12/02/06
6810 Visitors to date!
Would the lady from San Gabriel, who works at Warner Brother's Studio please call me again. You called last Thursday and reported a black cat without a tail, not even a stump in your backyard. You wanted to call me back and I have not heard from you again. Please call and tell me about this cat. There is extremely little chance that this is NoTail, since you mentioned, this cat let's you pet it and your niece said it is a girl, but I still need to see the cat and verify myself. Please call me. Numbers at the end of this page.

Thank you.

3440 visitors to date!
Thank you everybody for expressing so much concern for my little NoTail. One thing I never mentioned, every time I picked him up he would place his arms on each side of my neck as if to hug me. He would hold real tight when he got scared. It felt very special to be hugged by him and I can still feel his paws around my neck. None of my other cats ever did that…

6/04/05
I had to gear myself up for months now to update the website. I guess I was afraid of the pain it would cause to enter NoTail’s world again in such depth. But I was contacted by www.thecatconnection.com if they could post NoTail’s story in their news letter. That was very kind of them and I really appreciate the help to get the word out for NoTail. I received a lot of wonderful and caring emails from more people than I knew cared about pets. Since it will take a while until I get to each email for an answer (and I want to reply to each one of you) I want to thank all of you in the meantime for your moral support and caring words. Many of them I read with tears in my eyes. Thank you!

A lot has happened again since the last entry and here is a summary. Forgive me for going into too many, what seems unimportant, details, but I want to have a complete account of all events.

6/02/05
Remember the little boy that disappeared from the campground in Lake Arrowhead or was it Big Bear in July last year? He was found by hikers, or what was left of him. I felt so sorry for the family, because I know exactly what they went through all this time. Now, almost a year later, they can put their fears and worries and hopes to rest, bury their boy and move on. If NoTail is not alive anymore, then why can I not know, so that I can do the same, and rest?

06/01/05
Newsletter from The Cat Connection and lots of emails for NoTail. Still put fliers in the trashcan at the bottom and the top every week since two months. One way of contacting the workers that sort out the trash by hand at the plant in City of Industry. Athens Disposal was so unpleasant with my inquiry on what they do with dead animals in the trash. They didn’t want to talk to me. Although they claimed to call Animal Control, which Animal Control insured me, they received only one call in the last two years or so for a dead animal pick up. Why didn’t I come up any sooner with this idea?

5/31/05
Woman from Monrovia called and wanted to know if I found NoTail yet. She saw the ad in the Pasadena Star News.

5/30/05
Cyril moved! That dreaded day arrived. He promised to stay for one year and one year and four days he stayed. Now there is no home for NoTail to come back too, if he is still out there. He brought back my cage and bowl to feed the strays and they no longer will have food either. What a horrible day this was, what a horrible week.

5/27/05
Today one year ago exactly, at 7 in the morning my phone rang. My world was just getting okay again until I answered this call: it was Cyril to tell me the most feared, the most dreaded three words in my life to date “NoTail is gone”!

5/25/05
Report on the news, a woman and her dog were rescued from the San Gabriel River in Irwindale this morning. It was the homeless woman, that I see so often walking along Foothill with her long haired German shepherd. Could this be Hurricane? Imagine if it was and I helped Irene to find her dog after more than one year… I will keep my eyes open every day.

5/21/05
All those emails I received now from all over the world for my little NoTail... an email from New Zealand, one from London, one from Holland. Someone has a great site for missing cats, a clearing house for ads, in Holland and posted NoTail’s site on his.
Linda from the mobile home park north of the rail road tracks at Grand and Edna Place, a short distance from NoTail’s home called. She lost her tabby Key with a kinky tail on May 13. She is disabled, walks with a cane and can not really look for him the way I did. I wish I had the time to help her. He jumped out the window after a fight with another cat and disappeared.

5/17/05
Was invited by Carol to come to a class of the Learning Light Foundation in Anaheim. The class that day was about how to talk to your pets. Everyone sat around a table, pictures of pets were placed on the table, the lights went out to clear the mind for a few minutes. Then everyone took someone else’s picture and tried to listen to what the animal had to say. An older gentleman and a young woman had each a large picture of NoTail. The gentleman told us that this cat had a fight with an opossum and that he slept very close with me. I don’t know about the first statement, but yes, NoTail slept on my right cheek every single night he lived with me. The young woman told us that she sees NoTail playing in the grass being happy. Neither of them was sure if he was alive or not. It was a strange experience!

5/15/05
Called Gloria at the Covina Garden Apartments, who helped me a lot looking for NoTail and is still looking. since Cyril is moving away or already moved, she will be my only contact there. She asked what Cyril will do with the cats he has been feeding? I didn't know. She told me that he must have stopped feeding them or he may have told her so when the rains started. She remembers all those cats coming to her feeding stations then. That means that NoTail eventually would have found his way to her ever filled bowls. Since he didn't, with this new evidence I am sure that he was never out there and that he has been taken for whatever reason. Therefore he may still be alive!?

5/14/05
A Mexican woman called me. It was somewhat unclear what exactly she said. She knows of a cat without a tail that was taken to Mexico. Instantly my heart jumped, that would explain everything. But then again, no, that is just not possible. She went on to tell me about a cat without a tail that had three kittens, one of them has no tail. So she thought one of them is NoTail. But of course I told her that NoTail is fixed and can't have any babies. Another flop!

5/12/05
Call from Carol, who feeds the large stray colony at Grand and Edna Place, regarding a class at the Learning Light Foundation the following week with Shelly Duffy as the teacher who also talks to animals. Carol asked if I wanted to come to the class and I should go.

5/11/05
Email from Irene, who lost her long haired German shepherd on April 1 last year and has been looking for him ever since, launched her website for lost dogs www.k9alert.com and there is a picture of her dog Hurricane. It looks so much like the dog that walks with the homeless woman along Foothill every day. I will have to take a picture when I see her next. Last time she turned into a street before the one where I was waiting with my camera.

4/26/05
A woman from Arcadia called, she keeps seeing my ad and wanted to tell me to get another kitty. She said she keeps telling her husband to just cut off the tail of her black cat. She repeated that several times and kept adding each time that this is just a joke.....

Don't know why I didn't think of this long time ago, but a couple of weeks ago I started laying the fliers on the bottom of the trash can upside down and then when it is full on top. That way whoever handles the trash will see it every week. Just in case the trash workers saw a black cat last year without a tail and wondered or marveled at it or being superstitious. Although I don’t think he ended up in the trash. But that is a way to get right to the trash handlers there at Athens in COI.

4/23/05
Call from a woman two blocks from a mobile home park in La Verne. She saw a black cat with white markings around neck and face. But this one also has a little stub of course. It sounds like the cat that was reported to me several times. And if this is so, then this cat has lived there for almost a year now. Why do I keep coming across cats, strays, that live so long outside and NoTail is not???

4/22/05
The Pennysaver wouldn’t post the website link in my ad for NoTail anymore. Their reasoning? ”You reamed a bunch of people in there” was their reply.
Hahaha, who reamed who is the question. Those bastards made fun of me and others tried to extort money and "I" am reaming a bunch of people? I cant believe their political correctness. Shame on them to see it that way. I didn’t start this. I’d rather be doing anything else! But that is okay, the only call I ever got from the Pennysaver ads was from a woman that wanted me to adopt one of her tailless kittens. And after reading this little entry they will probably never even run the ad again.

4/15/05
Call from an older man in Arcadia, a cat without a tail in his backyard harassing his pigeons. But again, this cat had a stub and was more grayish then black.

4/4/05
My backyard this time, a gray cat, long hair, and a black and white one run around every day. Great, have to get them fixed now too. Will this ever stop? Almost hope that this is someone's cat who then comes back to me all upset that I got it fixed, haha. Come on, I am ready to take you on anytime! Sorry for this one, I am just mad about all the fertile strays and the helpless kittens that end up dead in the road. I see it all the time. During my search for NoTail I have seen so many more than I normally do and it is an endless fight.

4/3/05
Denise called from North El Monte. Her cat (the only one that was not fixed yet) had kittens today and one of them is black with a little stub. She wanted to give me first option for adoption. It was the neighbor's cat who bought it. He was not fixed. So now she has 5 kittens to find a home for and five others will die that won’t get a home because of the neighbor not getting his cat fixed and letting it outside. People are so thoughtless. I don't understand.

3/26/05
Susie from Glendora called, saw ad in SGVT, just wanted to know where NoTail got lost and will look out for him, but she was very concerned that it was so long ago but yet at the same time she said, miracles have happened and yes they did.
Read in the Daily Independent last week that a woman send a letter to the editor to encourage another woman not to give up, because she lost a dog once and a year or so later, she drove down the street with her father and there was an older lady walking her dog, it was hers and her father got it back for her…

3/21/05
No cat stories today. The tumor in the lung of my boyfriend could not be removed, it already spread. Everything came to a screeching halt and my world again caved in on me. Every year in regular intervals, right! From here on out I couldn’t go to the shelter anymore (everyone there knows about NoTail and I am pretty sure they would contact me if they ever saw a black cat without a tail, I bugged them so much). I couldn’t go out and search anymore, because I have been spending every single weekend with him. My email box has been getting fuller and fuller. This website not updated and on and on and on… But I keep the newspaper ads running.

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Thank you again for your support and joining into the search for this very special little guy. He has been missing for a while and we need to find him!

NoTail is all black (not grayish), has no tail at all (we get calls for black cats with a stubby tail all the time), is neutered and will be 9 years old on October 5, 2004. He is medium sized and weighed 13.5 pounds before he disappeared.

He is very scared and shy if not in familiar territory. He is skittish and hides, can not be touched, and will not be seen unless he wants to be seen. That may keep him alive but unfortunately makes it nearly impossible for us to find him or anyone else seeing him. Although he lived indoors, he was allowed occasional supervised access to the outside. He knows how to hunt of course and he loves water. He would not be laying around in daylight taking a sunbath.

By now everyone should know how much I love this cat. I have never known one to be so different from any other cat I ever met. And we share a special secret, NoTail and I.

NoTail might still be out there, maybe in the apartment complex, maybe near the park, or someone may have taken him in. Even though this would be very difficult. But he is used to humans more than strange cats. If there is anyone out there, that has any information about him, please, please call us. It has been a very rough time for us and still is. Not knowing what happened to him is the worst and closure is not possible. If he is still alive, I know he wants to come home, he wants to be with his sister, all the other cats, and me. I can't just give up hope so easy!

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Here is a brief summary of how the search is progressing and other info, phone numbers and email at the bottom of the page. If you are interested in more daily detail, please go to the search page:

09/05/04 Sunday
So many calls, so many cats without a tail, but they all have a little stub... Details on the August and September pages.

08/25/04 Wednesday
I hope, that the residents will not get upset just yet. They must see us driving around at night and think this very suspicious. But no, it is just us looking for NoTail. Please bear with us and keep your eyes open. We are still waiting for the story to be published. Today they printed a story about Jennifer, the volunteer at the shelter. The only person we were not able to speak to yet about the black cat without a tail that vanished from their cages on July 3rd.

08/23/04 Monday
Sadly the story was not yet printed by the paper. I was hoping for someone to contact me who has seen him or knows where he might be.

08/20/04 Friday
Tomorrow is THE big day for us. A newspaper article will be published in the San Gabriel Valley Tribune. A newspaper with a circulation of 100,000 households. Maybe, just maybe this will bring someone forward that knows something about NoTail. I pray!
What else did I do? Got up at 3 am nearly every morning and watched cat food in the quiet area of the complex. The police now knows me too, they come up not to ask me what I am doing here, but instead they ask "are you still looking for your cat?" Tracked down the street sweepers for Covina, and that was not easy. The driver didn't see NoTail. What else, oh yes, tried to find a searchcam for rent and that seems to be impossible. Called more than a dozen businesses, manufacturers, and rental companies. A few referred me to the Fire Department...

08/16/04 Monday
Another week has gone by without a sign from him. I ruled out other possible sightings and areas where he could have been trapped, talked to the apartment manager again, and the newspaper guy. No one has seen him. A couple of boys played a crude joke on me just to see me run around chasing a wild goose. That was very sad, I wasted two and a half hour that I had planned to prepare a new flyer. During these times my hope is fading and is replaced by incredible deep sadness for the loss. NoTail did not deserve this.

08/13/04 Friday the 13th
The mystery of the vanished cats without tails continues to stay unsolved. That is NoTail as well as the black cat without a tail at all that was seen in a cage in the Shelter in Baldwin Park on July 3rd. I don't understand how two cats could disappear like this. Just because they don't have a tail?

08/10/04 Tuesday Update
It was an eventful weekend again with sleepless nights of searching, dozens of new flyers on telephone posts, consultations with animal communicators, profilers, friendly callers, and emailers, and even a run in with the local police who thought we were spraying graffiti on a wall (actually it was spreading a trail of used cat litter, but we didn't tell them that for fear of getting arrested :-)). But no sign of NoTail....

08/06/04 Friday Update
Last night while we approached one of the secluded feeding stations in the complex, we both saw a black low-rider running away from the food. Couldn't see if it had a tail or not, too fast. NoTail is a low-rider, crouching when running away in fear...

08/04/04 Wednesday Update
Animal Control has no record of the black cat without a tail that was seen there on July 3rd by a volunteer. What to make of it??? The neighbor insures me that he doesn't know what happened, but believes NoTail was killed by a car on the street. Is he telling the truth? Can I believe anyone anymore? Still making u-turns every time I see a black thing on the street only to be chasing plastic bags and dead or dying crows... I miss NoTail so much! When I ask Fuzzy where he is, she just stares intently to the front door.

08/02/04 Monday Update
Another weekend gone by without a fleeting glimpse of NoTail. I am beginning to think that he may have been killed even before C returned home from work 4 days later. That thought kills me! Animal Control is giving me the run around regarding the cat without a tail that was seen there, have to go back yet again and speak to yet another person...

07/30/04 Friday Update
Another week gone by without a sighting. Where is he? I don't understand that he can disappear like that? Did he go through the Animal Shelter after all? We are following up on a sighting there...

07/26/04 Monday Update
Nothing, absolutely nothing. So close now to complete despair. Talked to lots of people, really nice cat people in the area, animal communicators, and cat profilers. Every single one of them wishing NoTail to be home. Myself most of all. By sheer will power and number, I should find him - right!?

07/23/04 Friday Update
NoTail is still out there! All the information I have gathered to date leads to this conclusion. He is very well capable of taking care of himself. Where ever he is hiding, I will find him!

07/22/04 Thursday Update
Animal Control claims there was no cat matching NoTail's description ever picked up or brought to the shelter in Baldwin Park...

07/20/04 Tuesday Update
Animal Control follow up will take some time. It seems, someone adopted a black cat without a tail on July 3rd between the volunteer leaving the shelter and me arriving around 4 pm the same day. I don't know what happened, but C should have seen this cat the Wednesday before when we spend a lot of time there looking at all the animals.

Thank you everybody for your continuing support. To date 7/19 we had over 230 visitors on this website wanting to know about NoTail's fate and growing each day!

07/19/04 Monday Update
Another eventful weekend passed and again without finding NoTail. Or even getting a glimpse of him that I had so hoped for. BUT I think I know where he is, and I feel he is alive. I received some information, that leads me to this conclusion. He is where I suspected him to be the first time I saw the place. And he is alive because he is smart and knows how to hide. Details on the search page. Then again, there are other leads that came up this morning, that I need to follow. A call from a volunteer at the Baldwin Park Shelter, that he was seen there. And a call from Covina, where yet another black cat without a tail lives. Details as they develop...

07/16/04 Friday Update
Okay, now everybody can call me officially crazy! Except the people that know better of course! I hired a pet communicator. Lets hope for the best!

And would the person that sets up traps for a spay/neuter program close by please call me. I left a flyer at one of the traps last night.