Will says: My wife and I volunteer for SPCALA here in Southern California. We are in our ninth year and have fostered more than 300 cats and kittens. We have turned spare bedrooms into kitten rooms and have had as many as 19 fosters in the house at one time. In addition to photographing our fosters, for the past several years I have been photographing most of the cats and kittens that come through our adoption center in Long Beach.

Tuffy was born about a week and a half before Christmas of 2006 at a construction site in Long Beach, CA. When the mother cat disappeared, construction workers tried bottle feeding Tuffy and his three siblings and then took them over to Long Beach Animal Care Services on Sunday, New Year's Eve. Long Beach Animal Control and SPCALA, Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals Los Angeles, share the same facility with Long Beach Animal Control taking charge of animal control functions and SPCALA running the adoption facility. The kittens needed to be bottle fed and were given to SPCALA almost immediately. The afternoon is not an ideal time for bottle babies to be coming into the shelter because of the difficulty of finding someone to take care of them. My wife and I were volunteering at the shelter, and since we had the room available at home and were experienced foster parents, giving the kittens to us to foster was a no-brainer.

Tuffy and his siblings turned out to be among the most photogenic kittens that we ever had in foster care. Tuffy was a very normal kitten but he and the camera seemed to really hit it off. His facial expressions were his forte and hopefully you can see that in some of the photographs. He in particular would wrestle a lot with his sister Muffy, though Tuffy would often get the worst of it. I like to use a cat toy called a "cat dancer" to move the kittens around, get action out of them, and to get them to look toward the camera. Tuffy became bored with it very quickly but he seemed to always find new things to play with, even pieces of paper. Of course, to kittens, everything is a toy and they just have to figure out how to play with it. When he was ready, Tuffy was adopted to be a companion for another cat.

All Photos Courtesy of and ©: Will and Kathey Haas
Will and Kathey generously share hundreds of photos they've taken of needy kittens on their Flickr account and their Photobucket account

Comments and LOLs:
Lilly_Meadow -
Lilly_Meadow
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68 points
What a gorgeous little one! I adore his smiles and the wink :)
lisaboese -
lisaboese
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What a beautiful, sweet, sweet kitty; wish I had him!!!!
M -
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Hahaha, I have a hard time chosing a favorite picture! Such spunk, I love this little kitty. :D
Kephara -
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Kephara
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I love this little cutie!
Kayli -
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Kayli
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I have never seen a cat wink before! You're right, he is very photogenic!
paulajeanne -
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paulajeanne
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Holy Cuteness -
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Yeah, kitty wink!
amycats -
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amycats
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Tuffy and his "tuff-guy" pose?
wolfgirl66 -
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wolfgirl66
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Sooooooooooooo ADORABLY CUTE!
Koala10 -
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Koala10
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70 points
Eeempossibly cute ! What a little ham. Marmies are so special.
docsquid -
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docsquid
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He is a wonderful little boy - like you say, very photogenic. I love this one!
Amy -
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Amy
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Love this one! He's got his little model face going :)
sheephead -
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sheephead
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kittycatluvr -
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kittycatluvr
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BirmanMama -
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BirmanMama
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Sweet smiling baby! Indeed he's very photogenic. It was hard to pick a favorite. I hope he found a great furrever home.
Natthecat -
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Natthecat
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Tuffy indeed. Was he adopted, do you know? Or did you keep him?
mma -
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mma
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sweet, sweet, sweet; love the photos, esp. the winking one.
ChanurCousin -
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ChanurCousin
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I got mine!!!
Siobhan -
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Siobhan
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Siobhan -
Siobhan
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What an adorable expression!
MomcatSooma -
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MomcatSooma
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misscriss -
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misscriss
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Woah! That was sour!
Shelley -
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Shelley
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Shelley -
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Shelley
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Shelley -
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455 points
Shelley -
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Awesomejoha -
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I love this pic. I wanna cry, he is so cute!
lamenta3 -
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lamenta3
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MoreKittens4Me -
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MoreKittens4Me
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Snowysmom -
Snowysmom
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395 points
Tuffy is absolutele precipus! I hope he found his forever home - or did you keep him? He's so sweet!
demiller -
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demiller
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EFM411 -
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efm411
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Yeah..right!
efm411 -
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efm411
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I'm a stand in for Yoda on the next episode of Star Cat.
kibblegirl -
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kibblegirl
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Tuffy is showing his tough side in this photo. He is adorable. Wonderful photos. I enjoyed looking at all of them as I just love orange tabbies.
Smooch -
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Smooch
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My cat Smooch loves to tear strips off newspapers too! Tuffy is a very handsome ginger boy.
IttyBitty96 -
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IttyBitty96
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skyeltd -
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skyeltd
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skyeltd
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skyeltd
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akk -
You are a wonderful photographer. You really know how to capture the personality....And, he is adorable, of course!
BooBooKitty -
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BooBooKitty
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CareAboutCats -
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CareAboutCats
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Smiling kitty! What a character!
Caillie -
Caillie
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I love seeing a kitty's first meeting with a mirror. What a great photo of a most handsome kitty!
JohnandPiper -
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itigger2 -
itigger2
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I could not pick a favotite. He is adorable beyond belief. I hope he found a furever home. Also thank you and your wife for the work you do
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wokkawokka
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229 points
Oh my God, he's so cute!!! I love his expression here, he's almost like a living cartoon.
CatFancy68 -
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LOL i love this shot! You should send in a photo to Lifetime's photo contest on their site. I just sent in one of my cat Lily, if you win you could get free cat food for a year or cash prizes. I figure I could use either and so could most ppl. http://www.mylifetime.com/sweepstakes/c…
Chris -
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Love the meerkat pose :-)



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