Cleo doesn’t wander too far from home these days.
Mere days after the six-year-old cat’s family moved into a new home by the Legion, Cleo escaped out the window and disappeared. That was last October.
After putting up posters of Cleo, canvassing their old neighbourhood by Whitesails Dr. and following up on all possible sightings, Sandie Paterson still had no luck finding her elusive cat.
That is until July, when Paterson’s old landlord at a different former home, in Eaglecliff, called to say she thought she’d spotted Cleo.
So Patterson went out to the Eaglecliff property on the water and set up a live trap.
“On the third day, we get a call before 7 a.m. saying, ‘The cat trap is sprung and we think there’s a cat in it.’”
They rushed down to the trap and lo and behold, it was Cleo. “I was just crying,” said Paterson. “It was relief, absolute relief to have her back and then wondering if she would be feral.
“But she wasn’t any of those things. She was the same loving cat she always was.”
“We brought her home and she was just so happy to be home,” said Paterson. There was lots of purring, headbutting and the cat was also very hungry.
Later that day, Paterson brought Cleo to the vet to be deflead and dewormed. She seemed to be a healthy cat.
After nine months gone, Cleo had lost only a pound.
“She’s a great hunter,” explained Paterson.
“Because she would be too shy to go to somebody…I’m sure she lived on mice and birds and whatever else she could find,” said Paterson.
By the time Cleo rejoined her family, they had already gotten another cat––Luna––and the two get along well. (Rocky, the family’s other cat, on the other hand, has his nose a bit out of joint that Cleo’s back.)
Though she hoarded food at first, Cleo’s appetite has returned to normal and she’s just one happy kitty.
