Guess Who's Coming for Meow Mix?

Well, let's see... it's been getting a little crowded on the back porch this past weekend.  Along with Orange Kitty, there is now a small white-ish cat with a dark brown tail who has been munching on the Meow Mix. I don't know how long he's been out there, but I saw him just the other day. He was walking around the yard as if he knew his way around the property, then he walked around the garage, and then he made his way to the back porch for the cat food.  I just watched him and let him eat.... he's very small, and seems to be a young cat.

Later that same day, I heard a noise on the back porch and there was the little white cat again... time for more Meow Mix. I was at the window and just watching him, trying to see the markings on his face, but he never did turn towards the window. Definitely a 'new' cat around here, though. Is Orange Kitty telling his friends about the cat food buffet?

After the white cat finished eating, he sat underneath one of the chairs and started to clean his paws. As I was watching him, a fox came up onto the porch...... a huge fox. So big that I thought it was a dog at first, but that pointed nose and the long bushy tail was beyond a doubt... it was a brown fox. As the fox sniffed the door mat, the white cat continued to clean his paws.  Would the fox attack the small cat? I had no idea but didn't intend to find out.  I turned the door knob and at the first clicking sound, that fox ran (flew!) off the porch, down the steps and out into the yard. The movement of the fox scared the white cat and he ran off as well, but he ran in the same direction as the fox......... I have no idea what happened to either one of them, but I'm hoping that they both kept running till they were miles away.

In the front of the house, behind the bushes near the outdoor faucet for the water hose, I found a huge mound of dirt that had been dug out from under the paving stones around the steps. Something has definitely made a home underneath those stones, and possibly dug far enough to make a tunnel underneath the front steps.  The small mountain of dirt that they moved as that tunnel was dug is over twelve inches tall.... what on earth could dig that much?  Certainly not a cute little bunny.  We're thinking it's a raccoon, or now that fox is also a good possibility.  My husband is going to set the catch/release trap out there tonight..... whatever scampers out of that tunnel tonight is going to be caught inside that cage.

Always an adventure out here..... and not often a good one.