Kitty pity party

Sadly I am still pretty much immobile, relying on bedrest and prescription meds to hopefully help me heal up soon.  Poor Steve is left to keep the house running as well as taking care of me, I can't even dress myself.

Enough of that pity party, you came here to read about cats.  Annex Cat Rescue has kindly taken on some of my recent rescues, the kittens born in a trap are ready for adoption.  The black one already found a great home but Captain Charisma and Dr Hush Hush are still available. http://annexcatrescue.ca/adopt/.  Aren't those fantastic names? I can't take credit for them, Raven came up with them.

Bella and Twix are also kittens I rescued that are on the Annex site.

Twix

I've moved on to Orange is the New Black in my lying in bed video watching.  I really hope soon to be better, the weather is beautiful and I've got stuff to do!  

And then you stop

I forgot how much I take my mobility for granted and how much I do until I was picking up a large pot on Sunday to do some plantings and then my back just went.

Since then I've been in terrible pain and can barely do anything.  Bending over to feed cats or scoop litter boxes is excruciating.  Thanks to so many people for helping out, I've had to cancel all the things I was planning to do and just lie in bed, it's the only position that doesn't hurt.  I just can't do anything, this is the worst back issue I've ever had, so I really need to heal up.  I hate this!  Well the only upside is I'm catching up on Justified while lying in bed.  

Over the weekend I got a call from Colleen, she's the woman I help out with 11 cats and no money. She was being evicted this week and nowhere to go.  I really didn't know how to help but found it very stressful and now I can't reach her to find out was has happened.

Who needs a cat cafe?!

We were in Montreal recently and visited one of the two cat cafes there, it was fun but I have more cats in my home than the cat cafe did.  I kept thinking why don't I invite people in my home, charge them four bucks for a coffee and have them pat my cats?

Or right now we could do that at Susan's too, luckily her upstairs tenant moved out and instead of renting it out we've turned into quarters for cats!

A week or so ago I was trapping at a little colony and trapped this beautiful girl, I pretty much knew that she wasn't feral and well she wasn't but she did not like recovering in a cage and promptly bit Joanne, who ended up with an infection.  Thankfully Susan agreed to take in Ava, and she's been wonderful there, friendly and sweet.  We are hoping this trend continues so we can find her a great home, she's tiny and only about seven months old.  Maybe she was abandoned as a kitten and had to fend for herself, I wish they carried their stories with them.

Little Ava

Susan also took in some kittens, one of those situations where kittens were being given away no questions asked.  This litter is adorable and will get vetted and go off to new homes.

Kittens at play

So if you need a kitten fix better act quickly, I've been going in during the day while Susan is at work but I can't stay long those kittens are too cute and cuddly, it's dangerous.

This Victoria Day is better than the last

It was the middle of last May that our beloved Buddy burst through a screen in the middle of the night and eluded us for 32 days.  It was 32 days of hell, with little sleep, lots of weight loss, middle of the night sightings and many trapping failures.  We still have PTSD and are paranoid about open doors and windows.  We spent last Victoria Day standing on the street and the laneway terrified Buddy would run with the fireworks that take place in our park every year.  We cursed every bang.

It was a relief tonight to just enjoy them.

Fireworks at our park

Our Bud Bud

Unfortunately poor Joanne isn't having such a good Victoria Day.  We trapped an older kitten last week who clearly wasn't feral and Joanne was working with her, but I'm still not sure what was going on, she bit her this morning and the bite has become infected so off to the hospital she's gone.  She seems like a nice cat, we've moved her to Susan's, and will see how she does.

More kitten tales

In my last post I was having a mini-rant about free kittens and being aware of the potential costs of having a cat companion.  Well, here's a perfect example of a situation where that came into play.  I was forwarded a kijiji ad that said they had a kitten with a broken rib and couldn't afford medical care and would somebody help.  I sighed and looked around, I guess I was that somebody.  I ended up talking to a young girl the story was murky but their cat had kittens and the kitten fell or something and was injured.  They had no money, no car and no way to help the kitten, and to top it off the kitten was in Mississauga.  Thanks to Avril for offering to pick up the kitten and to THS for agreeing to take him right away, little Jeremy was delivered yesterday afternoon to the THS to get much needed medical care and a good home.  Avril said the house was full of animals, big dogs, a litter of puppies (surely destined to be sold), and of course an unspayed cat.  Little Jeremy is lovely, when I picked him up he was tiny and I could feel something wrong on his side, I know he's in good hands now.  

Injured kitten

Maria who feeds in the west end and has a female she just can't trap, found a litter of kittens a few weeks ago, no surprise there.  Thankfully she got them while they are young and has been able to tame them up, in a few weeks they will go to THS for adoption and be snapped up I'm sure.

Maria's kittens

Beware the free kitten

It seems funny but there appears to be a shortage of kittens, at least with THS and the rescues. Maybe it was the cold winter or all the spay neuter, I'm not really sure.  Unfortunately it's not that way on kijiji, if you browse there as I occasionally do there are people still giving away kittens for free or selling kittens who have not had any vetting.  I worry that people take in a free kitten not realizing how much vaccinations and spay neuter cost.  Beyond that, even with a kitten or young cat you need to somehow put aside money for medical issues.

Just last week our ten month old kitten Oliver became very lethargic.  I knew something was wrong when he didn't help clean the house.  He was still eating though, but sleeping way too much, so I took him to the vet where they found he had a fever.  I was terrified that he might have FIP, a terrible disease that mostly affects kittens and is fatal.  So we did an X-ray, and bloodwork and was sent home with antibiotics, hello and goodbye $700.  A month ago we did a cardiac ultrasound on him due to a heart murmur, that was $900.  Now maybe I could have been conservative and not done those things, but he's my baby and I love him and I want to do all I can for him.  Thankfully the antibiotics are working and he's back to his old self, I'm just praying it was just a passing infection and not a marker of anything more serious.  I'm grateful that we had the money to care for him but it's not something that everyone considers when adopting.

My baby Oliver

Joanne has gotten happy updates from Clara and Cassie's new homes.  Talk about success stories.

Clara in her new home

Clara and her new friend

In other good news, the diabetic cat has found a foster!  A wonderful woman named Tara has offered to bring him home, she's never done insulin injections before but is willing to learn.  Yay!

Dumped in a cardboard box

One of the vets I use called me to ask for my help.  They had come in that morning and found a cardboard box by their back door with a cat inside.  Who does that?  

SunnyBoy as the vet is calling him is an older gent, and after running bloodwork discovered he is diabetic.  One of the rescues in town had originally agreed to take him but couldn't find a foster to deal with the diabetes so they contacted me to see if I had any ideas.

Diabetes isn't such a big deal but many people find the idea of twice daily insulin injections daunting. Sometimes though with the proper diet it can go into remission, who knows what kind of care he was receiving.  I'm sharing like crazy in hopes someone will help this lovely guy, he's friendly and sweet.

Six years!!

It's May and that means that I'm celebrating/bemoaning my six year anniversary of getting involved with feral cats.  Ah that fateful day when I saw an article about feral cats in the portlands and contacted Aaffien.  Sometimes I think it was the worst decision of my life but those are the bad days. On the good days I know I have changed the lives of hundreds and hundreds of cats for the better and met wonderful people along the way.

Of the two cats I trapped this week, one was pregnant and the other orange boy is tameable so that's good news.  Princess has been spayed and will soon return home.  The kittens have moved up to Raven's bathroom.  I visited last night and watched the black one play with his very first toy.  I hope they lead wonderful long lives as beloved pets.

I decided to help the neighbour after all and today I caught one and a woman braver than me from another rescue got two and a nasty bite for her trouble.  The good news there is they have all gone to a vet to be boarded and hopefully will join my neighbour in her new home.    There are still one or two more to go....

I'm sharing a picture Gerri took of Clara, a success story too.  Clara was relocated to our colony a year and a half ago, stuck around, then disappeared, and I found her emaciated and ill half a kilometre away. Unable and unwilling to return her to the colony, she went off to Gerri's sanctuary.  Look how fat she is!  She has joined the outside gang there and clearly is very happy.  Some other friends and I have this dream of a Safe Gardens project, spaces where ferals could be safely enclosed, ah we just need money and space for that.

Clara at Gerri's sanctuary