Learning to Swim

I have a rule…barn cats here must know how to swim.
I have a reason for that rule…our metal water trough holds 200 gallons of water. With 4 horses, when it’s hot, I’m filling this daily.
Cats have been known to walk the edges of the trough.
Cats have been known to fall off the edges of the trough.
Horses have been known to push cats off the edges of the trough.

200 gallons of water is deep when you are little. I do put a cinder block in there, so they can climb up on it and jump out, but, they have to get to the block in the first place…

So, barn cats must know how to swim.
And, I must take pictures of the process…

This was the first time a cat had to swim…

Oreo had been walking on the edge, balancing as only a cat can, and had fallen in. As you can see, the trough was almost full. I ultimately had to scoop her out, because she couldn’t quite catch the side well enough. And so, we knew, cats needed to know how to swim, and we needed something they could get a boost up off of in the water.

Xena was panicking at first…

“Oh, wait…I can stand up in this!”

We waited to give Xena, Felix and Grey their swim lessons until the trough was lower. Low enough that they could stand up and have their heads above the water.

Felix stood up right away, and had no problems leaping out.

GreyCat was not impressed.

She leaped out fairly easily, but stood on the fence yelling at me for putting her in the water.

And then there was Blue…who refused to go in, even after she was snuffled and licked by Ruby…

Second time she met Ruby up close and personal…

She wasn’t impressed with Ruby either time.
lol 😛

Sharing for Wordless Wednesday with Blog Paws, Create With Joy and Crafty Spices.