Monday September 13, 2010 – 9:15 a.m. – Still no Mugsy. Well, we know she is THERE, but she has not entered a humane trap…yet. Here is what Vicki reported in an e-mail on how her surveillance work went the first night (Saturday night):
Rick and I spent 24 hours up there trying different things. Misty (the other cat) spent 9 hours out there in a large dog crate as a decoy with a trap…..and two additional traps in other areas. One trap is exactly where she was seen on camera. Some distance away we had a BBQ (for the smell factor), drank wine, talked in Normal voices………… and played a recording of Ettas voice calling Mugsy in for treats…..while shaking a can of treats. All of this to try and imitate a “normal evening in McCall” where Mugsy normally lives. Hoping to bring her to us. No luck. We had two wildlife cameras in place. All we caught was about 15 photos of a cute little mouse gathering enough food for his whole village. By the way………….we took the advice of a pile of marshmallows a bit away from the trap to keep the raccoons away. It appeared to have worked as there were no raccoons on camera and most of the marshmallows were gone.
Since Mugsy is soooooo trap savy (she has seen raccoons and other feral cats in McCall)………….we are now going to focus our efforts on acclimatizing her to the traps. The traps are all wired in the open position so they can’t close. They are all disguised with tree branches with food placed “in front of the trap.” If we can see her on camera eating this food…………then the next step is to keep the traps wired open and set the food just inside them…..and further and further until she is comfortable with them. Then hopefully we can arm them and catch her. All of this will take time…..and patience….which we are learning from Kat at missing pet partnership and our new friend Vickie in Northbend ……………. is paramount!
Vicki
I know how difficult and frustrating it is for everyone following the Mugsy case that she still has not been caught. I fully believe that now that we’ve seen Mugsy approach a feeding station (proof that she is now hungry enough to break cover) that she WILL be captured as long as Vicki remains diligent and hopeful (which it appears she will in her email).
The news on Roxie is good. She has been spotted by several people on a road near the trail head for Rachel Lake but Roxie just runs from everyone and as soon as Megan gets in that area, Roxie is no where to be found. Missing Pet Partnership is working on getting a humane dog trap and wildlife camera transported to Megan. Megan has been putting food out for Roxie, so she likely will stay in that area, making trapping easy. In our experience with cases like this, once the dog has stopped running and settles into one area, it becomes easy to bait and trap them. We had one case in Everett, WA where it took three months to trap a panicked Basset Hound named Daisy (you can read her story/testimonial here) and just last week a woman named Crystal in Preston, WA trapped her Keeshond named Fiona who evaded capture for a month.
So I know it has been over two weeks for Mugsy, but I just encourage everyone to continue to pray, have hope, and buckle down for the long haul.
