Another Track for Gus

Thanks to a really successful fliering effort from Thursday evening through today, we completed the fliering we wanted to do north of Route 50. These were the most important areas since our best information has been that Gus is on the International Country Club grounds, and this area is on the north side of this busy road. We know that we need to also flier the south side of 50 -- the homes, apartments and townhomes on either side of and behind the Greenbriar shopping center -- so we are still looking for folks that can cover that side. Thanks a mil to those volunteers that have started that section! But we can breathe a little easier knowing the highest priority areas are fliered.

And that fliering came in very handy during the track that we ran this evening, with Laura Totis and her dog Chewy, with LJT Training. Just about everyone we spoke to was already aware of Gus, so the word is getting spread effectively. Thanks MUCH to everyone that helped out.

Here's how the track went down, starting at the 16th hole, where we know Gus had been:

It did not take long for Chewy to pick up Gus's scent and start trailing it. We did find both feces and muddy prints that we feel could be Gus, and since the last rain. But we later found out that no fewer than two dogs roam the grounds regularly -- the club owner's dog does so daily; another employee's dog does so less often. Because of them, it's more chance than a certainty that what we saw was evidence of Gus.

But Chewy did get excited in a few areas. One was at this tree stump, which had been dug under. Gus couldn't fit inside it, but he may have attempted to hide there or otherwise spent time at it, given Chewy's interest in it. She was not looking up inside the tree, so it wasn't something that scurried up that had her attention.

Another area was in a drainage pipe. The photo here is funny looking, I know, but Chewy wasn't clowning around on purpose. She has to have smelled Gus in that pipe for her to be trying so hard to stuff herself into it. However, if Gus was there when we were there, Chewy would have given a completely different signal.

We found a couple of ways that Gus might get out of the golf course and into the neighborhoods outside the course, which may give him another source of food if neighbors there feed outdoor cats. Chewy showed us those ways out. One was a gate with plenty of space for Gus to get through; the other was a hole in the fence that interested Chewy very much.

When we left the golf course, we went to the neighborhoods on the other side of the fence line, and got permission to go back and find the gate. (Finding the hole in the fence from the other side would require more than we could give it at this point.) While in that neighborhood, we saw an outdoor cat scooting around. In speaking with neighbors to get permission to walk back on their property, they confirmed that the cat's people feed him on their back deck. So, that could be a source of food for Gus.

When we approached the gate from the nighborhood, Chewy didn't get excited like we thought she would based on her interest when we approached it from inside the golf course. So we're now less confident that she is using that gate to move between the golf course and the neighborhood. But we do still feel it's possible, or that she is using the larger hole in the fence that we were not able to investigate.

The rest of the story, which really refers to the implications and what we need to do based on what we've learned, has to be continued. I'm beyond beat from being on my feet for so long! But check back for the rest.