CARLSBAD: Owl-attacked cat a hit at auto shop

Fallbrook residents Richard and Monica Johnson went looking last summer for the biggest, toughest cat they could find to roust out mice infesting the second story of their newly acquired auto parts business in Carlsbad.

Instead, they ended up adopting a rather-battered-looking, scrawny teenage cat who had recently survived a harrowing owl attack in Temecula.

Richard Johnson, owner of Carlsbad Auto Supply, gives the store's cat named Auto a treat as he and his son Royal Johnson, right, work in the auto parts store in Carlsbad on Thursday. Auto, who survived an owl attack, lives in the store. (Photo by Hayne Palmour IV - Staff Photographer)

Fittingly re-named "Auto," the short-haired tabby still has at least a half-dozen scars from his battle with the big owl and he's not much of a mouser. Still, he has come to dominate Carlsbad Auto Supply on Tyler Street so much that the Johnsons and their employees said they can't imagine life without him.

"His story needs to be told," said employee Larry Entzminger, a self-described recovering cat-hater. "It's because of him that I (now) have a cat at home."

Entzminger has gone so soft on the cat that when he discovered Auto slyly drinking from his water glass Thursday morning, he simply smiled and patted him. Even the family's German shepherd lets the cat run the show ---- Auto sleeps in the dog's bed and eats the dog's biscuits.

But last summer, the cat's life wasn't so good.

His former owners ---- the people who dropped him off at a Temecula veterinarian's office and signed away their ownership rights because of the costly medical bills ---- told the vet that they had witnessed him being lifted into the air by an owl, said Laura Prindl of Mini Mutts N Meows Rescue in Temecula.

"They brought him in to the vet and they said, 'We saw the owl drop him,'" Prindl said. "It had to be a good-sized owl. He was at the vet for over a month. He was pretty beat up."

The cat was so bad off that the vet wasn't sure initially he would survive, she added.

"When I saw him, he had holes on either side. It looked like the owl had tried to get at the lungs," Prindl said.

After his medical condition stabilized, Prindl brought the "owl kitty" home and began hunting for someone who'd be willing to take a ratty-looking cat. She found just the right sort of family when Monica Johnson walked into a Temecula pet store during one of Prindl's adoption days last summer.

Johnson petted the cute little kittens in the cages, but told Prindl that what she really needed was a "Catzilla" ---- a tough cat that could bully the mice out of her shop.

"I started laughing," Prindl recalled Thursday. "I said, 'I have got the cat for you. He's nothing to look at. He's never going to win a beauty contest.'"

Johnson said Prindl probably thought that "a cat that's going to live in an auto parts store didn't have to be perfect looking." She agreed to take the cat sight unseen.

Within days, Auto was comfortably established in his new digs.

"He thinks he runs the place," Monica Johnson said.

A nearby shop owner comes by twice a day to give him salmon and a regular customer has created a Web photo site album starring Auto. When the Johnsons' house cat died a couple of months ago, Monica Johnson tried to relocate Auto from the shop to her home, but lost that battle.

Employees and customers circulated a petition and wrote up a job description of all the tasks Auto performs at the shop, including greeting shoppers. She capitulated and the cat stayed put.

"I don't think I had a choice," she said, laughing.

Prindl said she's thrilled to hear that Auto has such a happy life, saying she wishes every pet she finds could be as lucky. She's now looking for a home for "Snacker" ---- a 3-pound Chihuahua who was half-eaten by another dog, but survived. He's a fun-loving, smart little guy, but he's a bit of a handful to manage, she said.

"He's just full of trouble, and he's only 3 pounds," she said.

Call staff writer Barbara Henry at 760-901-4072. Continue ►