A Cat Up A Tree.

Feline attraction.

Bitterly cold almost close to icy when I walked with my friend through the Deutsch Schützen vineyards. Lovely to walk but icy all the same. Halfway through our walk I noticed a tabby crossing ahead of me doing the notorious quick dash to escape a cuddle and not ten meters further along another feline reclining dashingly atop a little hill all the while giving us the once over, ready too for a quick dash away from these old biddies!

Quaint, I thought, how cats are in my life and around it too and we walked a bit further. Perhaps I had my head in the clouds because suddenly I noticed something resembling a kitten right up a birch tree. High up indeed. We stopped and I made sure that I hadn't mistaken it for a martin but no, a kitten it was, dangling ever so nonchalantly between two branches.

Surely you can guess that I started to worry about this little one. Had she become stuck and was freezing? Or had she merely escaped from a tedious neighbourhood dog? Or was the view better up there? I went back and forwards in front of her trying to see a movement. Thankfully, her eyes followed me but she wouldn't budge.

My friend sagely mentioned her neighbour's cat doing exactly that and that it was more than capable to climb down a tree. Oh well, I agreed and we went home although I had a plan for my husband who happened to be home on leave. What good is a husband in a fire brigade if one can't make use of him and a tall ladder?

As you can imagine, he was far from pleased at the thought of going outside in the freezing cold trying to get a kitten ( who might not be there anymore ) down a tree. Suffice to say that I drove back there half an hour later, on my own, to see if a cat was indeed stuck in a tree. Visions of having to call out the troupes without looking too much like a crazy cat lady flashed through my mind. Too late. Perfect moniker indeed.

Shoo, luckily it had climbed back down on its own and my kitten rescue was more theoretical than real...as for Bob, let's hope I never climb high up on a tree because he might just leave me up there!

What a beauty. She was at least five meters up that birch on her perch...

Biggi