"Fenway" is Fettered

Details

It was a Saturday morning when I noticed a Facebook message from Christy. Her kitty, "Fenway", had been stuck in a pine tree for two nights in Merdian MS, could I help? I contacted Christy and arranged to be there around noon. Upon arrival, I was met by Christy, Chuck (her husband), and their college age son, JT. They led me out back where "Fenway" was stuck in a pine tree at the edge of the woods that bordered their backyard, separated by a high chain-link fence. Christy told me to park the truck at the back corner of the yard to shorten the distance that gear had to be lugged to the tree. Everyone helped carry equipment to the tree which was great considering the hot weather. During the setup, I discovered that JT was a freshman in Electrical Engineering at Mississippi State! This was the first time that I have been able to rescue a kitty for one of our students, a nice coincidence. Christy said that Fenway was several years old; a rescue who started out at a neighbors house but then adopted them. Christy said that Fenway was the most friendly of their seven rescue kitties, and was the designated porch greeter. This made me hopeful that Fenway would be cooperative during the rescue. Christy did not know what caused Fenway to climb the tree.

I geared up and climbed to Fenway's limb. He was about 8 feet out from the trunk and meowing nervously. I pulled out some dry cat food but he was not interested. I then put some wet cat food on an extensible pole, but he snubbed this as well. The food offerings made him nervous, and he retreated out to the very end of the limb, looking like he wanted to either jump down or jump to a neighboring tree. I put away the food and reluctantly pulled up my net and rescue pole, hoping that I would not have to use them. Fenway kept nervously traveling back and forth of the limb, looking for a way to get to Christy, who continually coaxed him from the ground. This went on for about 15 minutes, and I began looking at limb walking options to try to get closer to him. Fenway eventually decided that he had to reach Christy, and tried a dash past me in order to reach a neighboring limb. As he is a hefty kitty, his 'dash' was not very fast so I easily nabbed him and put him in the Kat bag. Everyone was relieved. Back on the ground, JT took him inside for food and water, and then all helped to pack up. The post rescue picture below from Christy shows Fenway receiving some long overdue loving!