Duckling-gate.............

How much panic could one cat cause? An awful lot, I can tell you! Having a friendly, curious, roamer for a pet kept us on our toes constantly, and even having him neutered made no difference what so ever. I was under the impression having the 'operation' would calm Jonesy down....did it heck! Cats have a particular yowl which all cat owners know means a 'present' is being deposited in a place you would definitely rather it wasn't. We got used to headless bodies being found in the garden from time to time, but 'duckling-gate' was the start of weeks of stalking Jonesy to see where he was going. Our house is fairly close to a river. By that I mean it is around 500 meters away in a straight line. Cats cant be bothered to follow pavements and roads, but simply weave their way across fences and gardens directly to the spot they are aiming for. In Jonesy's case the spot he aimed for was the river....with it's abundance of fascinating things for him to stalk! The first inkling we had that he had been down the river, was when Jonesy returned home one day after his foray into the unknown (well, the unknown to us). He was smothered in a muddy, black gunk which smelt marginally of fish. I must admit we laughed and thought he had tried to catch something and slipped into the river......thinking back about it we should have been worried, but he looked like some punk cat with his fur sticking up in all directions so we just thought it was funny! Finding a ducking running around the garden squeaking, while a cat bats it with a large paw is not so funny. Jonesy did precisely this in the weeks following. It was spring, and ducklings were being born, and Jonesy found out that they could be caught pretty easily, or at least he must have because we ended up with loads. There would be that yowl......one of us would run to the garden......Jonesy would have a duckling in his mouth.....the duckling would play dead....we would tell Jonesy he was wonderful while creeping up to him.....he would drop the duckling....it would come to life.....the duckling would run.....Jonesy would bap it.....one of us would chase them both round the garden.....eventually one of us would get the duckling *phew*. Jonesy would always lose interest pretty quick at this point, and go off and wash himself in the sun, leaving us to place the duckling in a box and cart it off to a wonderful lady who lived in Southbourne. This lovely lady took in hurt birds, orphan birds, all sorts and nursed them. We got to know her very well as a procession of ducklings made it to her house. Unfortunately, if none of us were home the duckling would meet an unfortunate end, meaning a disgusting mess for my husband to clear away, but on the whole we learnt to run when he yowled!! Obviously Jonesy had a particular route back from the river which involved going past people's houses, as one day he came home (without a duckling) with a note attached to his collar. The note said "did you know your cat keeps catching ducklings". Hmm mm yes we did, who are you, shall we attach an answer to Jonesy's collar and why not give us your telephone number? We never did reply as most of the ducklings Jonesy brought home survived, but to this day we have no idea who wrote the note.............