Protect your PI puss

Yesterday, both before I left for Gloucester and after I got home, it seemed as if every dog in the neighborhood was barking. Incessantly.

This is not usual. I switched to semi-alert, because one of my neighbors had told me that his dogs only barked continuously if there was a predator around.

I always do shut my cat in when I go to bed. Last night, I shut off his means of leaving the house earlier than usual because the dogs were still intermittently barking. (I leave a window on the enclosed porch open.)

Just a while ago, a young neighbor saw me out in the yard and stopped her car. She had been out walking her dog on the marsh when she came across the head of a cat. Just the head. A black cat, thank God for my ginger boy (who I knew was safe in any case).

It goes without saying that my neighbor was shattered by her discovery. She ran home and started calling other neighbors on the phone to try and find out who owned a black cat.

Her family's cat disappeared last summer in the rash of cat disappearances out here that began in June and ended with the summer. Oddly enough, my cat was the first one to go, on Memorial Day - but he came home after 3 days - within an hour after I put up fliers that included the information that he was micro chipped.

This led me to believe it was not a predator but a human that was to blame. That and the fact that all the cats only disappeared on a weekend, including my Chewie. Her cat went missing well after all the others; no trace of any of any of them was ever found.

So pay attention to the behavior of the animals around you. Those dogs were sending a warning that a fox, or a coyote, was in the area. No barking today, I'm happy to report.