of relief.

E
lke invited me to a lunch party at her house and it felt good to exchange my work clothes, jeans and T-shirt for a dress and jacket. It was 11 November and Taormina was enjoying a Saint Martin’s summer. Autumn is no sad affair in Sicily; leaves linger on the trees and it is warm enough to swim. Against an azure sky veiled with wisps of cloud, the pale globes of lemons ripen for the second or third time. Saint Martin, the brave and the good who cared for the underdog and sought social justice, is a fitting name for this season. Summer has not spurned us, merely divided its bright cloak and is saving some for later.

Autumn is also the time of the
vendemmia
, the harvesting of the grapes for wine. Years ago, some friends invited me to join them.

We were up before the sun to drive to Francavilla, close to
the northern slopes of Etna. From there we left the car and rode on sure-footed mules along steep and rocky paths into the mountains. I remember the sun-dried skins of a group of women we came across; their hair bound up in scarves, full skirts spread about them. They were having breakfast, they said, would we like to join them? Sicilian hospitality demands you accept. The bread had been baked in an old open oven, the cheese was made from the milk of mountain sheep; heavenly flavours eaten in the open air, washed down with country wine. Nine on
vendemmia
morning and we were already tipsy. But then it was down to work. If I’d been led to believe I was invited as spectator, I was mistaken: an extra pair of hands was welcome.

You take a sharp knife and bend double over the vines to clip each bloomy bunch of grapes until your basket is heaped high, then carried away and emptied into a large canvas sack. My teacher was a girl called Antonia, who was about fifteen years old. She had left school to work in the country. Soon they would be picking the lemons again, she told me.

The grape gatherers sang as they worked, one then another taking up the tune of a traditional
vendemmia
song.

When the last sacks were carried away we made our way back to the farm. Here, in a stone outhouse heady with the scent of fruit, the men trod the grapes emptied from our baskets and sacks. With their trousers rolled up to the knee and legs stained purple with juice, they tramped solemnly round, hour after hour, ignoring the hordes of buzzing wasps. Meanwhile, the crimson liquid trickled into the vats to ferment and become the new wine of the year.

When I walked once again through Elke’s garden I saw
long tables were set in the sunlight. With her sense of occasion, she had decorated the trees with coloured lanterns and set the tables with flowers and wine. I spotted Stellario, an old friend, chatting to Ross, who was on a visit from America. Another guest, Mariella, told me she was psychic and said I would write a book – ‘When you decide where you are going to live, England or Sicily’. Conversation ranged over many topics but by tacit agreement Elke and I stayed away from the subject of felines.

The cats were there, of course, slinking round the tables, fascinated by the scents of so much food. I felt the sun warm on my face and, taking up my glass, savoured the robust Sicilian wine. For a while at least, I put the events of the past week out of my mind.

Later, while her guests strolled about the garden in twos and threes, Elke and I were alone.

‘Have you heard from Dorothea?’ she asked.

‘Not yet but they can scarcely have got back to Naples.’

‘It went well, she is so efficient.’

‘Yes, but…’ I hesitated, remembering the strains of that week, my loss of confidence and a growing doubt as to whether I was right in what I was doing. It all came pouring out: how anxious I had felt, the difficulty of going along with the mission, neuter at all costs, even the attitude of the two volunteers.

‘I found it very difficult this time, Elke,’ I told her. ‘And I got very upset over the age of some of those kittens operated on. I’m not sure I’m cut out for this work – perhaps I’m not tough enough.’

A grey cat had strolled up and Elke bent down to stroke it.
‘I understand what you say, it isn’t easy what we do. We don’t start out tough but we can learn,’ she replied.

I remembered then what she had told me on another occasion. We had arranged to meet for lunch and were sitting on the terrace of La Marina, a little restaurant near the cable-car station.
Bruschetta
had been brought to us, that delicious appetiser of grilled bread topped with olive oil, basil and chopped tomatoes. It is believed the dish originated in ancient Rome when olive growers, bringing their olives to the local press, would toast slices of bread to sample their freshly pressed oil.

Elke described her latest project, working as an exporter of olive oil and other Italian products.

‘You’re very enterprising,’ I noted.

‘I have learned to be a survivor – I’ve worked since I was fifteen and, don’t forget, we lived through the Second World War,’ she told me.

‘How did you come to be so involved with animals?’ I asked her.

‘When I was living in Italy, my mother called me from Germany and asked me if I would like to have a well-trained shepherd dog. I agreed and some weeks later I owned Ajax, a really fantastic, fun dog. He had had an excellent training and listened and obeyed many commands. He could even fake being dead and on command wake up again. From then on this dog was always with me and slept in front of my bed. He was thirteen when he died.

‘From then on I always bought trained shepherd dogs in Germany and brought them to Sicily to Villa Pace, Messina and Isola Bella, Taormina. I had very nice doghouses built
for them, but the big problem was the heat in summer, also there was no branded dog food available as we have today. The dogs suffered a lot. I would not do it again unless they could live in an air-conditioned home in hot weather. Some females had puppies and suddenly I had fourteen dogs, a cat, a gibbon monkey and a beautiful English Weimaraner. I had my hands full, you can imagine.

‘When we sold the villa in Messina, the new owners asked me to leave the last three dogs as watchdogs there. I always sent money every month for their food. Later on, I heard that one dog had died, which made me suspicious. I went from Rome, where I now lived, to our ex-villa in Messina. Nobody was living there but I knew how to get into the big park. No dogs! Then I remembered the place where they would hide, when they did not feel well: a large underground space. I went and called them. After a while they came slowly out of their hiding place. When they recognised me they started to cry bitterly and I could not believe what I saw, two skeletons without hair and their skins crusted by ticks and fleas. I caressed them and took them into my old bathroom, washed them with anti-parasite liquid, dried them; I put them in my car and drove back to Rome, where they slowly recovered and became beautiful again. Nero lived to be fifteen and Sabbia until he was seventeen years old.

‘But living in a flat with two big dogs was not easy, not for them nor for us. So I decided after they passed away to have cats in future, and we got our first black Persian from Germany; his name was Flory. During the flight to Rome that tiny little thing managed to sneak out of his basket and suddenly there came an announcement from the captain over
the loudspeaker: “We have a little black cat in the cockpit. Would the owner please come here and pick it up?”

‘Swiftly, my young daughter, Adriana, obeyed. Thank God the captain wasn’t superstitious about black cats, as are some Italian passengers!

‘When we rented the house in Taormina, I remarked to my daughter that I would like to have a garden full of cats. And that is exactly what happened. One day there were five hungry cats in front of my door. Of course I gave them food but, at that time, I had no idea that feral cats should be caught and sterilised. Suddenly I had fifteen cats, later on twenty and then about thirty. At that point I asked vets who were friends what I should do. We started to catch them with traps so that they could be neutered and it worked. Now, after many years, I still have about thirty cats but all “done” and looking fine. Of course sometimes I get the surprise of a pregnant new cat, which delivers her babies in my garden. Meanwhile, together with some friends, we are managing the whole neighbourhood and its feral cats. We feed about a hundred cats and check on their health. Lots of time and money are needed! But when I complain a bit, Adriana says: “Mummy, you once said you wanted many cats and God heard your wish and gave them to you.”’

Elke’s guests were calling to her. She signalled she would join them and then turned back to me with her lovely smile.

‘Don’t worry, Jenny, whatever any of us do for these animals, we do with love and their best interests at heart.’

E
very year, I added more news to my website of Catsnip’s progress. As time went by, I received an increasing number of emails from animal lovers visiting Sicily, who had found Catsnip. Several of them were concerned about dogs, too. One of these was Christine:

I didn’t know how to reply to this – my work so far had been on the eastern side of the island and I had no contacts in Trapani. However, a few days later, I had an email from Susie telling me of her visit with her friend Esther to Cefalù on the northern coast. Here, they had fallen in love with a little grey cat and had fed her. One evening she had brought one of her kittens to them. They wondered who would feed her when the hotel closed. Was it a very complicated process to adopt her and have her in their home? Always a ponderable question, it may seem a kindly act but, as with my experience in Letojanni, sometimes taking a cat away from her territory is not the best thing to do. When I realised what dedicated animal lovers they were, I told them about the Trapani dog and my sense of helplessness.

‘Don’t worry, we’ll find it,’ Susie replied. And they did. Their journey involved an heroic 400-kilometre (248-mile) round trip but, with Christine’s map, they located the dog.

‘He’s a Dalmatian,’ Susie reported. ‘He wagged his tail when we spoke to him. He seems to be known in the area. We’ve called him Tito. I don’t think he’s ill, though the claws do need to be cut.’

What next? I’d begun to create a database of local animal welfare contacts. One of these was the international organisation for the protection of animals, OIPA. Its primary aims, I learned, are to raise awareness of the correct care of animals and defend their rights, including a campaign to help feral animals, oppose hunting and any form of ill treatment. The group also collaborates with people in the medico-veterinary sector to abolish vivisection and promote medical research devoid of the use of animals as laboratory
guinea pigs. I contacted Raimonda, local delegate of OIPA for Trapani. When I spoke to her on the phone she told me she had gone several times to look for Tito. She, too, thought he was a neighbourhood dog. After a few weeks she wrote to me telling Tito’s story, except that the dog was a female and her name was now Dina.

Dina was found on the motorway in 2003 with an exposed fracture to her back leg and was taken to the Trapani Dog Shelter. Several weeks passed before she was operated on. Because of this delay, at the time of the operation the bone was already set, provoking another fracture, and it was necessary to use a metal rod to align the leg. The operation didn’t go very well because the bone was already fragile and for this reason it set badly. It was thought she would be liberated into the neighbouring territory, but then found preferable to put her in the shopping zone as a neighbourhood dog, considering her difficulty in walking and that here she would be loved, fed and cared for by all the residents. A young woman treated her with anti-flea and tick medicine and she explained to everyone the dog’s state of health.

After a few months, when she was sleeping under one of the parked cars, she sustained another injury. Fortunately, this time there was only bleeding and bruising, nothing serious and she was treated with antibiotics and medication on the spot. About four years ago, she was put back in the dog shelter because some fishermen noticed she had sores as a result of her considerable body fat. Dina was generally not very mobile. Everyone was feeding her so there was always available food under her nose and she didn’t need to make any effort. Taken to the vet, he found she had developed a
heart problem and he said she must slim down. She passed the summer in the dog shelter, where she was treated and stabilised then taken back to her place, where she was welcomed with affection.

Dina lived with two other friends, one called Neve who is still there, and another, Little Dog Moon, who in 2010 was skewered through the throat by the spear of a gate in a shop door. Having witnessed the death of her playmate, Dina is now isolated and hardly comes through the gate. For ten years she has lived by the sea and, for a dog, ten years is almost an entire lifetime.

‘Some people in Verona would like to donate a kennel for Dina and one for Neve. I have to speak to the town hall to ask authorisation and to position and fix them in place because someone might steal them. I hope to give you some positive news soon,’ Raimonda concluded.

Paolina found me on Facebook and wrote to tell me about her work with dogs: ‘I’d been working in Germany for a number of years and when I returned to Italy I was shocked by what I saw. I found myself confronting an extremely cruel reality – animals considered to be nothing, maltreated, poisoned, slaughtered and abused. This was the order of the day; also there were many starving dogs. In order to help them I have committed all my belongings, reducing myself to poverty, and obtained, as well, a marginalisation on the part of my countrymen. Because of this, my aim is to achieve a secure location where I can keep the dogs, make sure they have enough to eat, care for them and find good adoptive homes.’

Over the next few months she described the fight to achieve her dream. The family owned a piece of land but
she needed to raise enough funds to satisfy the authorities it would be built according to their regulations. At the same time, she waged a daily battle against hostile neighbours and animal cruelty.

‘I scarcely sleep,’ she told me. ‘At night I go to the outlying farms where there are starving dogs. And I am forever finding injured animals and female dogs, which have just given birth. Sometimes I feel so tired I don’t know how I can go on.’

In spite of all these difficulties, Paolina has built her refuge, thanks to the generous donations I was able to send to her.

Animal rights is the last bastion of morality; there are still so many people who do not recognise these creatures are sentient beings, just like us. The only difference is that they cannot speak our language. And because they can’t speak for themselves they undergo all kinds of cruelty and exploitation. We have to be grateful to those students of animal behaviour who are accepting that animals are feeling and thinking beings with complex emotional lives. They feel joy, love, pain, fear, anxiety, sorrow; they demonstrate humour too. The range of animal sentience that is now being recognised is astounding – rats who chuckle when being tickled and come back for more, turkeys who are so clever that they have been known to hold up heavy traffic in order to let their babies cross the road. Parrots are a whole amazing story in themselves: they have the emotional age of a toddler and the intelligence of a five-year-old child. They bond so deeply with either their parrot or human companions that parting and separation cause them great suffering, so much so that they have been known to stop eating and die as a result of this.

Mother Theresa of Dogs was a badly abused and neglected greyhound locked up and left to die. She was finally rescued and taken to an animal sanctuary, emaciated and shivering with fear. However, as time went by, she grew in confidence with the love and care she received and has ended up becoming the sanctuary’s resident surrogate mother. She welcomes all the new arrivals, providing them with the love and care their bruised souls so badly need.

I have always loved animals, especially the cat, this divine creature: a pygmy lion who loves mice, hates dogs and patronises human beings. Latest statistics from the Pet Population Report show that there are 8 million of them in British households – 17 per cent of the population shares its family with a cat. Worshipped or reviled in the past, there is no doubt about it: felines reign over many of today’s households.

They have even usurped the selfie and taken command of the Internet, where photos and videos are concerned, according to research conducted by network Three. There is also a trend towards Social Petworking – with over 350,000 cat owners creating social media accounts for their feline.

A fifth of those who created an account for their cat said they’d done so because they felt their pet was more interesting than themselves, and 15 per cent share content in the hope their animal will become a viral superstar.

I have certainly noticed the increase in sharing funny or cute pet pictures online. Recently, I became addicted to the cartoon feline Simon. Thinking about it, however, I wonder what the object of all this attention feels about it. While dogs are natural comedians, tongues lolling, they often seem to be inviting us to join in the joke; cats take themselves far more
seriously. Theirs is a natural dignity and grace. If, for example, Sheba botches a leap from floor to counter top when I am opening her food, she seems to expect me to behave as if it hadn’t happened. Call this my imagination, if you like, but no cat of my acquaintance enjoys being made to look ridiculous.