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Cat from window well is alive, well

Cat from window well is alive, well

A little orange cat is resting in a warm, dry place with plenty of food and lots of love and attention after spending more than a week in a rain-drenched Downtown window well. He had cried and mewed continuously, breaking the hearts of concerned animal lovers who were unable to rescue him from his precarious perch six to eight feet below the sidewalk.

It took a village to save this cat. It took ingenuity, a heavy-duty saw and the help of department store executives in St. Louis.

The feline doesn't have an official name, but one of the rescuers calls him LT.

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"That's for Lord & Taylor," said Ron Smith, a humane agent at the Western Pennsylvania Humane Society.

Downtown workers and shoppers on Smithfield Street, outside the former department store, first heard the crying kitty on New Year's Day. Kind strangers lowered food, but no one could figure out how to bring the cat up.

On Jan. 5, Smith and Bob Gosser got on the case. They have worked a combined 63 years as humane agents, investigating and prosecuting animal abuse and neglect cases. They have been involved in uncountable rescues, using tongs, nets, snares, traps and other tools, but they could not snag this cat.

Pittsburgh police officers and firefighters were consulted, along with animal experts at the aviary and the zoo. Assistant District Attorney Deb Jugan, known as "Doggie DA" because she prosecutes animal abuse cases, went to bat for the cat, calling the media to alert us to the problem.

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Smith even tried to lure the orange cat out of the well with a gray tabby from the North Side shelter.

"The gray cat cried in his carrier from the moment we left the shelter until we got to the well," Smith said. "Then he became mute."

The kitty in the well was surrounded by thick bars. Rescuers had an eight-inch outside opening to work with, and nothing worked. The only hope of rescue appeared to be working from inside the former store.

Officials at May Department Stores, owners of Lord & Taylor and Kaufmann's, initially seemed reluctant to drill through the historic building that once housed Andrew Mellon's vault.

On Jan. 7, May officials sent Smith, Gosser, a Kaufmann's security guard and others into the building with a saw.

When the saw created an opening, the cat leapt out of the well and jumped up into a small hole in the ceiling of the basement.

Smith and Gosser left a box trap filled with food, and predicted that the cat would enter the trap when he got hungry.

Several hours later, a construction worker used a rope to lasso the cat and get him into the trap. Smith retrieved him, and rubbed the cat's head.

"Boy, was he happy to be out of there. He was calmed down and fairly friendly."

When I checked on him Jan. 11, the cat was enjoying the attention of the Humane Society staff and volunteers. The public cannot see him yet, because he is in isolation to protect the other shelter cats. Though he is about the size of a 5-month-old kitten, the shelter veterinarian thinks he's about a year old.

The cat, an intact male, tested negative for feline leukemia, but is wheezing a bit and being treated for an upper respiratory infection. When he recovers, he will be neutered and put up for adoption.

There is a long list of people who want to adopt him, headed by the Kaufmann's security guard who helped with his rescue.

LT lived as a street cat for more than a week. We don't know where he came from, but he looks and acts as if he has had a home for most of his life, the humane agents say.

In any case, the Jan. 5 Pet Tales with tips for helping outdoor cats generated a lot more tips from readers who have fed and sheltered cats variously know as strays or ferals.

The main tip was converting $4 heavy duty plastic storage containers into outdoor cat houses.

Several people asked how to cut an entrance.

A Bon Air man says he uses a small drill to make holes, close together. He uses a jig saw to connect the dots. A good hardware store employee might be able to direct you to a heavy-duty box cutter, or something along those lines, to get the job done.

A number of readers suggested using Styrofoam coolers, which can be hard to find in the winter. Kim Stewart, of Lubbock, Texas, suggested building boxes from 4- by 8-foot sheets of insulation Styrofoam using a glue called "silicone sealant."

Cat house boxes should be lined with straw, blankets, old towels, carpet and other items picked up, cheaply, at yard sales.

"If the shelters are put under porches, make sure the cat does not get snowed in during heavy snowstorms. They can suffocate," said Bob Boscia, of Ross. "Although with all of this rain we are having, we should probably be more concerned with an army of stray cats floating down the street on their Styrofoam beds."

First Published: January 19, 2005, 5:00 a.m.

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