Catnip

[elainegrey]

cynthia1960's post about catnip reminds me of the first time i introduced it to our first cat, Grey Beard. Christine was living in Edenton, NC, a coastal southern town, on the second floor of a southern frame bungalow. I don't know why the spaciousness of the home strikes me as important in the story (and the spaciousness was probably more of an effect of comparing it to my Philly apartment). The kitchen had a door that opened to the tiniest of "decks," barely room to stand when opening the door, which was then surrounded by the wrap-around porch roof of the first floor. The egress had little use for humans, but it was lovely to let Grey Beard out on the roof.

It was on the brick wall that separated the "deck" from the roof that i placed a little 3" pot with catnip, a small plant like sold at pet stores. Grey Beard came over and gave it an investigative sniff, then a more interested sniff, and then he began eating the leaves. And he kept eating the leaves. I'd only seen cats rolling around in the stuff, so i hadn't realized that they also ate it, but Grey Beard kept going until all the leaves were gone, and then he started gnawing on the stems until all that was left was a frayed twig at soil level.

No wild behavior, no cat crazies. Grey Beard was always the alpha cat, always in control. But he ate the whole thing.

Comments

[cynthia1960]

d00d! Haven't tried keeping fresh nip around here, afraid of what our darling burnouts would do.