I took Poe to the vet clinic early in the morning and did not return with him until 6 pm. But there's good news: his kidneys are perfect!! His bloodwork was completely normal.
He does have feline AIDS but no leukemia. More decent news. He was neutered, vaccinated, dewormed, and given flea meds, IV fluids, treatment for his fight wounds and antibiotics. And seriously drugged up. He was exhausted when I got him home. I put him on his blue chair and gave him a soft, cool sheet to rest on. I opened two windows in his room and refilled his water bowl. He stayed in the chair most of the night.
When we got to the clinic I found out that the relief vet was on - that meant that we would be charged full price for his treatment - about $350. Quite a difference from the free treatment we recieved for Hugo. But when I went to pick him up one of the regular vets had arrived and gave me a "courtesy" discount - $200 off of the total bill from the stray cat fund. Nice. I owe them some chocolates and coffee.
Now, the neighbor's daughter (I'll call her Persephone) had named him before he was rescued. She named him "Popo", which means "Kiss" in Korean. I was later informed by Jaypo that Popo means something altogether different in Hawaiian.
Well, the relief vet loved this story. After she got my information she went in back to set up his chart, only to burst back into the exam room when she heard about his name. "I have to know", she said, "how did you come up with the name Poe?"
I told her that all of our cats (except Watson) are named after composers, painters or authors. Thus, Edgar Allen Poe. That way the name Popo won't sound so strange to me. Upon hearing this, the vet became terribly excited and began frantically reciting "The Raven" but with some kind of strange cat hunting metaphors. This took me completely by surprise and between her fast paced ramblings and amazing recall of Poe literature I was speechless. I have to admit I am greatly lacking in familiarity with Poe so I had to use my best fake laugh when she was finished. But it wasn't completely fake, her wild twisitng of classic poetry had me in stiches anyway.
The big challenge now: finding him a home.
This is probably a good time for an update on Hugo as well. Hugo has made incredible progress. He is quite healthy, and amazingly social. He loves being petted and brushed. He follows me everywhere in the downstairs shelter, and he's practically a lap kitty.
More later.
Here he is, from wretched street stray to beloved house cat. All in one night. That was easy. For those of you who don't know, this striped stray kitty has been hanging around our house for probably about six months now. We were not able to catch him in our humane trap and I was forced to watch him slowly starve to death right before my eyes. The neighbor's kids were also very worried, and they were becoming attached to him.
Well after several weeks of worrying and frustration, we decided to give up on the trap and try to get him eating at our porch on a regular schedule. He was becoming emaciated and coming around less and less. I only saw him once every three or four days.
But last night he appeared on the front porch, and I tried a different strategy: I put some tuna fish on a plate and simply opened the downstairs door. Wouldn't you know it, he walked right in. That doesn't work with most strays. But of course he panicked big time when I shut the door behind him, and I have no idea how I managed to get him into his private room. But I did and we managed to move some furniture in there to make him comfortable.
By the way, yes the floor looks dirty but it's just cedar litter. Cats manage to spread it everywhere, and it's easy to vacuum up. But there's no way on earth I'm going to subject him to the vacuum right now. The room is otherwise very clean. He really likes his catnip mouse. The next huge hurdle is getting him to the vet.
Right now I'm preparing for the worst; he's so thin there's a chance he may be in kidney failure. It wouldn't be surprising; he's been getting food anywhere he can find it, and that can put him at risk for poison ingestion. But we'll just have to wait and see. His appetite has been great, though. If he's healthy, the next giant hurdle will be finding him a home. And of course the minor hurdle, giving him a name.
In case you don't know, we run a small stray cat shelter in the first floor of our duplex. We began in 2000 when we rescued a cat named Earl. We thought we could get him veterinary care and find him a home, but it turned out that he had feline AIDS and feline leukemia. The vet I worked for at the time told us to have Earl destroyed. We found a shelter by the coast just for Earl and our other double-positive cats, but her shelter closed last year.
This cat pictured is our newest stray. We have not had the time nor money to take him into our shelter. This is what he looked like a few months ago. He disappeared for a while, then came back.
This is what he looks like now. He's lost a lot of weight, and I can see his ribs. The first picture was taken through our second floor window, because he was terrified of people and I could not get near him.
In this photo, I'm sitting right in front of him. He's letting me get close because he's starving and I have wet food for him. What happens with AIDS infected cats is they get mouth ulcers, and it becomes terribly painful to eat dry food. So he has to wait for me to bring him wet food every day.
But now, the other, stronger neighbor's cats are chasing him away because he's weak. I only see him every few days. Our neighbor's young daughter is begging me to trap him and take him into our shelter. But we just don't have the money yet. I don't want him to die in the meantime.
I will repeat this message, I think all animal shelters in the United States should become stray-only, like they used to be in the early 1900s. There are too many people using shelters as a drive-through for pets that they don't want anymore. We need to rescue our truly homeless pets first. Please see my Gray Stray blog for more info.
This is why I am thinking of trying to get a nonprofit status for our shelter. We're leaving out high-quality dry food all day just to have the neighbor's cats eat it, and it's costing us a fortune. My friend told me I could probably just put out a donation can in stores. Does anyone know the legalities of this sort of thing? Any ideas would be greatly apprecieated.
PEACE! ;)
Hugo on his new blanket.
If you haven't read Hugo's backstory, you can find it here: http://maya086.vox.com/library/post/hugo-wolf.html
I can safely say that he is now completely stable and as healthy as he will ever be. Sometime during the summer we might let him have the run of the house (in the downstairs duplex) and see how he does.
Mentally he's stuck in his old unsocialized stray pattern. I still can't touch him or approach him. He has to approach me first, and when he does he only wants to sniff my hand and run under the bed.
It could take years to make progress, but we're not going anywhere. So we can wait.
Isn't he cute?
Hugo sleeping on his new $37 blanket from Dave's. Don't get me wrong, he's worth it. But since he's so sick I won't throw it in the laundry so when it gets dirty I just have to buy him another one. We live really far away from any public laundrymats
Plus it's not great for the environment, plus Dave's sells reptiles and other animals that should be living in the wild, not in some glass box.
We have very little to complain about - Hugo has been a real gentleman, is using the litterbox, is very gentle, and is very neat and clean. Not bad for an unsocialized stray. Plus I think he's pretty happy.
Our newest stray to begin hanging out at the igloo is limping. I think his left front leg is injured.
That happened to Earl, he began limping a week before we caught him and brought him to Laurel. We took Earl to the vet, and they shaved his leg to get a better look.
Well, Earl's leg was riddled with holes. It was unreal. The vet said he had been most likely "nailed" by a raccoon. His leg was swollen and painful. Earl was fortunate that we were able to get him the rabies vaccine and keep him indoors until we got him to Laurel.
This poor guy is not so lucky. I hope it's a minor injury.
Have you been affected by the pet food recall? Has it changed the way you feed your pets?
As a veterinary technician, cat rescuer and behaviorist, it had a tremendous impact on me. My first emotion: sheer frustration. The misconceptions are running rampant. I wish to share my knowledge with others. The two most important concepts that I learned: 1. Cats, dogs, rabbits, etc are each extremely unique in their needs. 2. Nutrition is an exact science. The wrong amount of nutrients, either too much or too little, can cause fatal heart damage, blindness, toxicity, etc. Good intentions do nothing for an animal's physical health. Work with an animal doctor so you don't kill your pet.
After years of independent study, it was clear that guardians' misconceptions about nutrition for their companions is killing their pets. It's not as simple as cooking at home for companions, and it's also not as simple as "all pet foods are the same".
My next emotion was anger. The fact that several companies, who shall remain unnamed, tested the contaminated products and hid the facts from pet owners, resulting in thousands of deaths, did not surprise me but gave me major palpitations. It's criminal, period.
Then, panic. I emailed the company who make the pet food that I use for my cats. They assured me that their food is inspected by a human food auditing company, and no corn or wheat is used in their products. They do, however, use the same manufacturer implicated in the recall.
I am seeing the sharks emerge in this fiasco, raw pet food companies playing on people's fears for their own profit, people embracing blind mistrust in perfectly good and nutritionally advanced pet food that has managed to extend domestic animal's lives by many years, and general rumors and misinformation spreading everywhere.
* I should mention that there are new reasons to avoid feeding fish to cats. Besides the fact that fish contains thiaminase, and is a very common allergen in cats, there is research being done which suggests that a diet high in fish may be responsible for feline hyperthyroidism.
There is a very good article online called "What's Really In Pet Food". I urge people to read the entire document, and educate themselves for the sake of their pets. http://www.api4animals.org/facts?p=359&more=1
Alas, there are two new strays wandering my street and hanging out at the Igloo. I found this handsome guy lounging in my neighbor's driveway on Saturday. His coat looks fabulous because of the wallet-melting cat food I leave out for the strays, and it is tempting to think he has a home. But he is unneutered and at best he is an "outdoor only" cat who is not well cared for.
Monday night, however, I opened the front door to find a tiny silvery-gray spotted cat barreling down the front porch stairs, overturning the stray cat food bowl on his way out. It was late in the evening and pitch-dark, so I did not see much of him or her. Sadly I barely have room and funding for Hugo right now, as much as I would like to help these two strays. I hope that through this blog I can network, idea swap and find solutions with other cat lovers.
Here is a wonderful "after" picture of Hugo Wolf, in his new home. The "before" pictures can be found a few posts down under the heading "HUGO WOLF". In any case, Hugo is healing really well and he is completely comfortable. His hearing came back. He has a big appetite and he loves catnip, despite the fact that I used catnip to lure him into the big scary trap three times!
Hugo was never socialized so he sure isn't a lap kitty. He is, however, getting used to me and he now stays on the bed when I enter the room, and he even falls asleep while I'm in there. It's a good sign!
