Armarkat Faux Fleece Deluxe Cat Tree

I got the coolest cat tree for my Gotcha Day. My gotcha day was actually last week, but my present didn't come until Friday. It's the Armarkat Faux Fleece Deluxe Cat Tree and Mom got it from Petco. It came in a great big box and Mom had to put it together.

It had so many pieces, I couldn't believe it! It even had the tools to put it together. The tree came with good directions, too.

It actually went together pretty quickly.

Of course I had to inspect all the pieces and snoopervise the construction.

Look at how cool this is. It's got 2 hidey holes for playing and sleeping. It's got ladders for climbing and lots of scratching posts. At the top there are three platforms. I'm getting two brofurs so it's perfect - we each get one!

I wasn't to interested at first. I didn't understand about climbing and how fun high places are. Then Mom rubbed catnip in one of the hidey holes and put treats in the top to make it more interesting for me to check it out. Once I climbed up to get the treats and play in the catnip, I saw how furry cool it was to be up high. Now I go up there without prompting cause I know how much fun it is. I'm a little nipped out in the first picture. MOL!

Look at my floofy tail hanging down. And my toes hanging out. MOL!

So that's my Gotcha Day present. I think it's a present for my brofurs, too, 'cause it's big enough for all three of us. Only two more weeks until they come. I still can't decide what to name them. I think I'm gonna have to live with them for a while first.

Oh, and Happy Howloween!

Anipal Photo Hunt #11: Trick or Treat!

The Pumpkin Daily Paper

I keep getting questions about the Pumpkin Daily Paper from pals who get mentions when the paper comes out each day. They want to know how they wound up in my paper? What did they write? What is the Pumpkin Daily?

The paper is produced daily by an app. You can sign up for your own paper at http://paper.li/. It takes links from your stream for the last 24 hours and consolidates them all in one place. I think this is furry cool. I don't get to spend near as much time on twitter as I like. I also have pals all over the globe that I follow, so lots of good stuff goes on when I'm sleeping. I don't get to see all their tweets, but the daily paper shows me what links, pictures, and videos my pals have posted in the last 24 hours.

I also like seeing other pal's papers. They have followers that I don't have and I can see the links and pics they're posting, too. And I meet new pals that way.

Sign up for your own paper and see what pals are tweeting about when you're asleep.

My Gotcha Day!

Happy Sunday everyone! Today's a very special day. It's my Gotcha Day! One year ago today I came to live with Mom, and it's been a fantastic year. I won't go into details 'cause you guys hear me brag on my Mom all the time, so you already know how spoiled and lucky I am.

I only got a small present, but good things come in small packages. And this package had my favorite treats - freeze dried shrimps! I may be getting something else. Mom was looking at the Petco website today. I wonder if she ordered anything?

It's also 3 weeks until the brofurs arrive. I guess I'm sort of looking forward to that. Mom's gone so much that it will be nice to have company and someone to play with.

The Lake with Petie book is half done, and looking pretty good if I do say so myself. I've heard from some pals that you want to add stuff to the book. Well get busy and get that stuff in to me or the book will be done. I'm hoping to finish it up next weekend. I'm gonna have a few pals look it over before printing to see if I left out anything important. I really want to have it done soon, so please get stuff to me this week. I think this book will not just be a great memory book of the fun we had at the lake, but also a good present for our humans for the holidays coming up. They can see what we do when they're not looking! MOL! And don't forget, the proceeds go to Duncan's Place, so it's for a good cause, too.

I have to apologize to @joeybeancat. I said I'd write about his howloween costume contest and then forgot and now the contest is over. I'm very sorry. *hangs head in shame* Please forgive me.

That's it for this Sunday. Love to all my pals!

Brofurs!

Cathy at Duncan's Place sent me pictures of the squirts that Mom's forcing on me. I guess they're kind of cute. I'll give them a chance. Do I have a choice?

The butterscotch one is named Peanut and the grey and white is Bob. I don't like those names, so I'm taking suggestions. Cathy said Peanut is a real daredevil and climbs everywhere already, so I'm thinking of calling him Evel Knievel, or EK for short. What do you guys think?

Introducing GREENIES® JointCare Treats for Dogs

I've never written about a product that I haven't used before this, but today I'm making an exception. I got an email today from GREENIES® about a new product for dogs. I thought I'd pass this info along because many of my doggie pals do have joint problems. I know this is especially true for big doggies. They get hip problems a lot. Since you're gonna get your doggies treats anyway, might as well buy treats that may help them feel better, too. Besides, who doesn't love GREENIES®?

What follows below is quoted in its entirety from the email. I've received no compensation for posting this info. The photo was provided by GREENIES®.

Introducing GREENIES® JointCare Treats for Dogs

A Nutritious, Tasty Way to Promote Healthy Joints for Life

Nashville, TN – October 21, 2010 – The GREENIES® Brand—makers of the #1 vet-recommended pet specialty dental chews**—has introduced GREENIES® JointCare Treats, designed to maintain dogs’ healthy mobility.

GREENIES® JointCare Treats contain Green-Lipped Mussel, a species indigenous to New Zealand. A very low incidence of mobility issues in natives, for whom Green-Lipped Mussel is a regular part of their diet, caught the attention of researchers. Applying that to dogs, The Waltham Centre for Pet Nutrition performed clinical studies that demonstrated that certain nutrients contained in Green-Lipped Mussel, including omega-3 fatty acids, vitamins E and C, glucosamine, chondroitin and other amino acids and minerals have a beneficial effect on canine joint health.

“Our philosophy as a company has always been to create treats for pets that have specific health benefits. We’re excited to bring the knowledge we’ve gained from being a leader in pet oral health and medicine compliance to the joint health category,” said Bradley Quest, DVM, product development veterinarian.

GREENIES® JointCare Treats help to protect the mobility of adult dogs of all ages and sizes by nourishing healthy joints. JointCare Treats are for daily use and should be given to pets as part of a complete joint health program that includes diet, exercise and, if needed, medications prescribed by the veterinarian.

GREENIES® JointCare Treats are available in two sizes for small/medium and large dogs at pet specialty products retailers and will be available in the coming months in many veterinary clinics.

# # #

About The Nutro Company

The Nutro Company is a leading manufacturer of natural* pet food products sold exclusively at pet specialty stores. The company has been making "The World's Best Pet Food" for more than 80 years and is dedicated to quality, excellence and innovation in dog and cat nutrition offering healthful formulas for every pet's life stage, activity level and size. The Nutro Company's family of brands includes MAX®, NATURAL CHOICE® dog and cat foods and ULTRA™ food for dogs in addition to the GREENIES® brands, which include the #1 vet recommended pet specialty dental chews** and PILL POCKETS® treats. For more information, please visit www.thenutrocompany.com and www.greenies.com.

*Natural fortified with added vitamins and minerals

*Among veterinarians that recommend dental chews/treats for at home oral care


®/™ Trademarks © The Nutro Company 2010

U.S. Pat. No. D614,830

Anipal Photo Hunt #10: How Annoying!

Mostly I like when Mom treats me like a baby. But there are limits!

Need I say more?

Sunday Musings

Happy Sunday everyone. Hope you all had fun at #pawpawty. I know I did. Had my first barktending gig, too. I lucked out. Everyone was so busy watching the Shibbering Cheetohs that it was slow. MOL!

Thank you all for your response to my last post. So far it's gotten 87 hits! That's a lot of hits for me. Duncan's place is just pawsome and I'm glad to spread the word about them. I hope some of you have given them a donation. They really need it. If you haven't, click on the badge on the right. It will take you to their donation page.

And speaking of Duncan's Place, Mom went up there yesterday to pay them a visit. Big mistake! She fell in love with 2 of the kittens and now I'm getting brofurs. That's right. Brofurs. TWO OF THEM! I'm gonna be outnumbered, so I better put them in their place real quick when they get here and make sure they know who's the boss kitty around here.

I don't know how I feel about this. On the one hand, it will be fun to have someone to play with while mom's out day hunting. On the other hand, now I have to share everything, including Mom's attention. I have to share my toys, my cute little red tent, and worst of all, I might have to share my pawsome stroller! It's very roomy inside, but I don't think it's big enough for three of us at once. I may have to draw the line at letting them in the stroller.

I don't have pics yet. I'll try to get pics from Cathy at Duncan's Place and put them up later. The kitties aren't coming to live with us for almost a month. One still need some tests and is still a little too young to come live with us. The other needs his mancat operation and they're gonna keep both until after that. Then they come to us.

Right now they're named Bob and Peanut, but we're thinking about renaming them. I'll ask for ideas for new names when I put the pics up.

It's a nice sunny day, so I think I'm going for a walk. Later!

Blog the Change - Duncan's Place

Pumpkin's Mom here. Pumpkin's letting me take over her blog for today.

I started this blog just for fun. It never even occurred to me that it would be anything other than fun. About the same time I started this blog I got involved in the Twitter Anipal community and started reading other pals blogs. I saw what others were doing with their blogs and with the connections they made through Twitter. I decided I needed to learn more about using social networking to help others and went to BlogPaws West 2010. I came away from BlogPaws determined to do what I could to help. I'm still going to have fun with my blog, but I'm also going to try to do some good with it.

I contacted some shelters letting them know I was looking for someplace to sponsor on my blog. It was amazing that none of the places got back to me. I finally had success when I contacted Duncan's Place. Duncan's Place is a cat sanctuary started by Cathy Campbell. They don't have a facility, so they foster cats in homes until they can adopt them out. Their mission is to make sure every cat in their community has home. I think that's a pretty awesome mission.

From Cathy: "Duncan's Place is named after my late beloved kitty. He was my first cat,and a lot of little furry lives owe a lot to him. Duncan was a Scottish Fold and was a rescue, too. I now have another Fold, Ainsley, who is also a rescue. The neat thing about Folds is that they can all trace their ancestry back to the same female Suzie, so Ainsley and Duncan are related."

I had a nice long talk yesterday with Cathy and asked her some questions. I was really curious about how she was able to run a successful cat sanctuary without a facility. It turns out she does manage to do it -  and quite well, too. Since 2008 when Duncans Place opened, they've rescued 133 and adopted out 113 cats. Not bad for a small operation with no building of its own.

Here are the questions I asked and her answers. Unfortunately I'm not great at taking notes, so the answers are all my paraphrasing and not direct quotes from Cathy.

Q: What happens to cats you can't place?
A: They stay in foster care until they're adopted. Sometimes they're adopted by the family that fosters them. None of the cats have ever been sent to another shelter because it couldn't be placed. They also try not to move the cats around to different fosters so the cats have nice, stable, comfy homes where they're cared for as part of the family until they find their forever home. Duncan's Place is a no-kill sanctuary, and cats stay in foster care until they find homes.

Q: Is the sanctuary how you support yourself or do you have another job, too?
A: Cathy is not supported by the sanctuary. She works as a vet tech and also as a massage therapist, both for humans and for animals. How she finds the time to run the sanctuary and coordinate supply distribution, listing the animals for adoptions, arranging adoptions, making sure all the cats are properly cared for, keeping up the website, getting donations, and doing all the other things that need to be done is amazing! I don't think I could do it.

Q: Do the fosters supply everything for the cats or do they get supplies from the Sanctuary?
A: Both. Duncan's Place has some extremely generous donors that give them lots of supplies. The foster parents buy some things themselves and the rest comes from the food and other items donated to Duncan's Place. These supplies are also distributed to families that need help feeding their pets and also to people helping to feed feral cat colonies.

Q: Do you find it's harder to get donations without a facility?
A: It's more difficult to get donations from the general public, but they've had some success getting donations from some corporations and some of the local businesses. Here is a list of some of the corporate donations they've received.

• Merrick Pet Food
• Avoderm Pet foods
• Drinkwell
• Bach's Flower Essences
• Catit Drinking fountains(Hagen pet company)
• Hartz
• Dr. Esley's Precious cat litter
• Idexx laboratories(FIV/FeLV/HWE tests)
• Home Depot(shed & cat enclosure)
• Lumber Liquidators(donated laminate flooring)
• Tiki Pet Products

That's a very impressive list for an organization that hasn't been around that long. And impressive as that list is, it still doesn't cover all the costs they incur. There's an equally impressive list of individual donors, but they still need help. Caring for so many cats and trying to help people in the community who need assistance caring for their pets takes a lot of resources.

Q: Is it hard to place the cats without a facility where people can just come and see them?
A: It is a little harder when people have to make appointments. On the other hand, people who make appointments are more serious about adopting. Out of 113 adoptions, only 3 cats have been returned. That seems like a pretty good track record to me!

Q: Would you like to have a facility someday?
A: Yes. Cathy would like to have a facility where the cats could be cared for in a cage-free environment. She doesn't want a large place, just a small one where the cats could get enough individual attention and be cared for in a loving environment until they find their forever homes.

I learned something about cats in foster care, too. Since they live as part of the family and interact with everyone in the household (including kids and other pets), they tend to adapt well to their new homes after adoption. I'd never thought about this before. All my cats came from friends whose cats had kittens, or were rescued from the street.

Duncan's place is about finding homes for cats. Sometimes that means helping families in distress keep their pets with them. This can be help with spaying or neutering, vaccinations, food and litter, or whatever else they can think of to keep cat and family together.

They also work with Northern Colorado Friends of Ferals. They help with the trap, neuter, release program. They've also taken in ferals that were young enough to socialize and helped them find homes.

Most of you already know about my first project to help the sanctuary - The Lake With Petie Memory Book. Pals have been sending me pictures, stories, poems, and memories to put in the book. The proceeds from the sale of the book will be donated to Duncan's Place. I was hoping to have the book finished by the end of the month, but I'm waiting for one of the contributors to come back from vacation, so the book may not be ready until November. I'm still taking submissions, so if you want to add anything DM Pumpkinpuddy and I'll send you the email address to send it to. Please remember that you must have the right to publish whatever you send me. We used a lot of cute stuff that was copyrighted for #lakewithpetie tweets. That's considered fair use. But since this book is going to be sold, we cannot use that stuff without violating copyrights, so be careful what you send.

I've also signed on with Sponsered Tweets. Watch for the hashtag #ad on my tweets. For every #ad tweet link that gets clicked, I earn money. All money earned from ad clicks will be donated to Duncan's place. (@Boriskitty is doing the same thing for the places he supports, so please click on links in his ads, too.)

Sorry this is so long. Now you know where Pumpkin gets if from! Check out the Duncan's Place website, and if you can, make a donation. You can find them at duncansplace.org. You can also find Duncan's Place on Facebook (Duncans Place).

Garden of the Gods, Manitou Springs, Pikes Peak

Treasure here. I got to go on another mountaintop adventure. Mom and her friend, Chris, took Stanley and me to Manitou Springs for the weekend. We only went overnight, but we got to see and do a lot!

We started out at the Garden of the Gods. This place has some of the most amazing rock formations you'll ever see. Stanley and I had a great time climbing rocks, hiding in trees, and seeing all the wonder scenery. There are walking paths all over the place. Many of the walking paths are wheelchair accessible. We only got to see a small portion of the park, but what we saw was incredible. Take a look.


When we arrived at the park, we saw an historical ranch right next to it - Rock Ledge Ranch. We decided to leave time to go to the ranch too. The ranch was having a festival with a pumpkin patch, a barn dance, house tours, musicians, and lots of other activities.


After the ranch closed, we still had some time before it got dark so we went up to Cave of the Winds. We didn't have enough time to tour the caves, but we did get some great pictures. The entrance is high up a cliff side and has quite the view.


Before going to the hotel, we decided to stop in town for a drink. We went to the Townhouse Lounge They had an outdoor area with beutiful flowers everywhere. They also have some cats that pretty much live there. Anyplace with cats hanging around was ok by us.

We stayed at the Towne Place Suites off Garden of the Gods road. The room was nice and clean. It had good amenities, in fact, more than we needed for just overnight. Rosemary was the person on duty. She recommended a great restaurant for dinner, and it turned out to be one Mom had eaten at 25 years ago with her sister! She didn't know it was still in business and was thrilled to find it again. The restaurant was The Mason Jar and the food was just as good as Mom remembered. Rosemary also recommended a place for breakfast - The Peak Grill. Mom had pancakes with her breakfast and they were very light and fluffy.

Our Sunday adventure was to take the cog railway to the top of Pikes Peak. But before we got on the train, we stopped to take pictures of Miramont Castle. It wasn't open yet, so we just pictures from the outside. Other people were taking pictures, too. One of them started asking Mom and Chris about Stanley and me. She thought the fact that we go on adventures with Mom and Chris was so interesting, that she was taking pictures of us, too, and taped Mom and Chris talking about our adventures. She was also interested in Pumpkin's blog. I'm sorry we didn't get her name. Ma'am, if you're this hello, and it was lovely to meet you.


Pikes Peak is another one of those places where there's no air. I don't know why Mom and Chris keep going to these places. I'm glad I don't need air cause there just isn't any at that altitude! The train ride up was lots of fun. The conductor told us about the history of Pikes Peak and the cog railway. Most people know Pikes Peak was named for Zebulon Pike. What most people don't know is that is was the same guy that started Simmons mattresses that built the cog railway! A trip on the Pikes Peak cog railway also inspired Katherine Lee Bates to write 'America the Beautiful'. After taking the trip I can understand why. You can see for hundreds of miles in every direction and truly see the beauty of the surrounding landscape. It's always amazing to go above treeline and watch the trees get shorter and shorter until they disappear all together.

We got to see lots of fall color on the ride up and down. I saw a marmot, but it hid before Mom could get a picture. We saw some of the old water tanks from the days of steam engines. On second thought, I do know why Mom and Chris keep going to the places they do. It's always interesting and always beautiful. The more places I see in Colorado, the more I'm glad I live here.


I know this post is a little long, but we did a lot of different things on this trip. Until the next trip, this is Treasure saying Happy Travels!

Anipal Photo Hunt #9: Compromising Positions

I always like to get into Mom's stuff that she's eating. Usually I wait until she's not looking, but a couple of times I been caught in the act. Here I'm trying to get her Cadbury eggs.

 Look at me with my head in the jar.

Now I'm trying to get Mom's celery I don't even eat celery! It just smelled so good I had to play with it.

Why don't you join the fun?

Sunday Musings

Happy fall everyone. And it's finally definitely fall here. The trees are turning colors. The crab apple tree had apples this year for the first time. You can see them lying all over the ground. The tree out front has lots of berries for the birds, and the aspens are just starting to get yellow on the edges. I was supposed to go for a walk today, but it's raining today. We don't get very much rain so I guess I can't complain.

I've gotten some fantastic submissions for the #Lakewithpetie book. It's getting quite exciting. I'm waiting for some more written submissions and I hope to have everything by Friday (10/15). One picture I'd really like to have for the book is all the guys in the tent wearing plaid pjs. If you're the one that took that pic, I hope you're willing to share it.

My cards came from TokiPoki.com. I'm very excited to start trading with my pals. My first card is already on it's way through the mail from @BorisKitty. I know of at least two more pals who just signed on with Toki Poki and I can't wait to trade cards with them, too. I do have to tell you that somehow my birthday got messed up on the cards. I was thinking of fixing it with a magic marker or sticker, but Boris said I should leave it. It would make the cards more collectible as an 'error card'. MOL. What do you think?

I've found that trying to keep up with almost 100 different blogs is too difficult, so I've had to weed some out and will probably drop a few more. They've all been blogs of anipals that don't subscribe to my blog, so I haven't dropped any regular readers. My apologies to anyone whose blog I've dropped, but I had to be realistic about how many I can actually read. I hope you'll forgive me.

Treasure's blog about his adventure will be posted by midweek, I promise. That's it for this Sunday. Love to all my pals!

Pet Gear AT3 Stroller Review - Update

I've had my new stroller for a couple of weeks now and I want to compare the old one and the new one.

 Old stroller.

 New stroller.

This is the second generation of the stroller that I had. As you can see, it no longer has the big pet step sticking out in the front. This makes the stroller more compact, more maneuverable, and easier to fold up and put in the car. But that's just the first improvement!

The drink tray, which in the old version was so difficult to put on, now comes attached. The fabric cover has been slightly redesigned and zips with ease. The mesh windows are lighter so it's easier for me to see out and for Mom to see me.

The way the stroller folds has been changed completely and is now so easy I could do it! (If I had opposable thumbs. MOL.)

The front wheel is now the same size as the other two wheels. The wheels simply snap on. And more important, they can now be removed to be replaced if by some miracle you actually manage to wear them out.

The only thing on the version that I would consider a negative is that the basket underneath sits much closer to the body of the stroller which makes it harder to put things in it. But frankly, everything else is soooooo much better that it really doesn't matter. I thought this stroller was pawsome when I had the first generation of it. The new version is miles above the old one. I would recommend this stroller to anyone wanting wheels for their pet.

I've had a few requests for tips for buying a stroller. So here they are!

Pumpkin's Tips for Fancy Wheels for your Pets

Bring the stroller in the house and let your pet get used to it before trying to take him/her out in it. Also, get your pet used to wearing a harness. Even though I’m enclosed in the stroller, I’m also harnessed and on a leash attached to the stroller. This way Mom can open the stroller to give me water or treats and I can’t run off. The leash and harness also help with getting me from the carrier to the stroller if we’ve gone somewhere in the car. I can’t run off while Mom’s taking me out of one and putting me in the other. I wouldn’t run off anyway, but you can’t be too careful. 

Mom also always brings something for me to play with in the stroller. Usually it’s my duckie, Fred. As much fun as riding in the stroller is, sometimes it’s nice to have a toy to play with.

My stroller came with a nice pad in the bottom, but Mom put a fleece bed in anyway. I like fleecy beds and Mom wanted to make the stroller extra inviting. And like any other time you’re training your four legged furriend to something new, make sure lots and lots of treats are involved!

When picking a stroller, think about how you’ll use it, how big your pet is, and what fits you. How easy or difficult is it to use? Will you take it in the car a lot? How easily does it fold and unfold? What kind of terrain do you walk on? Lots of the paths around here are mulch or hardpack (very fine gravel). The strollers with the little wheels would get stuck, so we got all terrain wheels. How tall are you? Mom also liked this stroller because it’s very tall and she’s on the tall side. Some people don’t mind using a stroller with a lower handle even if they are tall and then other things would be more important. Will you need to haul anything in it beside the pet (like a picnic)? She also liked that there’s a basket for stuff underneath and a tray for drinks and keys and other small stuff (like the flashy box).

There are lots of strollers to choose from. Some can go from carrier to backpack to stroller. That would have been nice because I wouldn’t have to go from carrier to stroller when we go in the car. But we couldn’t find one with big wheels. There are double-decker ones for people with multiple pets. There’s every color of the rainbow to choose from. There are strollers special for small pets all the way up to one like mine that’s for 60 lb. pets. Of course, I don’t weigh anywhere near 60 lbs. MOL! But Mom liked everything else about the stroller and I have lots of room to play in. Look at several before picking one. If you don’t get the best one for your needs, likes, and that suits your pet you won’t like it.

I think a stroller is a great way for people to take their pets with them to places they otherwise wouldn’t get to go. Without it, I’d always get left behind when Mom goes out. Now we get to go fun places and have more together time. What’s better than that?

Tabby Tuesday

Mom thought she'd put up a couple of my baby pictures. Wasn't I a cutie?

Treasure had a grand adventure this past weekend. There are hundreds and hundreds of pictures to organize before he can blog it, but he hopes to have it up within the next couple of weeks. Also, Mom's going to start putting together the Lake with Petie book this weekend. We're still taking submissions of pictures or stories to put in it. DM me if you have anything to submit.