Funny enough I was Thinking about that the other day......all those young cats are going to be a'courting.........
..you could be Grandfather to hunderds...
Within a week of buying my farm, I was on my back porch looking into the yard as my lathered beard was soaking. I see a long black haired cat walking behind the fence. It catches my eye and I do a double take. I see sonething hanging out of her butt It was a kitten!
That Momma cat was the best mouser anyone could ever ask for and she taught a few generations of kittens. I showed her mole mounds and she started hunting them. I kept her kittens on the screened in back porch. She could open and close the door, when not latched. She would bring in stunned prey and let the kittens 'play' with them at first. It was always interesting to watch the process.
I kept lots of cats for snake killing. The first two generations had quite a few encounters that I witnessed. No telling how many the did have. Outta that first gen, there was a BIG gray short hair that was fearless, but loved to be petted. I saw him walking the fence row, tracking something with his nose to the ground and face darting upwards. He lets out a calling meow and here comes 5 others along with Momma cat, that was her name too.
It looked like the Savanna in Africa and I was watching a pride of Lions stalking something. In this case, it was a 4ft copperhead. Good size for a copperhead. They made quick work of the snake, but not before it got big Tom on the nose. He swole up quite quickly on the top of his nose. It didn't look good for him. He came to me a day or so later. He had a big abscess. I gave him a pill the vet gave me to calm cats. I wrapped his ass up in a big beach towel, very tightly! OH JEEEEZE! The smell! I cleaned it up and applied medicine. About a week later, ya almost couldn't see much of anything happened.
The cats followed my tractor when I was shredding the pasture close to the house. They would kill the mice I scared up.
Lots of amusement overall the years.