Cat stalks beagle.

A few weeks after we got Toast, then a little ball of furry snooziness, we started letting her out in the garden.  After the first week of tentativeness she discovered the cat entrance to the shed and dashed in there and hid whenever she was outside.  She gradually got braver but the scratch evidence suggested that, in fights, she was either running away or lying passively on her back. 

Then she grew some more. 

A couple of days ago I came home to find a tom hanging around the front yard.  This is the same tom that tortured  Mousie in the last few months of her life and left unpleasant fragrances and heaps around the back door just to make it perfectly clear that poor little Mouse had ceded her territory in her decrepitude.  (The cat world is a cruel one.)

Later, the husband heard a cat fight and dashed outside to see the stripey tom and Toast flash by, with the tom in the lead. 

Then, today, a beagle came into the garden.  Toast disappeared into the basil patch then 20 seconds later came out and started stalking the beagle.  The beagle got slightly freaked (as you would being stalked by a smallish cat) and went and hid behind the disused chicken yard.

Lets face it, our little Toasty has hit her prime.  Bring on the wildebeest.

Just watch the horns Toasty, and save me the ribs - I have a recipe.