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Community Corner

Five Newborn Kittens Saved Before Irene

The employees of the Weston Gardens and Lou Ten Landscaping found five little surprises just hours before chaos erupted.

While many of Weston's residents were rushing to grocery stores and gas stations the night before Irene barged in, the Weston Gardens and Lou Ten Landscaping were beautifying the land for her arrival. Little did they know that they would find five newborn kittens just in the nick of time.

"[Lou Ten] was with a few of his guys," Debbie Giannelli, owner of the Weston Gardens, explained. "They were weeding and the weeds were so thick that they were using a hedge trimmer."

Giannelli believes that if Ten and his crew had used a weed-wacker, the kittens would have been killed. Not only were the five felines saved by Ten's choice in gardening tools, but they were found by the crew just in time. The kittens were found Friday morning, according to Giannelli. blew in on Saturday and stuck around until Sunday.

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"All of them still had their umbilical chords attached," Giannelli said. "We think they were born Wednesday night or early Thursday morning."

Giannelli, her daughter and her friend, Beth Low, have been caring for the kittens since their discovery between and the firehouse. Although the crew looked for the kittens' mother, she was nowhere to be found.

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"The mother wasn't their when [Lou Ten Landscaping] got there, and no-one has seen her since," Giannelli explained. "Nobody knows who this cat was and we'll never know."

Although the kittens have been abandoned by their mother, they will not go a day in their lives without family. Giannelli has found homes for each and every one of them. One of the landscapers that participated in the rescue of the kittens will be taking one home to his elderly mother, according to Giannelli.

"It doesn't take long to find kittens homes around here," Low said. "As soon as people know they're around, they want one."

For the next eight weeks, Giannelli, her daughter and Low will be caring for the kittens. They have created a schedule of care for each of the kittens. One has even recieved her first manicure, and for good reason.

"There are two orange kitties, so we painted the toe of one of the kitten's nails so that we know which one has been fed and which one hasn't," Giannelli explained.

Giannelli plans to get the kittens to their rightful homes by the third week of October. With her experience caring for animals, she feels that they will not be ready to leave her care until then.

"They take a tremendous amount of care, we even need to help them poop and pee because newborn kittens can't do that," Low explained. "The mother has to stimulate them to or else they get backed up and die, so that's part of our job right now."

Gianelli believes that the discovery of the five kittens was a silver lining in the weake of Irene. She has no doubt in her mind that they wouldn't have survived the next day.

The question remains — how many are going to be named Irene?

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