Jeff The Giant Orange Cat passed away this afternoon. We think he was 16 years old.

He was taken to the emergency vet last Saturday after a brief seizure-like episode. It was caused by anemia, which turned out to be related to an acute kidney infection. Treatment for the kidney infection involved a lot of fluids, which apparently exacerbated an underlying heart condition and resulted in congestive heart failure. After 2-3 days in an oxygen cage and various courses of treatment, he was still unable to breathe comfortably without oxygen support. His condition worsened this afternoon and nothing more could be done.

Our devastation cannot be described. When our former neighbor moved away and left Jeff behind, it turned out to be one of the best things that ever happened to us. We can only look back on the seven years he spent with us and hope we provided him a happy retirement; Jeff seemed pleased enough to come inside with us and leave his hunting days behind.

What Jeff Killed was started because the neighbor’s giant cat started leaving dead things in our backyard, and for some reason it seemed interesting enough to put online. At that time we had no idea of the fan base that would come to follow Jeff, or the level of international interest. We know of no other cat controversial enough to receive death threats. We never anticipated interview requests, or that one day a post about him liking french fries would result in receiving coupons addressed to Jeff from Carl’s Jr. Most of all we never anticipated that Jeff would later choose us to be his Staff, or how completely we would love him. We didn’t plan for all the directions Jeff took us in, but we are grateful he did.

We thank all those who took an interest in Jeff and followed him over the years. We thank you for your comments, gifts, emails, and fan art/music. Most of all we thank you for loving animals and loving your pets as we loved Jeff.

This is our last photo of Jeff; he was helping us play Hay Day. We will miss him always.