A Little Bit of Feline Paradise

     With so much suffering in the world--animals and humans alike--it inspires hope to discover someone who is devoting her life to helping animals whose situations would otherwise be desperate. T.C. Flynn, who created and runs Cat Habitat, is just such a person. This past weekend I went with my friend Charmaine, another Feline Network volunteer, up to north county to visit the Habitat. It's a beautiful sprawling piece of land, safely fenced and enclosed, where little white igloos peak up from among a profusion of almond trees and other shrubs. As soon as Charmaine and I arrived, the more people-oriented members ot the 80 or so cats that live at the Habitat, came strolling up the path to greet us. Some were shy, some curious, others eager for tummy rubs. Several followed us around the entire time.
      Charmaine and I had come up with a particular goal in mind--to see how Socks and Fruity, the Habitat's newest members, were doing. These are two older gals who, until a couple of weeks ago, lived near some apartment complexes in Pismo Beach. Charmaine had been feeding them there every day for six years! I have watched these gals come out to greet Charmaine when she pulled up in her vehicle with their food. Their situation was made impossible, however, by a few unkind people in the area whose lack of empathy and compassion is truly astonishing. They insisted Charmaine 'get rid of" the cats--as if there were anywhere to take them, these two ferals who've been living on the street all their lives.
     Into this dire situation came T.C. Flynn.  After much effort on Charmaine's part, Fruity (originally named 'Fruitcake" for her comical ways) and Socks were relocated to the Habitat, where they spent their first rainy week snuggled inside a shed designed for kitties making the transition to life in the Habitat. After those first few days, when the sun came out, they were ready to go outside into their new world. It's a wonderful world, with plenty of shelter, good food, and no predators, but it's still got to be scary--not only a new environment but one filled with new faces. As Charmaine said, "It must be like going to a party where you don't know anyone."
     On the day we visited, Fruity was being shy and stayed in whatever hiding place she'd discovered (and there are so many places a cat can hide at the Habitat!) but Socks seemed completely at home. She followed Charmaine around the entire time we were there. Other cats perched in the almond trees, watching, while another pair seemed intent on protecting the bags of cat food in T.C's wheelbarrow, sure to be the first one's to eat when it was dinner time.
     Every cat at the Habitat has a story to tell--and all of them, to one degree or another, are sad ones. Fluffy is an elegant grey and white long-haired kitty who was rescued from an area where cruel people were putting ground glass in the cat's food. Mama is a gentle, sweet kitty rescued from an elementary school where kindness to animals was not something they wanted the kids to learn. Oliver is a solid grey tabby who got into trouble for sneaking into a building at night trying to get warm. He was rescued just in time from Animal Services. The little black female I named Braveheart was living in a woodpile up at the Mesa. Another of my rescue kitties, Twinky, was being 'evicted' from her safe haven by a home owner with plans to board up the little crawlspace where she'd taken refuge. Every cat at the Habitat has been granted a new life, free from hunger, cold, and the danger of human and animal predators.
IF YOU CAN HELP:  The Cat Habitat needs funds and volunteers.
             Contact T.C. Flynn at CAT HABITAT, PO Box 577, Atascadero CA  93423

                                                    Two residents of Cat Habitat

                                                      Charmaine with Socks

                                                       Guarding the Meow Mix

                                                         Kitty in almond tree

Update on the Dude

      As many of you know, the Little Dude is my six-month-old rescue kitty who was found up on the Mesa in Arroyo Grande last summer. He's brother (or maybe half-brother? cousin?) to Chella, the black kitty adopted by my neighbors Debbie and Jeff next door. Anyway Little Dude, aka Doodles, has problems walking. He does not jump or run like a normal kitty and uses little stairsteps designed for small elderly dogs to get up onto the bed and the sofa. Up until a couple of weeks ago, he had been doing relatively well. Then a few days after I returned home from a trip back east, he suddenly began showing symptoms again--he could barely walk or would walk a couple of tentative steps and sit down.
     At the vet's, xrays were taken that showed the Dude's bones were in very poor shape and he had a new fracture in the area of his pelvis, hence the difficulty walking. Also his front legs were both very obviously bowed. His disease is similar to a very bad case of osteoporosis.The vet put him on some heavy duty pain meds in addition to some liquid meds called Calcitriol Oil, which  had to be shipped out from a lab on the east coast. That was a little over two weeks ago and since then, the Dude has regained his former walking ability--still not what one would hope for in a normal kitty but much better than before. The vet says it will take a month or two, however, for us to know for sure if the Calcitriol Oil is going to work. It's designed to  help his body absorb vitamins D and Calcium, which he evidently lacks.
      Needless to say, I am distressed by the Little Dude's infirmity. If the Calcitriol Oil doesn't cure him, then we are pretty much at a dead end.
      So I pray for his recovery all the time and, in the meantime, I try to take one day at a time and make every day as good as possible for the Dude. He loves to eat--the Dude is a foodie for sure--so he gets wet food a couple of times a day and little bits of whatever Ma's eating--he especially loves the Morning Star fake bacon. I haven't told him it's vegetarian and I don't think he knows.
      If anyone out there has had a cat with problems absorbing calcium and vitamin D or has heard of anything like this, I would like to hear about it.
      On a lighter note, one thing I have discovered is that however beautiful, glamorous, and gorgeous a black cat may be, it is very difficult to photograph one well. They come out looking kind of like, well, a black blob unless you can get a good shot of the face and then it's a black blob with eyes. Of course, I share my home with three of the most gorgeous black cats in the Whole Known Universe--Little Mom from Firestone, Colorado, Sister Bug from AG and Little Dude from the Mesa, but it is hard to do them justice in photographs. With that in mind, though, I'm going to post photos of all three. Just remember the limitations of the photographer are no reflexion on the star quality of the cats

From bottom to top, Little Mom, Sister Bug (yawning and hanging out on roof), Little Dude with Kita

A Tale of 'Bobcat'

       In a world of too many unhappy endings, it's always a joy when something turns out really well, so with that in mind, I'm recounting the tale of an Abyssinian cat named

Bobcat. I never met Bobcat, but spoke to a kind-hearted woman named Hillary in Morro Bay who was trying to help him. It seems Bobcat had been living with people in the neighborhood who had, shall we say, an iffy relationship with the law and decided it to be in their best interests at some point to take off and go on the lam. They left Bobcat behind. Formerly an indoor cat, he was understandably traumatized and had been living under the porch of his former home. He was also an intact male.

      Hillary, who turned out to be his guardian angel, had been feeding Bobcat but he was too frightened at this point to allow her to pick him. Her plan was to trap him and take him to the vet for shots and neutering, then find him a home. Unfortunately she couldn't keep Bobcat herself because her two dogs have cat issues.

      I came into the picture when Hillary called Feline Network and someone there gave her my phone number. After talking to her, I told her I'd do the best I could to find someone who might be willing to foster Bobcat for a week or two and evaluate him as to adoptability. If he proved to be adoptable, we might be able to get him into the Adopt-A-Pet.

      I was lucky enough to actually find someone willing to evaluate Bobcat, when Hillary called again. It seems that, after taking Bobcat to the vet, she'd gone online and researched Abyssinian rescue sites. It turned out, there was a waiting list of people wanting to adopt Abyssinian cats. The rescue folks put her touch with a number of potential adopters, and it didn't take long to match Bobcat up with his new person in a forever home.

      Thanks to Hillary's compassion and her tenacity at continuing to look for a solution, Bobcat now has a safe, warm, loving home

     

     

Update On The Dude

        Not long ago, I wrote about the Little Dude's (aka Doodles) medical situation. Although to some extent baffled by the Dude's fragile bones and small stature, the vet's best guess was that he suffered/suffers from rickets, a disease in which vitamin D deficiency creates weak bones and sometimes stunted growth. The Dude has been on a highly nutritious diet, eating both dry and wet food with great enthusiasm, and spending more time in the sunshine now that the rain has stopped. He doesn't go outside--this is by his own choice as the back door slider is usually open--but he will lounge around on a cushion in a sun puddle, which is surely all to the good. He still doesn't run or climb, but his 'power walking' is very brisk and he occasionally engages in a mild form of play--he doesn't exactly chase the feathers on the stick but will roll around on his back and bat at them as they pass over. (Little Guy, my ten-year-old male cat from Colorado, has a similar style of laid back play).

         Lately the Dude has been getting up on the bed by himself and lounging. He is growing, but it is an odd sort of growth. I noticed the other day that he just about as big as Little Mom, another all black cat, but while Little Mom looks like a small adult cat, Little Dude more resembles a rather large kitten. His proportions are still kittenish and his front legs are bowed, a condition which may never change. He is adorable, though, and doesn't seem to be the slightest bit aware that he might be just a tad different from the other kitties.

        So I am very thankful to have the Dude as a member of my feline household. He came from a bad situation on the Mesa and now has a loving forever home here in Pismo Beach.

       

        

Open Hearts, Closed Hearts

 

     The other night at a meeting, I heard a woman talk about the difficulties of being a caregiver (I believe she was a nurse who works with children.) She said her perspective is that, in the face of suffering, she has one fundamental choice: she can protect herself by closing off her heart or she can keep her heart open, do the best she can, and then turn it over to God. I think there's great wisdom in that, and I try to apply it to my own work with ferals.

      Lately a couple of sad situations have come up. The day after Christmas I got a call from a woman who works at a business in A.G. She has been seeing a cat who, from the sound of it, must either have terrible skin cancer or some kind of severe facial wound. From her description, it sounds as though the animal needs to be euthanized as soon as possible. I've been trapping in the area where we think the cat is but haven't had any luck. Then last night it rained so I didn't trap. This morning the sun was coming out, so I went over again and put out a trap, but so far, nothing. All I can do is hope and keep trying.

       There is another tragic situation in Oceano. A friend of mine had a friend who shot himself to death the day after Christmas. As if this weren't horrible enough, he left behind three cats, one of them a special needs cat, in the house that he totally trashed before taking his own life. I went over there with my friend looking for the cats a couple of nights ago. A clean up crew was there. The house was filled with shattered glass, broken furniture, complete chaos--everything reduced to rubble. We glimpsed one cat but were unable to catch it. My friend left two traps that night, but when I returned the next morning, all I found was a possum and a neighbor's cat, both of whom I promptly released, of course.

      Now, a couple of days later, one cat has been found, another cat named Lucille (whose special needs made her virtually impossible to adopt) has been euthanized, and a third--who has a home waiting for it--is still free-roaming. This is a terrible end not just for the individual who killed himself, but for his animal companions, who have no way of understanding or coping with the complete chaos into which their once peaceful lives have been thrown. How terrifying it must have been for those cats when their person was destroying the contents of the house, when the gun fired and then all was terribly silent. All they could do was escape out the broken windows and wander around, trying to find their way back to the home they'd known which now no longer existed.

      In all likelihood, the third cat will remain in the vicinity of its home--it's being provided food and water, of course--and will eventually be rescued. In the meantime, all we can do is the best we can.

       And while this is going on, the usual trapping situations need addressing. I was alerted to a feral colony over in Avila Beach that is being fed and cared for by an animal-loving couple. They cannot afford, however, to have all these cats spay/neutered, so I'm trapping over there. Caught two the first night, then didn't trap because of the rain, but will be back there tonight with a couple more traps. It will take some time to get everyone, but this isn't mating season, so we have some time.

      And things seem to be leveling out at the Mesa. Perhaps the free-ranging dogs that were eating the food out of the feeding stations for so long are being kept home now--I hope! Anyway there was food left at the feeding stations when I checked them yesterday.

      So this is just a little recap on what's been going on with my cat trapping efforts over the holidays. This time of year seems to be particularly painful for many people and that pain filters down--to their companion animals and to feral animals in need of care. At any time, but especially in difficult times, keeping an open heart is a challenge, but I remind myself the alternative is far worse.