Cat escapes carrier and travels 16 miles back home

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By Karen Harrison Binette

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Mama Kitty poses with veterinarian Kris Muscari

A barn cat who had never been off the farm before taking her first car ride to the vet escaped her carrier and walked the 16 miles back home.

Mama Kitty is a four year old barn cat who had never been away from her Arriola, Colorado home since she first appeared there as a kitten. Mama Kitty has had kittens, and those kittens were beginning to have kittens, so her owner, Nedra Wilson, decided it was time to trap the female kitties and take them to be spayed through a free spay program.

On August 15, Nedra trapped Mamma Kitty, placed her in a carrier and headed to the Dolores Animal Hospital, 16 miles away, where veterinarian Kris Muscari provides free spay surgeries in conjunction with a program offered by the Aspen Animal Shelter.

Mamma Kitty never made it into the building. She escaped the carrier as Nedra made the short walk from the car to the door and evaded capture. Nedra returned to the animal hospital at 11 p.m. that night and called for Mamma Kitty but felt sure the frightened cat would continue to hide after the neighborhood dogs began to bark.

 “When I called her, all the dogs in the neighborhood started barking, and I knew there was no way she was going to come to me,”  she said.

The animal hospital put out traps but they didn’t get Mamma Kitty either.

Five days later, Nedra was surprised to see Mamma Kitty back in place at home.

“I went out to feed one morning and there she was sitting up in the hayloft just looking at me,” she said.

“It’s amazing, they must have a natural GPS,” Nedra mused to a reporter, adding, “How did she cross the river or the highway?”

The river on Mamma Kitty’s presuumed route is the Dolores River, which she may have crossed via the Colorado Highway 145 Bridge. She is also thought to have had to cross  U.S. Highway 491.

Nedra summed it all up saying: “She’s a cool cat.”

Nedra took Mama Kitty back to the Dolores Animal Hospital, where she was spayed without any further excitement.

Read the full story in The Durango Herald.

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