You might notice that Big B is BIG. Not only BIG, but FAT. Big B was rescued from my grandmother's apartment complex. He was a little stray kitten that was headed toward the pound. Big B is a great cat. He hunts mice and rats and is very friendly. He is the ideal barn cat and once was a slim trim rat-killing machine.
Well, until we adopted Little T. Little T was one of four tiny black kittens who were abandoned when some neighbors of my parents moved away. Their mother was dead (killed by some animal) and they lived under a gas grill on the back porch.
I went to feed them one day while visiting and three of the kittens (female), were feral, yet Little T ran up to me and begged for food. I had to take him home. When my husband saw him the next morning, cuddling on my lap outside, he said "Not another black cat! Why couldn't you adopt a pretty one?". And it was true, Little T was anything but pretty. He was tiny, starved, and his coat was very dull.
I bought Little T the best kitten chow and his coat grew silky and he wasn't little anymore. However, Big B enjoyed snacking on the kitten food and he grew fatter and fatter... I tried to feed them separately, but you know how cats are, they like to nibble and come back, and Little T's leftovers all went to Big B.
I decided to separate them a few weeks ago and not keep food out after a few minutes. Strangely, Big B kept on getting bigger, and Little T was getting smaller... I was completely stumped. Perhaps the neighbors were feeding Big B? Or he has some type of metabolic disorder?
Well, yesterday I solved the case. I was in the outside workroom (the cats sleep there at night) and noticed that they had knocked down stuff from the workbench. As I was putting it away I noticed a cabinet door was ajar. I opened it and found this:
Yes, a 7 lb bag of dry cat food I had purchased a few weeks ago and had forgotten about. And it was almost empty... Big B had found my stash and had been helping himself for weeks. And growing fatter and fatter...
Mystery solved, and now all food is safely locked away and Big B is on a diet. I noticed that he had knocked some stuff down again from the workbench while trying to find his kitty all-you-can-eat buffet. And he did seem a bit grumpy today. And strangely enough, he seemed hungry. ;-)
