Today’s Caturday Cat is Miss Molly. She is a calico beauty who believes at Saturdays are only for petty kitties (her) and not for doing anythings except filling the food and water bowls and emptying the litter boxes.
Caturdays Are For Petting Kitties
Molly came to the Retreat as a kitten who was found by a member of Sun City Cats. The good Samaritan knowing the she was too small for TNR, brought her to us for a little upbringing and socialization skills. She is a bundle of energy who demands cuddles — especially at 3am when we’re all in bed — and has been known to give a nip or two if petting is not forthcoming.
Molly is also one of eight calico kitties at the Retreat and she is the youngest. It is fitting that she is today’s Caturday Cat
This Caterday the Retreat would like to highlight Ms Katie who is one of the five Feline Leukemia (FeLV) positive cats who reside with us. Katie with her sister Alicia and her two brothers James and Quasar share a room with a FeLV+ transplant from Atlanta Little Miss Gray. Katie and her siblings were born in the Retreat’s backyard as part of a feral cat colony headed by dad, Mandarin.
While trying to catch the kittens for TNR, we also captured their dad. Mandarin was a scraggly beastie who we took to our vet because we though he was sick. Confirmed to have FeLV, we also tested the kittens who having once tested negative for FeLV, who upon retesting where found to be infected. Determined not to return these cats to the wild, we fixed up a separate living space and released everyone free to explore. We took a few precautions of separate litter and feeding bowls and allowing no visitors by the other residents.
For the last two years, Katie has needed no extra-ordinary vet care. She’s had her shots and was seen for sniffles but nothing else has been needed. She has become used to us humans and demands pets and belly rugs while in the cat tree. She’s shy when not in her spot on the cat tree, but she’s a silken princess upon her throne on the tree. Katie’s fur is literately silk fine and the fur produces a very feathery fan-like tail.
Katie is quite a cat and one who we have welcomed into our hearts at Mandarin’s Retreat.
Running a rescue is strange at times. We’ve had births and deaths, sickness and recovery along with just anger and pain. Mandarin’s Retreat is primarily a home for sick and hurt cats, but we try to branch out when we have the space. One of those branches is to be a temporary refuge for the pets of families that are in distress. By distress I mean families who either by family violence or economics have been displaced from their homes. Cats of these families most often can’t follow their humans to their temporary quarters. They need a place to stay rather than disappearing on the streets.
Linus is just one such cat. The woman who cared for him and several other cats succumbed to age and mental heath problems. Our Trap-Neuter-Release (TNR) community stepped in to help distribute the cats to fosters. Linus went to such a foster. But as sometimes is the case with pets, the current cats in the house wouldn’t accept Linus as a fellow occupant. A new foster was sought and found, but she couldn’t take in Linus for about 10 days. Mandarin’s Retreat got the call and we answered.
Linus arrived a bit matted, shy and a bit hungry. He went into a kennel in my office to acclimatize and decompress. Within a day or so, Linus informed us the kennel was too small for his needs and he was given access to the office. The office had been take over by Cookie and Toby, but they also had access to the rest of the house. They came and went when ever someone would open the door for them. They accepted Linus after a lot of sniffing and a few murmurs.
We quickly discovered that Linus is a snuggler. If anyone sat down, he was in your lap, purring up a storm. By observation we found that Linus was an old cat, older than we were told. We guess he’s older than the 10 years listed on his paperwork. He’s probably closer to 14 or 15 and with all the problems older age brings to cats (and humans, also). He appears to have some kidney problems based on his litter box trips. We’ve got a vet visit scheduled but we feel we already know the problem.
This brings me back to the “anger” part of the opening paragraph. We conveyed our thoughts on Linus’s health to the soon to be foster and the response was, “I thought I was getting a healthy cat, so just keep him!” For such a sweet cat to be rejected automatically because he’s “Not Healthy”; makes my blood boil and I wonder about the character of a person I haven’t met. This happening so soon after the lost of my Winston, impacted me even harder. In this disposable society, Linus is just another item to be thrown away because he’s not new, healthy, shiny or the latest version. He’s an old sick cat who only wants love and pets and not much else.
Though we don’t really have room, we’ll keep him. He’ll go to the vet and see what needs to be done. He’ll have a place to stay and will be cared for and petted until he tells us its time to go over the rainbow bridge. We’ll ease his journey as best we can, wish him sun puddles and pets forever and we will cry a lot.
On Tuesday 29 April we said goodbye to our VP of Operations, Winston. He was just 5 1/2 years old. He came to us at the request of our vet. He’d been dropped off without a word at the vets door, left to fend for himself through a cold, rainy night. He required bottle feeding every hour or so and was covered in a “fever coat”. I held him by cupping him in the palms of both my hands. He was a feisty little fellow who cried long and loud. It was from his vocal prowess that earned the moniker “Winston” after that great orator, Winston Churchill.
My wife nursed him back to health and one day, through some incident I’ve forgotten about, bounded in to my working office that, at the time, also housed a very grumpy street warrior named Jeremiah. Jeremiah was very territorial and as a veteran of cat wars defended his turf with fang and claw. We expected the worst to happen to little Winston, but the tiny squeak and Jeremiah instantly became great buds. Winston roamed our home with the other cats while Jeremiah was restricted to my office. Winston, however, preferred to spend much of his time with his new, large friend. The two rolled around together with Winston being sat on by the 23 pound (!) Jeremiah when cleaning was needed. Over the years, the two became as bonded as any two cats I’ve ever known. Jeremiah died on 5 Sep 2022 with Winston by his side at the vet ER. Winston mourned and was never quite the vibrant lively cat he after his friend’s untimely death.
Because Winston spent so much time in my office, he became my cat. Before the Retreat was formally established, we had a ton of cats, having arrived in El Paso with about 15. Never the less, Winston was the cat who “owned” me and sat on my lap at will. Winston was also a favorite at the vet. Wearing a cat skull-n-bones harness, he would run out of the treatment room to jump on the receptionist’s desk to demand pets and treats. While there, he would survey the waiting room talking to everyone. He was such a happy cat except when his nails were being trimmed. He hated having his nails trimmed and his yells could be heard in Madagascar!
Winston loved to lounge on our server rack in the Retreat’s office. He would look over his kingdom and keep us company. In the evening, he would following me to my office where we would watch a movie together. He would either sit on my lap or lay on the desk beside my chair , in the close vicinity of my hand for easy access to pets.
Sometime in the middle of April, Winston started having less bounce in his step and became lethargic. We though he had a bad tooth but his blood work showed lower white blood cell count and other anomalies. IV medication required a return to the vet and then a several day stay. Blood work would get better then fall. The bad new happened on the morning of the 29th when the new testing indicated no functioning bone marrow. Primary leukemia had struck very hard and fast. There was really no hope and wanting to ease my furry friend’s passage, Winston died in my arms around 4:30 in the afternoon. God, do I miss that cat.
Cody’s life began in a really horrible way. The TNR crew believed that his mother had been killed. They found Cody and his sister almost starved to death. The kittens were three weeks old at the time and when they showed up at our place, Cody didn’t have enough strength to sit up, so he rested on his side, just trying to survive. His left eye was bulging out of his skull, a mass of tissues and blood vessels that threatened to erupt at any time. Cody’s sister was a little better, but not much. They weighed 360 grams each.
First hour at Mandarin’s Retreat
This is the only picture we have of them from that time. We were so crazy busy with TNR hold-over, a new mama with babies and another set of kittens that taking pictures was about the last thing on our minds. Things got even more complicated as soon it became obvious thast both babies had panleukopenia. No amount of time at the emergency vet and later at our vet’s clinic was enough for the little girl – she expired not long after a day of hope when both of them looked like they were going to pull through. It was the first time in a long time that we’ve experienced the utter horror of the panleukopenia virus that every single cat rescuer knows very well – you provide supportive measures and then you pray, mediate, perhaps drink. Anything to make the time pass while little baby cats fight for their lives.
Cody waiting to see Dr HIbbs at Eye Care for Animals
But, Cody persevered. It was a long road he padded on, but eventually he came through on the other side of a deadly illness and began showing massive signs of improvement. Now, we had time to properly evaluate his left eye. Our vet referred us to the magnificent Dr Carla Hibbs at Eye Care for Animals and Cody was off to rounds of treatments for what was left of his eyeball.
His prognosis was pretty good and we found out pretty quickly that he didn’t seem to be aware of his loss of vision – the moment he regained his strength, he was off wrestling with cats ten times his size and having the time of his life. Over the next few months, his eyeball improved and while he has no vision in it, no surgery was required and so it remains an interesting looking reminder of some very tough times.
Here’s Cody today – a strong, vivacious Void with an appetite for any and all food and a playful streak a mile wide. He also likes bras. A lot.
