Mayberry is one of four siblings at Tabby,s Place. Two of her siblings are already on hold to be adopted and Momcat Halladay has already found her forever home. Mayberry was born on or about 3/26/13. She is an orange tabby head, back, and tail, with white paws, a white tummy, and white on her face. She is a little furry ball of energy and speed who is also an affectionate, purry little mite when she is not galloping around like a maniac. She has not been spayed yet because she is too small but we will attend to that when she has grown a bit.

Here’s where things get challenging. Halladay, the mother of Mayberry and her siblings, is FIV+. The standard test for whether a cat is FIV+ involves antibodies, but kittens are rarely tested this way. Why? Because Mothers pass antibodies to their kittens when the little ones are developing in the womb, so any cat under the age of six months tested by this old method is likely to come up with a positive reading, even if the cat isn’t really FIV+. However, there is now a very new test that looks for the presence of the virus itself—antigens, not antibodies. Antigens are not usually passed from Momcats to their kittens, though it is possible. So a kitten who tests positive for FIV under the new test is very likely to be FIV+. The system isn’t foolproof; both Mayberry and her siblings MUST be tested again at around six months of age. However, given the results from this newer test, we think it very likely that Cole, Mayberry,s brother, is FIV+, and we think it very likely that Mayberry and her other two siblings are not FIV+.