Mr. Darcy and Cupcake

This post is about two rescues done in the latter part of May and the first part of June.

Reagan left a voice mail in late afternoon - her kitty was stuck in a tree and could I help? I checked the address and it was only 10 minutes away so I packed up and was soon at the house.  I was met by Michelle (mom) as Reagan had to go to a function. She led me to the backyard where 'Mr. Darcy' was hanging out on the first branch of a large hardwood.  Mr. Darcy is a young kitty who likes to play in the front yard, but he got curious about some handy man activity in the back yard.  Unfortunately, has a mean dog brother who chased him up the tree.  He had only been in the tree for a couple of hours. I set a rope above him, climbed up, and Mr. Darcy was cooperative with the nab and bag.  On the ground, Michelle took him inside for food and water.  Michelle, many thanks for your generous donation which went to a 'A new leash on life' animal rescue!

 I received a call from Denitra at about 7:00 pm one night - her kitty was stuck in a pine tree behind her apartment complex, could I help?  I like to have plenty of daylight for a rescue so I said that I would come out the next day. This turned out to be the wrong decision as I failed to check the weather and heavy rains were predicted for the next day.  The apartment complex was only 15 minutes away -- I should have done the rescue. ANYWAYYYYY - the next morning it was raining of course but  I packed up and headed out. The rain was somewhat light, I had a hope that I could finish before it go heavier (FORESHADOWING- NOT!).  Denitra met me and led me to a large pine tree where 'Cupcake' was hanging out at 20 feet on a large limb, crying for a rescue. It started raining more heavily as I set my rope and of course the first attempt was unsuccessful - the rope got stuck in a notch as I pulled it up and I had to reshoot my throw line.  By the time I got the rope set it was full on tropical storm monsoon conditions.   Cupcake was hunkered down on the limb enduring the rain storm and we were both miserable as I climbed up to him.  When I reached Cupcake, he gave a loud meow of relief and practically jumped into my arms. Back on the ground,  I gave the bag with Cupcake in it to Denitra so that she could take him inside to get dry and receive some loving.  On the drive home, there was flash flooding everywhere. Later that afternoon, I had to go out with Huntsville Cave Rescue as there was a caver stuck in a flooded cave in Jackson County;  he actually self-rescued just as our AAA rescuers in our unit  reached him(there was also 13 people stuck in Tumbling Rock cave/Jackson County  because of flooding but they were able to eventually self-rescue before Chattanooga cave rescue arrived). It was a wet day!