Oh, how lovely it feels outside right now! I did my morning rounds and even remembered to wear a lighter coat instead of my parka, so I wouldn’t over heat.
What I didn’t do was break out little Spewie to clear the rest of the driveway. Not today!
As far as the pain levels go, I could do it, but I know myself well enough by now to know that if I did, I would be useless for the next couple of days – and we’ve got too much going on in the next while!
One of those things is to hopefully be able to snag this fluffy lady and get her to the vet on the 30th.
She needs a name, still. So far, no name seems to stick, other than “fluffy lady”, and we have several of those!
After I took this picture, I tried to reach out to pet her, but she kept backing off. I was able to move around and reach her more from behind. Once I started to pet her, she was good with it. She does love to be pet, and I was even able to give her double handed skritches on either side of her head. But we can’t just walk up to her, or reach out to her. We still have to sort of sneak in to pet her.
I am 99% sure she is pregnant right now. Last year, she’s the one who dropped her litter all over the yard and abandoned them, leaving me to have to euthanize the survivors. She got pregnant very late in the season. This year, she went into heat so early, there is almost no chance of survival for her kittens. Especially if she drops her litter again, like last year. So getting her spayed is a higher priority than getting Brussel spayed. We know Brussel knows how to be a mother. The chances of her kittens surviving is still really, really low, just because of the time of year, but we do know she has a safe nest somewhere beyond the inner yard.
As for which male we are able to catch, it could be any one of several friendly males. It might even be this one.
I was actually petting both Magda, when she was up on the shelf, and Kohl (you can just see Magda’s face beside Kohl, near the window) when this tabby pushed himself in, demanding pets. I believe this is the male that was pretty sick for a while, and allowed us to tend to him. He’s grown quite a bit since then!
It was interesting to see these three, plus a couple more kittens on the cat bed inside, and realize they are all almost the same age. There would be only days or, at most, a couple of weeks age difference between them. Magda, another grey and white, and a black and white cow baby the girls call The Grink, are all really, really tiny. Then there’s this tabby, Kohl and her brother, Rabi, who are all so much bigger! Kohl and Rabi were the first litter last year, so they are the oldest among the kittens, but by this time, the others should have caught up.
With things freezing in the snow and being visible that would normally not be seen in the summer, we have a pretty good idea of why some of these kittens are really small. At least one of them has a serious case of round worms. I was very perplexed when I found what turned out to be frozen throw up. There was nothing in the ice but these worms; no partially digested food or anything like that. I’ve seen tape worms before, but I’ve never seen roundworms before, so I was quite perplexed by what I saw. They are very curly!
I’d sent a picture to the Cat Lady (it’s a good thing we’re such friends! 😄😂) and she identified it for me. These are the worms that Button had. He needed to be treated for worms three times before he was clear of them. During treatment, she said it was like he was pooping spaghetti, it was so bad! Once he was clear of them, though, he started growing again, and is now almost normal size for his age. Still on the small side, but not abnormally so.
The question is, how do we even begin to treat yard cats for round worms? It’s not like we can give them a pill. For starters, we have no idea which cat had those throw ups I found. We’d have to basically treat all of them – yesterday, I got a head count of possibly 36 – and just hope we get the infected ones. I lean towards thinking it’s The Grink, a cat we can’t get close to, but there are the two other very tiny cats that likely also have them.
One of the recommendations is to feed them pumpkin. Which would be great if we could do cat soup for the outside cats. Without heated food bowls, though, we had to stop giving them the kibble we softened with warm water we’d been doing in the fall. We could mix in the lysine and ground pumpkin seed with that. When the softened kibble started freezing before they could finish eating it, there was no point in continuing. Once we start consistently getting temperatures above freezing, we can start softening the kibble for them again. That makes dosing them with supplements easier. Not that there’s any way to control the doses this way, but at least they’d get some.
The jury is out on how well pumpkin actually words for this. It might be worth getting more of the Happy Poops stuff as a supplement. Looking up the ingredients – pumpkin, flax seed, coconut, chicory root, turmeric, ginger and banana – I found that several of them were noted as helping against worms. The larger jar would be pretty expensive, though. It’s one thing to buy it for the inside cats, where we at least know that they won’t just get infested again. Quite another to get something like that for yard cats.
There’s only so much we can do for them, but we do the best we can.
I swear, it was more hectic as soon as I got home than with the running around I did earlier!
The Cat Lady and I met up after I dropped the cats off at the vet, then had breakfast at McRaunchies at the Walmart. She started handing me things for the back of the truck.
The big reusable bag, the cat bed, the small bags of cat food under it, and the big bag on the other side, are all from the Cat Lady. These are all things she can no longer feed her own cats, because it all has chicken in it, and The Wolfman keeps steeling into it, even though they give him things like freshly baked salmon way too often. There are five small bags under the cat bed. They are some fancy type of cat food – she described it as a prescription cat food, though the bags say senior cat on them – that normally cost $60 each. *gasp* She got them at half price, which is still insane. She warned me that this kibble really stinks. It’s a herring and chicken blend, so it’s likely the fish smell, she says. The cat bed is one her cats have stopped using for some reason, so she passed it on to us.
I am more than happy to take her cast offs!!
The other two bags were donated by a friend of hers for us. She’d never seen the brand before, so she couldn’t tell me anything about it.
After we loaded up the truck box, parted ways. I headed to the Dollarama to get new vinyl to repair the catio covering and things I thought might help hold it in place better – and some spring cat toys.
Then it was off to the Walmart to get some stuff my husband asked for. I also got myself a pair of slipper shoes. I’ve been trying to replace my inside shoes for ages, and can’t find any that are as comfortable as the old ones. So I tried the men’s slippers. I wasn’t able to try them on, but I got some size 9’s – the size I usually get – that were indoor/outdoor with memory foam insoles. I figured, if they didn’t fit, my daughter/s would have some new inside shoes.
I would have looked around for other things, but so many people were blocking the aisles, I gave up, paid for my stuff and left.
I still had time, so I drove across the street to the Canadian Tire to hang out there. Usually, I would have just stayed in the truck and napped, but it was too cold.
I did remember to pick up a carabiner for the isolation shelter latch, and a windshield fluid funnel for the truck. I was able to pay for it with change. I’m glad I had some, because I wouldn’t have wanted to make such a small purchase on my debit card! 😄
I did almost buy myself a new winter “going out” coat. I found a display of nice parkas on clearance that were very affordable. Alas, it was not to be. Being built like a tank has its disadvantages. I found an XXL to try on, and it mostly fit, until I tried to move my arms. My shoulders were too broad for it, and they didn’t have any bigger sizes.
Ah, well.
I still had time and it was coming up on noon, so I headed over to a nearby Timmies for lunch. For my readers outside of Canada, Tim Horton’s, aka: Timmies, is an iconic Canadian coffee and donut shop, though I don’t think they are Canadian owned anymore. Tim Horton was a hockey player. Today, they now do all sorts of sandwiches, soups and so on, as well as coffee and donuts.
Until yesterday, when my daughter and I went to one for breakfast, I hadn’t been to one in ages.
My daughter worked at the local one for awhile. She ended up quitting because of the health and safety violations from one employee. When she made a complaint to the manager, she was the one who got in trouble. After seeing more health violations by this employee that got ignored, she quit. She later got a job at the pharmacy across the street. During her interview, she told them why she’d quit her last job. The manager that was interviewing her just nodded and told her, that manager was gone.
The problem employee, however, wasn’t, yet.
We don’t go to that location at all anymore.
Then the illegal lockdowns and mandates happened and the entire franchise went full gestapo, right down to the physical assault of patrons.
I would rather have gone somewhere else, but it was either Timmie’s or back to McRaunchies. I do like their chili. A nice, thick, robust chili that is low on spice heat, so it’s something I can actually eat, served with a generously sized baguette style bun. I figured I would have chili for lunch.
It was quite the disappointment. It wasn’t chili. It was soup. I ended up literally drinking it out of the cup, because I could barely get anything with the wooden spoon they now provide. The bun was half the size, too. Meanwhile, the price was higher than it used to be, too.
Ah, well. At least the Boston Creme I also got was still tasty! A donut used to be part of the meal deal, but I had to order it separately.
I should have gone back to McRaunchies.
At this point, I still hadn’t heard from the vet clinic, but I figured I would be hearing from them soon, so I decided to go back and stay in their waiting room until the cats were ready to go home.
When I got there and told the receptionist which cats I was waiting for, she went to check their status for me.
They were ready!
It turned out, they had tried to phone me and left messages, but I never got a call. I had given my cell phone number before I left earlier, and asked what number they had.
One digit was wrong.
Someone out there must be getting some very confusing messages on their voice mail! This happened last time, too. I will need to take extra care in enunciation when I gave them my cell phone number in the future.
I’m told the kittens both did really well. They got their spay and neuter, basic vaccinations, tattoos and treatment for ear mites.
Since the rescue was covering the cost of this, they had to call the Cat Lady before they could release the cats, and then I was on my way.
Once they were loaded up, it was straight home. I’d already arranged for my daughter to take care of getting the isolation shelter ready, making sure the food and water was topped up, the litter box was good, moving the entry box and closing the ramp door so that there would not be other cats in it. She had to use the bricks that were under the entry box to keep the ramp door closed, though, until I could get the carabiner on the latch.
When I got home, I backed the truck up to the house, then dashed inside for a quick bathroom break while my daughter headed to the truck to get the carriers out.
When I got back to help her, I discovered she had slipped and falling, landing hard on one knee, on the concrete.
She is now walking with a cane again, because of it!
😢😢
As for getting the cats in, we used one of the sliding doors on the second level. I tossed in a couple of the spring toys for them, first.
Kohl was easy to do; she let me pick her up and cuddle her a moment before I put her on the shelf board with the sheet of insulation on it. She promptly loafed on the insulation and stayed there.
The fluffball – we still haven’t named him – wouldn’t let me take him out of the carrier, though, so my daughter just brought it up to the open window in the second level and opened the carrier door. He dashed right in, then down to the lower level and tried to get out!
My daughter took the carriers in while I unloaded the truck. Kohl stayed calm, but the poor male was having panic attacks, in between stopping to eat a bit. He really wanted out.
With the stuff brought inside, I fed the rest of the outside cats early to occupy them, so that I could safely drive the truck out of the yard and park it in the garage. When I came back, I grabbed a can of wet cat food and added it to the food bowl in the isolation shelter. While they are in isolation, they will get to enjoy wet cat food, since we know it won’t freeze in there. Hopefully, that will help socialize the male.
In between things, I took the new cat bed and set it on my bed next to our elderly Freya, who was asleep on one of my pillows. I came back a few minutes later and found this.
There are three cases of 24 cans from the Cat Lady – plus the 6 I used to make cat soup. There were also two big containers of treats. Made with Real Chicken! There’s another case of 12 same size cans from her friend, plus I think 9 of the big cans. There are also 3 boxes. They are labelled duck paté, but also as “sensitive” and as grain free. The boxes look like they should have liquid in them, though, not paté. I’m curious to find out what these are!
There were also three more bags of kibble hidden under the cans, the same size as the five small bags of kibble from the Cat Lady.
I’ve looked up the brand for most of these, and it looks like they are the house brand of a specific pet store franchise, which would explain why neither the Cat Lady nor I were familiar with it.
After I got all the cat stuff done, I finally settled down to try on the new slipper shoes I bought.
My daughter now has new indoor shoes.
I couldn’t even get my feet into them! I do usually get size 9 men’s shoes – in triple wide. These were NOT triple wide. *sigh*
Then I remembered that, since I had cats in the truck, I hadn’t stopped to close the driveway gate behind me, so I bundled up and took care of that. On the way back, I got a couple of pictures.
The entry box is just off to the side, and as you can see, it’s also being used as a shelter, even though it’s completely open at the back!
A lot of cats were trying to get into the shelter. Some of them had gotten used to being able to stay in there. Unfortunately, we can’t be letting other cats in and out when we have one that needs to recover. The fluffball male could probably be let out, but then Kohl would be in there by herself, and that would not be good. The male does seem to be calming down and only panics a bit and tries to get out when the house door opens and startles him. If you click through to the next picture, you can see that Kohl is still quite content to just loaf on the insulated shelf!
So the isolation shelter is getting its first test run. So far, it seems to be holding well, though it already looks like cats have tried to claw their way in from the outside! The vinyl on one corner at the back is tattered a bit. Not that they can get through the wire, but they may be trying to reach the window. They know it opens.
As I write this, we are at -16C/3F. The wind chill is -33C/-27F, but with the plastic around the bottom, that should have little effect inside the isolation shelter. The vinyl wrapped around the lower level should keep the wind out. They have the heat lamp, two cat beds to curl up in, one on each level, plus the insulated box “nest” under the shelf. Even the heated water bowl would add some warmth to the upper level. Some wind might get through the spaces between the boards of the ramp door, but this will make sure they get some fresh air coming in. With colder air coming in from the bottom, and warm air escaping through the gaps around the sliding windows and the space in the insulation ceiling the extension cord runs through, there should be decent air circulation in there, while still being warm.
Our temperatures are supposed to go up overnight, and keep going up for our daytime highs. Our forecast for Saturday is now a high of 4C/39F. It’s expected to slowly drop after that until we get a sharp drop on Wednesday, which is supposed to have a high of -20C/-4F, though the overnight low is supposed to be just a few degrees colder.
The long term forecast has changed and, while we are still supposed to reach highs above freezing in the week before Christmas, the overnight lows around Christmas and Boxing Day are expected to dip below -30C/-22F. 🥶 The cats will no longer need to be isolated well before then, so they will be able to join cuddle puddles in various heated areas by then.
Of course, the forecast is different pretty much every time I check it, so we’ll see how things actually go. I just want things to stay mild during their isolation period!
Meanwhile, tomorrow I will finally be able to do my Costco shopping. December is a weird month for my husband’s disability payments, though, and it comes in before Christmas instead of at the end of the month. Usually, that has meant us doing our Christmas/New Year’s shopping and January stock up shopping at the same time. This trip is so much later in the month than usual, I might be able to do most of that tomorrow, but we’ll see.
The less time spent shopping, this time of year, the better. I’d hibernate all winter, if I could! I don’t like shopping and I don’t like crowds at the best of times, never mind with holiday crowds and winter driving! Even just today, by the time I got home, I found the donated canned cat food I used to make the cat soup had started to freeze!
Ah, well. It is what it is. No point complaining about it! 😁
As for me, I didn’t get much sleep last night and had to get up extra early, so I am more than ready to go to bed early tonight!
Who am I kidding. I’ll probably be lucky to get to bed before midnight, anyhow! 😄😄
I’m currently sitting the the truck in a parking lot, waiting to meet up with the Cat Lady.
This morning, my daughter and I snagged two kittens for the vet. Kohl was easy to catch, once she joined us in the sun room, but none of the adult females were to be seen.
I’m writing this on my phone, so I don’t know if you’ll be able to see the above image slideshow.
The grey and white tabby turned out to be male. We’ve never been able to handle this one, though I have been able to sneak a pet while he was eating. He was too fluffy to easily spot gender.
They were both very quiet during the drive in. I hope they enjoy their recovery in the isolation shelter. The male doesn’t need 2 weeks in there, but I don’t want Kohl to be in there alone. Plus, we might be able to socialize him while he is in there.
After connecting with the Cat Lady, I will take advantage of being in the area and do some errands and possible shopping. Tomorrow is Costco day, though, so there isn’t much I need to get today. I do want to get more vinyl table protectors, and some sort of fasteners. Yesterday’s wind tore off a section at the catio door. It will be warmer on the weekend, so thar will need a good time to fix it.
Oh! Just got word from the Cat Lady. She will be here soon. I look forward to seeing her. She is awesome!
The rescue covered the neuter, a set of vaccinations, ear mite treatment and deworming. We were sent home with medication to give him tonight, then another dose in 2 weeks.
He will be staying in the catio for a couple of days – if we can keep him in there! – so we can keep an eye on him. I found some reinforcing plates for the upper corners of the catio while Gouda was getting his surgery. Once those are on, and the top is painted, I also found neoprene lined washers to use when screwing the roof panels on, to prevent water leakage.
The Cat Lady and I were messaging and talking to each other throughout the morning. As I was waiting for the pick up time, she started asking me questions about his behaviour and how socialized he is.
She might have someone who can adopt him.
This is someone who needs a barn cat that is friendly, but not too friendly. She doesn’t want a cat that will get under the feet of people coming in to the horses. He might get under the feet at feeding time, but when there are other people around, he’s not to be seen anywhere. Which may be exactly what she’s looking for.
This wouldn’t happen for about a month, though, as we are to continue observing Gouda – in particular, his ears – over the next month. As expected, he had ear mites and, as seems to be usual, it was pretty bad. He’s going to need time to heal, and we are to try and see if there is any leaking.
We’ll do the best we can!
As I was picking him up and they were finishing off the invoice, the processed the payment from the rescue. I asked, trepidatiously, how much it cost. With the extra treatment and medications, plus the cost of the neuter, I was expecting it to be over $300.
It turned out to be a bit over $160! Which is an amazing price! The rescue gets a really good deal with this vet! Most vet clinics do offer discounts for rescues, but this one seems to be making the extra effort to make spays and neuters affordable.
If the rescue can also find a new home for Gouda, that would be really something. Especially after the person that was going to adopt Button backed out!
I don’t have any dates yet, but the Cat Lady said she had us booked for 2 more males next month.
While I was out tending and harvesting the garden, the girls took care of eye baby.
We’re still having to feed her with the modified bottled, and she eats from it voraciously – and if we’re not fast enough, she’ll try to eat our fingers!
Then her eyes get washed and treated, and she gets set out in the sunroom for the day.
By the time I was heading back inside, that was all done, so of course I was keeping an eye out for her.
I have no idea which litter that black and white kitten is part of, or who its mama is, but it’s one of the ones that is a bit less skittish, and likes to hang out in the sun room.
After I finished with the morning routine, I headed out early to meet with the Cat Lady, so I could do some shopping – and window shopping – in advance. This time, I took the route through my mother’s town, as I wanted to get gas, then stop at the feed store to pick up cat food – and pay the difference from the last time I was there. That was when I bought a 20 pound bag of cat food, not noticing that the stitching on the top had come loose, and ended up spilling it all over the floor when I hoisted the bag on my shoulder!
I’m glad I left early. The highway is still being resurfaced; right now they’re at the stage of adding fresh oil over the new chips that were laid down. It’s looking fantastic! However, I did end up getting stopped on the highway to wait for the pilot truck, which ensures traffic doesn’t go above 60kph/37mph over the newest section.
Once I got through that area and into town, I was very happy to see that the gas prices had dropped. The last time I saw them in the town closest to us, it was $149.9/L, while the town my mother is in is always a penny higher – but now it was $140.9/L (On my way home, I took the alternate route to avoid construction, and the gas station I would have gone to otherwise was still at $149.9/L.) So that was a nice surprise.
When I stopped at the feed store, asked to get a 40lb bag of cat food, then asked about paying the difference between the 20 and 40 pound bags, explaining what happened. That’s when I heard a voice coming from the office behind him saying, nope! It was the same guy from last time that said to give me a 40lb bag when the 20lb bag spilled! He would not hear of my paying the difference, and said that it was not an uncommon problem.
As we were talking, I asked if they had any lysine. I explained a bit about trying to find bulk quantities, like for horses – I know they come in 2lb and 4lb buckets. I said I haven’t found a local supplier, and my attempts to buy some online failed at the border for some reason. He didn’t have any, but they made a note and will look into it. He might be able to get some for me.
After I paid for the kibble, the guy behind the desk came out to grab a bag for me from the adjoining building and loaded it in the truck for me. He made a comment about how that will last me a while. I said, about a week. He was shocked to hear that, so I told him we are caring for a colony. I don’t know how many we have right now, but in the winter, we’ve had a high of 33 (at least, that’s what I can remember right now). His jaw literally dropped!
I didn’t even mention the 22 we currently have inside! They need more variety in kibble than the outside cats, since they can’t supplement with hunting, so they won’t be getting feed store kibble.
Oh, while I was paying for the kibble, the guy behind the counter wondered out loud if I had a card.
Card?
It turns out the feed supplier has a deal where, if you buy a dozen bags of feed, you get one free. So they keep a Rolodex type organizer of cards for people, and made up a new one for me.
All the more reason to stock up on kibble for the outside cats from here! A 40lb bag is $60, and it won’t take us long to reach a dozen, if we buy there regularly. I’ll still be getting some from Costco, etc. for the inside cats, but I’d much rather get four 40lb bags at a time here, than eight 20lb bags at Costco.
That done, I headed to the smaller city and had time to do some shopping (more on that later) before meeting the Cat Lady, and three of her daughters. She had the antibiotics for eye baby – and a cat carrier! She got it as a donation. It’s an unusual one, triangular in shape, that folds down flat. Not something that can hold any of the heavier cats, but perfect for kittens and light cats.
(David has already claimed it.)
As we talked, she told me that Button is doing very well on the antibiotics, even though it’s only been a couple of days. She said they flushed his ears while at the vet, and there was a lot of black coming out of there, then treated him for eat mites. Now his hearing is back! So that is more good news, as they thought the hearing loss might be permanent. His appetite picked up as well, which is very encouraging.
As we were talking, I found out more about The Wolfman’s eye injury. It is fully recovered, but all I’d heard until now was that they figured the injury was some sort of blunt force trauma. Either he ran into something, fell onto something, or something fell onto his eye. My only guess is that he fell off of something. We can’t think of anything else.
Well, it seems that, even after the eye was healing and the swelling was gone, it was still leaking a lot. Then, about a week or two later, while getting checked, they found something had been pushed out of his eye as it healed! The vet said it looked like a nail (as in, from a cat’s claw), but she thinks it looked more like a sliver of wood. Either way, once that was removed, the eye stopped leaking.
Go figure!
That makes the cause of his injury even more of a mystery. A piece of claw I can understand, though that wouldn’t cause the blunt force trauma injury, but a sliver of wood? From what? With that one, unfortunately, there are too many possibilities, but not with blunt force trauma, too!
The Wolfman, meanwhile, has asserted his dominance over the other cats in the household! This is very different from our place, but he was brought in as a tiny ball of fluff with a dislocated shoulder, so he was too young to assert any sort of dominance in the pecking order here. Once in a new home, I guess that changed things for him!
He is also terrible for stealing drumsticks off of roasted chickens and turkeys!
The Cat Lady has gotten very familiar with the butcher at a particular grocery store, and they let her know when, for example, whole chickens are available for about $4 a bird. Normally, a whole chicken is about $16-$18, at least! When they’re super cheap like that, it becomes less expensive to feed the cats freshly roasted chicken than cat food. It’s the same with other types of meat and seafood; typically, when things are very close to their best-by date, they mark them down dramatically, and put on an “enjoy tonight” sticker to let people know they need to be cooked right away. Ideal for feeding the cats – but something we can’t take advantage of, because we live too far from the city.
Meanwhile, along with the medication, the cat carrier, and a couple of rings of turkey garlic sausage she got for just pennies a ring, so she bought over 30 of them (they had a cash back deal that allowed her to buy more cat food. 😄), she gave us a small bag of kibble. It hadn’t been opened yet, except that The Wolfman and chewed his way through the side of the bag, so it was taped up. 😄
It was great to get together with the Cat Lady. She is so awesome!
I’m also glad I brought an extra ice pack, and was able to split things up a bit to make sure the medication was kept cold. The fridge and freezer stuff I had were in the cab of the truck, so I could keep the AC going, too. It was way too hot to have anything like that in the box of the truck!
I just checked the weather again. When I started writing this, we had cooled down to 25C/77F. We’re now back up to 27C/81F! At least we’re now expecting some light showers this evening. That will give the garden some relief!
I’m not complaining, though. As unpleasant as I’m finding the heat and humidity, I’ll take this as long as we can get it, and be thankful for it, just for the garden!
I don’t know that the outside cats would agree with me, though. When I head outside, I find them splayed out in any shade they can get, all over the place!
Speaking of which, it’s almost time for my evening rounds, and I’ve got one more post to write…
We had eyeball baby inside for the night again, and she got her eye drops in the evening, after and eye wash. This morning, another eye wash and more drops. This time, I was able to get the eyelids open more, and she didn’t seem to be too bothered by the drops, which is good. I’m pretty sure she’s going to loose one eye, though. It’s hard to say, since the lids are still so swollen. On the plus side – I think – there is no oozing infection like before. The eyes are still leaking, for sure, but not the gunk like she had before.
After her eye drops, she went back into the carrier to hopefully eat and drink some more, before letting her outside again. I put her in the cage in the sunroom, as far onto their favourite cat bed on the bottom as I could reach. She went right onto the bed, and settled into a corner. I set a plushie beside her, but she didn’t go near it. The outside cats had already been fed, and the orange and white kitten had gotten his eyes washed, too. He was loafed in front of the sunroom door, so I picked him up, cuddled him a bit, then set him into the cat cage, too. He went straight for eyeball baby and snuggled with her!
The photo above was taken just a little while ago. Eyeball baby may not be able to see, but she can still find her way out of the cat cage and make her way around, so she must be able to at least see something.
Meanwhile, I got an update on how Button is doing.
When the folks at the clinic first saw him, they were convinces he was only three weeks old. The Cat Lady said, no way – I would have told her if he was born just three weeks ago! They ended up aging him at 11 weeks, but he weighed only half a kilogram – about a pound. Also:
Panleuk test: negative feline leukemia test: negative He has URD (upper respiratory), but I expected that. Grade 3 heart murmur Earmites are so bad, they believe his hearing is permanently damaged, but he was definitely born hearing.
To quote the Cat Lady “they have seen a lot of tiny kittens but this takes the cake.” She sent me a picture of her youngest daughter as she took Button outside for some exercise, and he looked even smaller than ever – barely the size of her foot!
The vet was saying they think he has failure to thrive.
Uhm… yeah. That’s really obvious.
One visit, and they’re already saying that this kitten has already really beaten the odds. My thought it, there was probably a reason he was abandoned by the mother, whoever it was. He’s a feisty little one, though.
They’ll be seeing him in two weeks, and hope to be able to vaccinate him then.
Which means, I guess, that he won’t be going to his forever home in one week, as originally planned!
I hope the woman that said she would adopt him doesn’t back out.
Since the folks at the vet clinic had been so sure Button was much younger, I went looking up my posts and photos to confirm when we found him. It was on July 4, and it’s August 16, now. So we’ve been tending him for 6 weeks, as of yesterday. When I found him, I was pretty sure he was close to weaning age, based on his behaviour and eating habits, which would typically be 6-8 weeks old. So them aging him at 11 weeks adds up.
Well, he is in excellent hands now. I just hate that we ended up passing another sicker-than-expected cat to the rescue!
I have to admit, I’m honestly starting to think seriously of culling the outside cats. Maybe not all of them – we did manage to get some of the dudes neutered – but most. They seem to have way too many health problems. We seem to have an unusually bad strain of feline herpes that seems to be resulting in life long URD, even after they’ve been taken indoors or adopted out. Cats from other colonies around us that got adopted out have been recovering, then never having problems again, so this is unusual. However, we’ve found several of them have had heart problems, several of the ladies that got spayed turned out to have uterine abnormalities. These are things that can’t be treated by simply getting them fixed, vaccinated or adding immune boosting supplements to their foods. We do the best we can for them, but it may be that our good intentions are actually causing more problems.
It’s an unpleasant line of thinking, but we just may not have a choice. Not just about the ongoing health problems, but the sheer cost of taking care of them – and that’s with help from the rescue and donations! We’ll never be completely without yard cats. They earn their keep and keep the rodent population down. But to have so many is something else entirely. We don’t even know how many we have right now, since they come and go, this time of year.
Meanwhile, we’re doing things like bringing in a sick kitty to tend to and medicate it that nature probably would have taken care of some time ago, if we weren’t such sucks for the cats!
Speaking of which, I got more progress on the isolation shelter. I will write about that in my next post.
Poor little guy passed right out, during the drive. For a while, there, he was really trying to get out of the carrier, and almost got the door open!
The exchange has been done, though. He is now with the Cat Lady. He’ll stay at the rescue for a week for standard vet care, then – if all goes well – be on his way to his forever home.
Even the Cat Lady commented on how tiny he is. He has definitely grown since we found him in the junk pile, but not by much!
One of the Cat Lady’s daughters was in the vehicle with her. She ended up holding Button rather than putting him in their carrier, and he actually started to fall asleep in her arms within minutes!
The Cat Lady also gave us a donation of cat food. There was a couple of cases of cat food – the kind that comes in pairs of packets with individual meal portions – plus a small bag of “immunity boosting” kibble.
She also found her bottle of the antibiotic drops for the eye baby. We are to give one drop in each eye, every 12 hours, for at least 14 days. She also warned that this stuff does does tend to burn, but to make sure not to wipe it off.
The hard part is going to be opening the eyes enough to get the drops in there!
I’ve got the kitten inside and in the carrier for the night. I’d gone out for my evening routine and found her in the outer yard, heading for the driveway, giving out her squeaky meow! The poor thing can’t open her eyes at all, even after we wash them. The eyelids are just too swoleen.
The girls and I will be doing the first dose of drops, soon. The kitten has already eaten and settled down in the carrier. Thanks to the individual portion cat food donation, it was easy to mix up some cat soup, just for the eye kitten, with the same supplements we use for the big batch we made for all the cats. When we added the food and water bowls to the carrier, I got some of the soup onto her mouth a few times before she figured it out and started lapping it up.
She asked us to keep her up to date on how things go. After Button has gone on to his forever home, they might be able to take this one for care. I appreciate that, but fear they’ll be stuck with another one of our sick cats – to go with the 6 cats from us they already have, all of which have had some sort of health problem! At least with The Wolfman, it was an injury that healed, rather than things like viral infections or heart problems.
She has us booked for the beginning of September for a spay or neuter. She’ll send me the exact date when she has a chance. This will be whichever cat we can catch, so I really want to get that isolation shelter finished before then. I was able to do the last of the painting this afternoon, which means assembling the frame can start tomorrow!
Several minutes later…
Wow. So much just happened in just a short time!
First, I started getting updates from the Cat Lady. Button has been eating well and sleeping well.
From his teeth, he looks like an 11 week old kitten, but he’s the size of a 6 week old kitten!
His eyes are weepy, which we could see, but he also had ulcerations in the back of his mouth, which we did not know about! Classic calicivirus, she says, and expects him to be put on antibiotics when he sees the vet tomorrow. Which likely means other kittens have it, too.
She also warned us that there is a severe panleukopenia outbreak in the province right now, and what symptoms to watch out for, and recommending to use bleach to clean even the outside bowls, if possible.
As we were chatting, my daughter came down and we took the eyes baby into the washroom to try and get those drops in. I don’t know that we managed to open the eyes enough, but at least it’s a start.
While that was happening, the phone started ringing. When I got to it, I found a message from my mother to call her.
*sigh*
My mother just heard geese flying by, and that reminded her that she wanted to take me and the girls to a nearby migratory reserve.
She has no idea what a problem this request is.
I told her, I would talk to the girls.
She didn’t like that, and then offered me a choice. We could go to the reserve and have a picnic there, or we could share a meal at the one local restaurant, then go to the cemetery where my father, brother and other family members are buried. That, I definitely don’t want to do, because then she’ll want to come here, and that’s never pleasant.
She could tell I wasn’t enthused, and I tried to explain.
First, there’s the fact that we all keep different hours, so my daughters would have to mess up their schedules. Which they wouldn’t mind doing, if it was for something pleasant, but my mother is never pleasant with them, but rather always testing and prodding and judging.
The other thing is, it would leave my husband here at the farm on his own – and no one to be on watch in case our vandal has another mental break and decides to burn the house down or something. A concern she dismissed.
What I couldn’t figure out how to explain was that, because of her own behaviour towards them – and how she treats me – the girls just don’t want to be around her.
It didn’t matter, though. She instead went on a rant about how I keep the girls basically imprisoned upstairs, and they should be free to go places.
I told her, just because she doesn’t see something, and it doesn’t involve her, that doesn’t mean it doesn’t happen. The girls can go where they want (frankly, I wish they did want to go out more, but they don’t). They are adults and free to do so.
She instead started ranting that no, they aren’t free, and now she can see why the government takes children away from their parents, because they don’t know how to parent…
Which is when I said goodbye and hung up.
I think she has forgotten that the girls are 28 and 31 years old, not the 9 and 12 year old’s they were when we left this province because of her. She did not approve of our homeschooling and kept reporting us to different levels, making up lies about what was going on in our household (which she knew nothing about, but thought she did). Each time, we got “investigated” and they recognized that this was a problem with her, not us – but at that point, the next place left for her to report us would be children’s services, and she would have been perfectly willing to do that, and have the girls taken from us, simply because she did not approve of how we were raising our kids.
*sigh*
Well, that’s it. I’m done for now. I need to update my family and siblings on what just happened, because she’s going to cause problems for us over this.
*sigh*
I would really love to have a boring life right now.
The Re-Farmer
Update: Well, I talked to my daughters, and they really do want to go to the nature reserve. With my daughter’s work schedule, though, she had deadlines she needs to meet before the end of August, so we looked into September. My mother’s 93rd birthday is in September, so that fits, too. So we picked an open day, I called my mother back, and now she’s all happy – though she really tried to get it to be sooner! September will be too cold, she says… 😄
Well, it took a couple of hours, but I’m finally settled in and able to take a break.
Which, for me, means doing other things. Like blogging. 😁
And fixing the typos in my last post, which are always pretty bad when I write using my phone!
My time waiting for the vet clinic to call me took a very pleasant turn. I got a message from my SIL and, as we chatted, I mentioned were I was. Which is about half way to their place. She was free, so she drove out to meet me, and we had a great time together.
My SIL is so awesome. I just love her to pieces.
I also got a few calls while we were together.
The first was from the vet clinic. They actually tried to call me earlier, but I never got the call. They contacted the Cat Lady and she messaged me, so I went back to the clinic. It turned out they weren’t sure who three of the cats were, so I cleared that up. Then, after not getting anything to say I had a missed call or a voice mail message, I checked the number they had. It turned out there was one digit wrong. So they had called someone else completely! Oops.
When they did get through to me, it was about Collin. They’d done Syndol first, and I’d mentioned he had a limp, but we couldn’t see what was wrong with his foot. They found nothing wrong, but Collin had a wound on one leg. I hadn’t realized, when we snagged him, that he was the one with the injured leg. We didn’t see it at the time, and with so many white and grey cats, we lose track. I’ve just made the executive decision that he is now Collin (because of the receding hairline marking on his head).
It turned out the wound was quite infected. They wanted to know if they could give him a slow release antibiotic (they know these are all yard cats and semi feral) and a couple of stitches. The rescue was paying for this visit, but when they told me how much it could be, I gave the go-ahead. We would make it work, and it wasn’t all that much. More than the neuter, mind you (the rescue got a really good deal!), but we could manage it.
Then I got another call from them. The cats all had really bad ear mites. When the Cat Lady and I were signing them in, they asked about ear mite treatment, if any were found (I told them I just assume they have ear mites, since they are outdoor cats). This would have been a gel treatment we’d have to do at home, and there was no way we’d be able to do that, so it was declined. Their ears were really bad, though, to the point of ear canals in danger of rupturing. They wanted to know if they could give the cats Ivermectin.
I didn’t have room in the a budget for that, after giving the okay on the stitches and antibiotics.
I explained that, and said that the rescue was paying the bill for stuff, but I had no idea what the rescue’s budget was. I also mentioned the Cat Lady had come home to their dog having had a medical event, and she was at a vet clinic with it at the time. Which is bad enough on its own, but to have to ask her about this, too? They did call her, though, and she did agree to the treatment.
She is so amazing.
I’m surrounded by so many awesome people.
After my SIL had our visit, it was past 3pm, so I decided to head to the clinic and see about paying for our part of the bill. I got there just as they were working on the invoice and billing the rescue. Which is also when the Cat Lady called!
They had talked to her about the ear mites and the obvious problem that, as outside cats, they will just get infected again.
She paid for 15 doses, including the four in the clinic.
Which means we now have a vail of Ivermectin and a syringe applicator. We need to put a single drop into each ear.
Which I suppose is going to be easier than doing the gel thing, but not by much! If nothing else, the syringe gives us better control and reach.
So we’re going to have to work on catching and dosing the ears of as many cats as possible – and keep track of which ones we do, so as not to double treat any!
Once the bills were paid – ours ended up being only $109, which was less than the estimate I was given (I think the Cat Lady covered part of it!) – I loaded up four very unhappy cats, sent a message to the family to let them know the status of things, and headed home. They had the gate waiting open for me, so I could drive straight to the yard, but I saw our vandal walking his dog down the road, so I made sure to stop and lock it, first. Thankfully, the stop did not startle the cats too much.
They did NOT like being unloaded, though!
We set them up in the sun room and left them in the carriers at first. My daughter brought over some wet cat food that she divided up into 4 bowls while I fed the rest of the cats to distract them away, and gave Collin his first doze of painkillers mixed in. We have three more dosed for them, to be given every 24 hours, but I really doubt we’ll be able to give him those. I was able to slip the bowls into the carriers for Collin and two others, but Stinky slipped out and disappeared.
So other cats got to eat his wet cat food.
I gave them time to eat their food as we unloaded the rest of the stuff from the truck. Then I parked the truck in the garage. I then had the unhappy job of disposing of the body of that poor baby raccoon I found this morning.
So you can probably imagine that, when I started to hear distressed crying, I had to go looking.
I found the source at the junk pile. A little, blue eyed, cream coloured ball of fluff, alone and clearly afraid.
I was able to pick it up before it had a chance to run away. I got a bit of hissing and spitting, but not all that much. I took it straight to the sun room. I figured the mama would find it there, and if she didn’t, the creche mothers would, plus there was food and water already there.
When I put it down next to a food bowl, it didn’t bother being scared anymore and immediately started sniffing at the bowl.
It reminds me so much of Ghosty when we first saw her, except this one has fewer markings visible. Pretty much just the darker patches on its head. There are some very faint markings on the body, but barely visible.
I’ve since checked on it, and the last I saw, it was loafed in the middle of the sun room, sleeping.
I feel much better having been able to help out at least one baby, today, even if it was just to carry it across the yard and to food and water. Particularly since we were hearing so much thunder at the time. In the end, the storm we were hearing went past us, and we got no rain, so that worked out, too.
Meanwhile…
Once inside, we set up the new cat trees, and can finally throw away the remains of the old ones. One is shaped like a cactus and it top heavy, so the cats keep knocking it down. The girls are considering duct taping it to the linoleum floor. 😄 The cats clearly love it!
There was a super soft, super fluffy cat cave with some hand knit blankets inside – and when I pulled those out, I found packages of cat treats and cat nip hidden in the blankets!
Then, before I finally settled in, I made some cat soup for the inside cats, using a new feeding tray I found at the dollar store today, to replace the one in my bedroom/office. It looks like it will work out better than the last one I found, so the next time I have the chance, I’ll pick up another one.
My daughters are now making supper and cleaning up in the kitchen, etc, while I finally get a chance to sit down. I’ve got the critter cam live feed on. The new kitten was nowhere to be seen at first, but I just saw it come into the sun room from outside, and it’s now watching one of the adult cats eating.
Oh!!! I think that might be Collin. I hope so. I had to let him out of his carrier before he at all his medicated food, because I was afraid he would hurt himself trying to get out. If he’s comfortable enough to come back into the sun room and eat from bowls right next to the cat carriers, that’s a good sign. I still can’t be 100% sure it’s him, though.
Ah, supper has just arrived. My daughter just brought me a plated supper, and some boozy hot chocolate.
I could really use that boozy hot chocolate, after a day like today.
Well, I am currently waiting around in a Walmart, as 4 males are being neutered, courtesy of the Cat Lady and her rescue.
This morning was rough, though.
Before seeing what cats we could catch, I went to bring the truck into the yard. I heard a strange noise, and something dark in the grass.
It took a moment to identify it. It turned out to be a baby raccoon.
Unfortunately, it was still alive. And suffering. I had to dispatch it. This is not something I have never done before, but this one left me crying. I don’t know what got to it, but I’m guessing another racoon.
Nature can be so cruel.
After moving the truck, I had the distraction of helping my daughter get 4 males into the carriers.
I was left with a bloody arm and the need to change my shirt, but we got them.
We got Stinky and Syndol, which I expected. Nosey was a bit of a surprise. I think the last one is Collin.
Today was not one of the cheap spay days (where they will also do neuters), but a regular clinic day. The rescue still got a very good price. The Cat Lady also passed on some donated cat trees, a cat cave, a couple of cones and some blankets. She has kibble for us, too, but it was to be delivered later today.
Since I am hanging around until pick up time – for the time and cost of gas, it is not worth driving home and back – we talked about meeting up again, so she could pass on the kibble donation.
Well, that changed.
She got home and discovered their dog had a medical event and had to rush him to a vet.
They just can’t catch a break!!!
We did get a generous cash donation, though, so I was able to pick up three 9kg bags of kibble. We still have some from our monthly shop, so we are good for a while.
For now, I’m just hanging out in the Walmart area, checking different stores out. I want to scope out some traps. The rescue will lend us one, but it would be good to have our own.
It would be good to get a raccoon trap, but those are a lot more expensive. With good reason. We might be able to get one of those on loan from the municipality. Yesterday, I found that we have at least one raccoon in the pump shack. I didn’t see it, but I heard it barking and snarling and went looking. When I opened the door, I heard movement in the back. I don’t mind the mama and her 3 babies (or is she down to 2 now?), but I think the big one is a male, and they can be a real problem.
Crud.
I need to think about something else. I’m getting weepy again.
Anyhow.
The clinic knows I’m hanging around town, so they will try to fit the boys in as early as they can. Hopefully, it won’t be too long.
I think it will be a while before they trust us or the carriers again!
The Re-Farmer 