Posted on 11/01/2005 11:44:39 AM PST by Diana in Wisconsin
DEERFIELD, WI - Buddy is a pudgy 16-year-old tomcat whose owner is serving in Iraq until January, and no relatives are willing to look after him while his owner is gone.
Buddy's one bit of luck lately was the opening of Catnip Hill a month before his owner shipped off in June. Since then, Buddy has lived in an octagonal building surrounded by pastures and woods, and designed for feline tastes. He'll stay here until his owner comes back to the United States.
Buddy has one of 12 guest rooms, each with a window with a ledge beneath it. There, the cat guests can take in the views of the nearby horse pasture. Or they can retreat to the loft in their rooms for privacy.
Screened doors on the rooms face the center, so cats can watch the interior hotel action if they're so inclined.
The entertainment includes a traveling troupe of hamsters, playing in a cage that is wheeled around the hotel. "It's like cat TV," said Christine Heilman, the proprietor of Catnip Hill.
Hotel guests might sometimes find a feline visitor outside their screened door: Cats from other rooms, let out to stretch their legs in the common area, might stop by to sniff, sprawl or try to slip a paw under the door. Plexiglas on the bottom of the screen prevents them from making nose-to-nose contact, and spreading germs.
At the center of the $250,000 hotel is the immaculate modern kitchen, where Heilman serves up cat food in bright Fiestaware saucers, and fills bowls with purified water. Some of the guests get mail. Buddy hears from his human in Iraq, and a pair of enormous Maine Coon cats received a postcard from their owner, who is visiting France. Others need medicine such as insulin, which Heilman administers at no extra charge.
Catnip Hill is as serene as a spa, and, surprisingly, it smells nearly as nice. An extraction system intermittently pulls stale air from the building and replaces it with fresh air, and Heilman frequently makes the rounds to scoop litter pans.
Heilman stays with the cats for most of the morning, registering new guests and saying goodbye to others. Then she walks up a path lined with flowers and huge old trees to have lunch with her parents in the home they built on the five-acre property to share with their daughter and the family's six personal cats.
A baby monitor and smoke alarms in the 2,400-square-foot hotel will alert Heilman if anything's amiss. She'll return about 2:30 p.m. and stay until dinner, then make a final stop later in the evening.
Office space
Catnip Hill is also Heilman's office. She's an "Americanizer" for a British book publisher.
"I'm the person who takes the "u" out of "colour" in the American translation of books.
Heilman was living in London and working in a publishing office with a view of Big Ben when she hatched her plan to become the proprietress of a luxurious cat hotel.
"I wanted peace and quiet, and beautiful countryside," she said. "If I'd bought land in England, it would have been the size of a matchbox eight miles outside of London."
During Heilman's 13 years in England she'd fostered about two dozen cats. "I started wondering if I could get paid for doing this."
"Boarding catteries" are common in England.
"In the U.S., people give their neighbors a key and ask them to check in on their cats once a day," Heilman said. "In London, people don't do that. They barely know their neighbors. So a lot of people have these little boarding catteries in their back yards."
On the Internet, she found two luxury feline hotels, one in upstate New York and the other in Santa Cruz, Calif.
She asked the owners of those businesses about practical matters such as insurance, as well as, "Is it possible to make a living doing this?"
Assured that it was, Heilman made plans to move back to Wisconsin, buy rural land with her parents, Jim and Sherlyn Stiewe, and build a family home and separate cat hotel.
"My one condition was that it be near Madison so I could have a social life," said Heilman, who is single and 37 with a bachelor's degree in linguistics from UW-Madison.
Heilman enjoys the company of her guests during the day, as well as that of her "concierge" - a once-abandoned cat named Elizabeth who now occupies one of the Catnip Hill rooms.
"Cats are the perfect combination of wanting to be your companion, but also being independent and having their own inner life," she said.
The feline psyche
Cat guests often arrive with their special blankets, stuffed animals, baskets and treats. If owners don't bring their pets' special foods, Heilman provides premium cat food.
Each room has a mirror, so sunlight dances on the walls, plus a chair suitable for human visitors. Heilman and her mother brush the cats frequently during their stays.
"It's a good way to bond with them. If you go in Buddy's room, he will always want you to brush him."
She decided against using the common area as a place for cats to socialize because she didn't want them to spread colds or other illnesses.
"Cats aren't like dogs. They don't want to run around in a common area and explore. They want to have their own place where they feel safe."
Heilman said Catnip Hill is the only dog-free environment for cat boarding in south central Wisconsin; the next closest one is in the Oshkosh area. "Barking and dog smells are very disturbing to cats."
Each solo cat or "cat family" has a private room with a view. The single occupancy rate is $20 per day for a 5-by-6-foot room, with reduced prices for longer stays. The day rate per cat is also reduced when more than one member of a cat family share a room.
Heilman sometimes boards cats for Angel's Wish (the no-kill animal shelter in Verona) at minimal price. Or if, like Buddy, their human is in Iraq for a very long time, the boarding price is next to nothing.
The only sounds at Catnip Hill are an occasional mew and the radio. "The cats like talk radio the best," Heilman said.
She still doesn't know if she'll be able to make a go of the business she opened in May, but she's hopeful.
"All the rooms were filled in July because people were going on vacations, and I expect a lot of guests over Thanksgiving," she said. "A lot of people who've sent their cats here have made reservations for their next vacation."
Especially for senior cats
Heilman expects much of her clientele will be elderly cats.
"Special-needs cats are my target market," she said. "Many people think of their cats as one of their children. Most cats are keenly aware of their humans ... and they get very anxious if they're left alone."
One of Catnip Hill's repeat customers is Barb Fibich, of Middleton, the owner of 21-year-old female named Ernie.
"I don't know if cats get Alzheimer's, but she gets flaky and confused when she's left alone," Fibich said.
Ernie's next trip to Catnip Hill will be in January, when the family goes on a ski trip.
"Before I take her (to Catnip Hill), I'm going to spiff her up. I was embarrassed last time because she came home looking better than when we brought her in," she said.
For details about Catnip Hill, go to www.catnip-hill.com
"The cats like talk radio the best,"
My cats like Rush and Hannity. Makes them serene, even sleepy during these daytime shows.
I leave a radio tuned to conservative talk shows on during the day for my cat and dog. They get to hear more of Rush and Hannity than I do!
Loud, stinky dogs are disturbing for some humans too.
This isn't much more than my daughter paid last summer for her cat to stay in a much smaller kennel.
ping
Kitty Ping
That's what I pay a neighborhood teenager to walk my three dogs twice a day, feed them, and feed my four cats.
He comes to my house, which has a dog door, because the animals are calmer if they can stay at home while we're away.
What a marvelous place! Kudos to everyone involved.
What happened to the other thread? What'd I miss?
Chelsea Clinton in a wet T-shirt contest (link only). The VK's zotted it.
Great article, thanks for the ping SaA!
This gal gets paid to play with kitties and Americanize British authors' books. Did I *ever* make the wrong career choice! She's the same age as me and has figured out how to avoid that 30-mile commute I make every day and gets paid for easy editing work. Quite the clever lady.
That's right. When we evacuated for Hurricane Ivan last year, we called a local vet's office near the town we were staying and were quoted a price of $18 per day per cat, and that was to stay in cages.
When we went to pick them up as we were heading home, the lady refused to take payment from us. She said that anyone who cares enough about their pets to not leave them behind in a situation like that didn't owe her any money.
There are some pretty special people out there.
Hmmmm...I may have just found my post-retirement career.
Let me know if you need investors/partner. I'd love to spend my golden years surrounded by kitties. (I could train them to be my minions).
That does sound like a "purr-fect" set up, doesn't it? ;)
I'm always impressed with people who find a way to make a living while doing what they love to do, anyway.
Very cool! Glad you and your pets survived the hurricane!
My cats solve this problem by rubbing against my dogs, transfering that nice kitty scent. The dogs seem to like it too.
She smells like Snuggle fabric sheets and she's so soft; what a cutie she is.
Dogs always have that musty doggy smell to them except after they come from the groomer. I like dogs, I'm just more of a cat person.
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