Life on Eagle Street: Our Animal House

We always had animals in the house. When Dad was alive, the permanent collection was limited to Fudder the Manx cat, Tiny and Collette, the dogs, and Topper, the blue parakeet. Other cats and dogs came and went. They were merely passing through. Once Dad passed away, however, our collection of animals started increasing, to the point where we reached hoarder status.

We started adding Poodles to the pack. Mom supplemented our Social Security income with cash from the puppy sales. Her first litters were silver Poodles, then through the seventies she branched out into chocolate, white, and apricot Poodles.

Tammy and the little kids with two summer litters in 1974

During the 80s, and right up until her death in 1986, she bred red poodles. Mom dabbled a bit in exhibiting her puppies in local AKC dog matches. A match is a practice dog show. The ribbon winners didn't earn points towards championships, but it gave both handler and dog a chance to learn the ropes and prepare for actual dog shows.

Mom showing a dark chocolate poodle, 1977. She took 1st place.

In 1976, someone gave us a friendly little chicken named Sonya Henny. She used to follow me when I walked the dogs down Eagle Street. She shared her day pen with a big white rabbit and a fluffy guinea pig.

Bambi the rabbit, Fluffy the Guinea Pig, and Sonya Henny, the chicken, 1976

I think these were called Dutch Dwarf rabbits, around 1978

There were also many more cats. After Fudder passed away, someone dumped a pregnant feral chocolate Manx cat on our porch. She had 6 kittens and we kept two of them, Fudder II and Mitty, our indoor cats. We also ended up with about 4 outdoor cats.

Little sister loved the cats

Black and white Manx kitten. The green skateboard was mine. Summer 1975

In the 80s, Mom got into birds. She bought an egg incubator and some eggs and started hatching and hand raising cockatiels. Her special hand raised bird was named Piper.

Mom's first one, hatched Sept 28, 1981.

Here is Piper a few months later. He lived right next to Mom's chair in the living room

Mom also raised chickens in a playpen in the living room in 1981.

Mom got into hatching chicks in 1981. The playpen was in the living room.

For a short time she also kept tiny quails in an aquarium in the living room.

I don't know why she had these quails in 1984

Then she got a few pairs of parakeets and put nesting boxes in the huge free flight cages that lined one wall in the living room. Soon, she had about 10 cockatiels and 50 parakeets.

Mom had four of these cages so the birds could stretch their wings

I never knew there could be so many colors of parakeets until she started raising them. The cute little babies were sold to the local bird store.

Some of the tame parakeets, 1984

The problem with the birds was that their bird seed attracted mice from the canyon. The irresistible food supply resulted in the house being completely overrun. The cats did their best to keep things under control, but realized they were so outnumbered and they gave up after awhile.

In 1986, Mom's final year of life, she had two huge cages full of parakeets in the back bedroom. There were another two big cages in the living room. These cages contained her cockatiels, a few parakeets, and rabbits. She also had four Toy Poodles. There was usually a playpen for puppies set up in the crowded living room.

This playpen always had some babies in it.

Her beloved dog Gigi was always at her side and went everywhere with her. In retrospect, I realize that Gigi was the first emotional support dog I ever saw, before the term was even invented.
She went with Mom to the bank and grocery store, sitting quietly on Mom's electric mobility scooter, and no one ever said a word about it.

Gigi slept on Mom's scooter so she would always be ready to go shopping

Mom's final animal project involved the rabbits. One day she put her pregnant female rabbit in a pen on the front lawn, and the rabbit immediately dug a burrow under the tree in the yard. The babies were born underground and we just left her there to raise them. Unfortunately, a couple days later she came up to the surface to eat and was attacked and carried off, either by a hawk or a coyote. Mom, who was just two months away from her own demise due to congestive heart failure, did not have the ability to run outside when she heard the ruckus. When I got off work the next morning and stopped over to check on her and to feed the animals, Mom told me what happened. I got a shovel from the garage and dug up the front yard until I found the orphaned rabbits. One had died, but two were still alive and hungry. Mom bottlefed those little babies until they were able to eat on their own. The two little orphans went to a happy pet home.