What is it about cats leaving their tails outside when they go indoors? As we’ve seen, ‘Nuki does it all the time with the various condos. And now, it seems we have a visitor who has the same habit.

You know, one of the major arguments behind Trap-Neuter-Release (TNR) handling of feral cats is that it keeps the population constant; removing a feral cat from the wild just leaves a vacant territory that some other cat will move into.

I believe we’re seeing evidence of exactly that. With GT out of circulation–and I’ll have an update on GT’s situation next week–the owner of the tail you see in the picture above has been hanging around the house.

Not just in the Rose Cottage, either.

He’s* wandered around the food bowls several times, both in the evening after Tuxie and MM have wandered off, and in the morning, when cats often wander through, hoping for–and usually receiving–treats.

* Don’t assume gender bias here. Since we don’t have any evidence either way, I picked the pronoun by flipping a coin.

He’s not quite a chunky as that picture makes him look. From other angles, he’s actually quite svelte.

And no, we haven’t named him yet. We’ll hold off until we know whether he’s going to be a regular visitor. But if we do have to name him, it’s going to be tough to use our usual descriptive naming. BC? Uh-uh. Wouldn’t want anyone to think he’d been named after a comic strip. Beekay? Nah, sounds like a fast food restaurant.

Well, should it become necessary, we’ll come up with something. For now, we’re going with “Hey, the black cat is back.”  Not easily abbreviated, but it’ll do.