We got a cat last fall, because we have mice and I needed a way to get rid of them – traps had not worked and I didn’t want to use poisons.  I found our cat’s picture on a website for a local shelter, and they said he was good with dogs, other cats, and kids.  He is great with my son, but he hates other cats (I found out at the vet’s office) and he is deathly afraid of my dogs.  We named him Wizard, and he lives in the upstairs of our house.  He stays up there because the dogs are downstairs.   My son Daniel added “the Purrface” to his name – Wizard the Purrface.

The shelter said he was found in the woods near someone’s camp. They kept him with them while they were there and then dropped him at the shelter when they left to go home.  They told the shelter he was great at catching mice at their camp.  Since I’ve had him, he’s been an excellent mouser, and we no longer have mice upstairs.  He sometimes leaves us little “gifts” on the floor as proof of his hunting skills.  It turns out one of my dogs can catch mice downstairs, so that helps the downstairs mouse situation.

I’ve kept him inside since we got him, because at first I was afraid he may run away, and since he’s afraid of the dogs I didn’t think he’d come back inside.  He is a big lovey-dovey though, and he loves us a lot (or at least loves us petting him),  so I figured he would come back to us if I let him outside.  He has his claws and his rabies shots, so he is relatively safe outside unless he runs near the road.  This weekend it was beautiful out, with sunshine and temps in the 70s, so we brought him outside – I had to carry him past the dogs, him clinging onto me for dear life, till we got out the door.  Then he immediately wanted down.

He did really well outside, wandering around checking out the woods near our house.  My son followed along to see what he was doing.  Daniel was afraid he’d try to run away, but I told him that if Wizard wanted to run, he’d would have run immediately.  He kept coming back to get petted and then wandering away again.  I let him outside for about an hour on Saturday, and then a few hours on Sunday while we were out doing yard work.  Our yard is pretty mucky from the snow melting, so there were big chunks of the yard he avoided, but I think it will be nice this summer for him to come out while we’re outside.  If he can ever get over his fear of the dogs, so he would come in on his own past them, I would just let him be “inside/outside,” but for now he is just going to come out while we’re doing work outside.