Guy Installs Owl Nesting Box And Finds A Fluffy Intruder Inside

The other day, Harry Saddler set up a small nesting box in his backyard, hoping to give local owls a safe place to rest. He secured the tiny box to a tall tree, then retreated to his house, anxiously awaiting his first flying visitors.

Someone stopped by Saddler’s nesting box just a few moments later, but to his surprise, the box’s first guest didn’t have wings at all.

Instead, he had round paws and a long, fluffy tail.

“This is not what we were hoping to attract when we installed nest boxes,” Saddler wrote on X, previously Twitter.

When Saddler grabbed his binoculars to get a closer look, his biggest fear was confirmed: A cat was inhabiting the nesting box.

An avid birder, Saddler was immediately concerned that the cat’s presence posed a threat to local wildlife. But he’d also never seen this particular cat roaming around his Melbourne, Australia, neighborhood, which worried him even more.

Saddler took a picture of the cat curled up inside the nesting box and posted it to a local community group, hoping to find his family.

Thankfully, someone was looking for the cat. As it turned out, he had a home of his own — he just didn’t know how to get back to it.

“I’m very happy to report that rather than being a free-roaming or stray cat, [he]’s an indoor cat which slipped out last night and ran off …” Saddler wrote in an update on X. “[T]he cat’s owner came and got [him].”

Saddler’s quick thinking saved the cat from spending another night alone in the woods. And his favorite birds finally have a safe place to land in his yard again.

For an animal lover like Saddler, there’s no better feeling than knowing everyone in his community is safe and sound.