krazycatlady’s blog

Vet-Pet Photos

nobody@vox.com(krazycatlady) — Tue, 03 Nov 2009 17:18:04 -0800

Here are pictures I took on Saturday of the foster pets looking for homes. The name of the group is different, but the stories are very familiar. With the exception of one. His foster-name is Cash, because he was used like money. The police took him away during a drug raid. His owner was an addict who would trade Cash for heroine, then go back to the dealers' houses and steal Cash in the middle of the night! Pretty gutsy! Cash is at least 30 pounds underweight and is looking for a safe, secure future. He's a good boy but is choosy about which dogs he gets along with. You just gotta love that happy face and really big head!

!vetpet14

!vetpet13

!vetpet3

Here are my foster cats Lizzie and Taffy at the adoption event. They're still looking for a forever home or a new foster home - such sweet girls! I still can't believe these gorgeous girls have been going to adoption events since they were 9-weeks-old and still don't have a home!

!vetpet9

And as always, we have a parade of cats, here are some of theirs who are ready for adoption.

It was interesting spending the day with a different rescue group. They had a lot of the same policies that we do, did a few things differently but the bottom line is that we're all in this together trying to find good homes for as many of them as we can before it's too late. I'm looking forward to hanging out with my own rescue friends this weekend. We'll be split between the O'Fallon PetSmart and Dardenne Prairie PetCo on Saturday, come join us and take home a new best friend!

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Halloween goes to the dogs

nobody@vox.com(krazycatlady) — Sun, 01 Nov 2009 18:23:19 -0800

I spent my adoption Saturday in a different way - I was hanging out with a rescue group that I met at the Pet Expo. http://www.petfinder.com/shelters/MO355.html One of my old rescue friends has started working with this group and I was talking about how I want to use my photography to help more rescue animals, so we put two and two together and I was added to their event! I got to bring my foster cats along, but sadly they didn't get new homes in the new location either.

But what I did get to do was a lot of fun - I got to take pictures of dogs in costumes as part of their fundraiser! Here are a few of my favorites!

It was neat talking to these great owners, a lot of the dogs had been rescued and are enjoying their happily-ever-afters!

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Adoptions 10-31-09

nobody@vox.com(krazycatlady) — Sun, 01 Nov 2009 06:58:37 -0800

A lot of these happened during the week. It's a rough time adopting out new pets on a holiday. Here's hoping that pets everywhere were treated well last night and didn't fall into the hands of moronic tricksters.

Dogs: Prada: female chihuahua

Cats: Masala: female manx kitten, Snapdragon: male snowshoe siamese mix, Duey: adult male tuxedo, Lilly: female tortie kitten, Ali: medium hair angora mix, Jerry: white adult male

Ali & Jerry went home together and their new family has reported that they are very glad they decided to take both in the end because both cats have settled in wonderfully! I love seeing two cats going to a great home!

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Pairs are pairs

nobody@vox.com(krazycatlady) — Sat, 31 Oct 2009 22:16:49 -0700

Sunshine & Shadow, still happy in their new home. This is my answer to the question I kept getting, "Will you split them up?" - this is why I said no.

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I love my dog

nobody@vox.com(krazycatlady) — Tue, 27 Oct 2009 08:31:13 -0700

I love my dog, I love my dog, I love my dog.... I gotta keep repeating that. I wanted an active dog that I could train. So today, even though I shouldn't be taking the time to write this because I'm so busy, I squeezed in a training session because our trainer had time and wanted to use my dogs as a distraction for another client. A free session - I wasn't turning that down!

So my tired self hauled the dogs up to the kennel, about 20 minutes away. The session went really well actually. I'm learning how training Jimmy is much different than training Lexi. I got a lot of insight on how to make things better for our training. I was feeling pretty good, but dreading the ride home. Jimmy gets car sick, especially if he's got food in his tummy. I do positive reinforcement training, so he had lots of treats. He threw up about 5 minutes from the kennel and about 2 minutes from home. I had to stand in the rain and clean puke out of the car. And of course he can't just hit where I've put towels. Even though I had my hands on his head trying to aim his mouth I was still cleaning out little crevices in my car!

I told myself that I knew that would happen, it's not the dog's fault. That I as an owner need to learn how to deal with this. We're going to try dramamine next time. I was calm, checking my email quickly before my next appointment and I heard the sound of water running. He was peeing on my carpet! He's only had 2 accidents in the house ever, this would be the 2nd. What the heck?

I'm sick of the rain and wet, smelly dogs. It's a good thing he's so darn cute. I love my dog, I love my dog, I love my dog - I really like cats!

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Awesome Weekend

nobody@vox.com(krazycatlady) — Mon, 26 Oct 2009 21:44:48 -0700

I'll post the adoption report tomorrow - none of mine got adopted, but it was still a great weekend. Maybe it was the break in the rain that lifted my spirits so much, but I got a much needed positive flow of energy.

The Pet Expo was so much fun. I saw so many people that I knew from the animal community - I didn't realize just how many people I know! And so many past adopters stopped by our booth. We remembered a few of them, but a lot of them had adopted pets from before I was part of the group. That made me happy to hear that we'd found real forever homes for them! One of the most memorable visitors was a woman who wasn't sure if I'd remember her dog. As soon as she said "Ian" I knew exactly the collie of which she spoke! He'd been left for dead in a rural area, had pulled through an amazing recovery and suffered bladder infections on top of all of that! But he has a wonderful owner who loves him and can't imagine life without him!

Sunday I managed to sneak off to the dog park before the rain started and Jimmy & I had a blast! We spent almost 2 hours out there and met some really fun dogs.

Here is Jimmy after taking a rather cool dip in the pond.

!jimmy

Here we have Jimmy meeting his new friend Baxter! Our dogs got along so well that we actually exchanged phone numbers to meet up again some time!

Baxter comes to the park because he NEEDS to run. His mom and I talked a lot about rescue - both of her dogs were rescues and Baxter's foster mom still thanks her for giving him a home. Not many people would have the patience to deal with a basenji mix that is very hard to tire out. It's not easy having a dog with such high energy needs, but it sure is fun. It was amazing watching them run non-stop. I thought that Jimmy was tired, but when we met up with Baxter he discovered another 1/2 hour of fuel.

!maggie

Her other dog is Maggie, an 8-year-old rescued mix. Maggie was happy to let the boys tear around the fields, she went off and did her own thing. If you look closely in this picture, you'll see the rain drops. That meant that our day of fun was over, but what a great time we had!

!flowers

I'm going to miss the flowers once we get a hard freeze. I hope that we get a couple of nice, sunny days before all the leaves are gone - I'd love to get a chance to take some scenic pictures!

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Pet Expo

nobody@vox.com(krazycatlady) — Fri, 23 Oct 2009 14:49:36 -0700

http://www.stlpetexpo.com/

I'm going to be at the Pet Expo all day tomorrow. I was there setting up today & can't wait to go back and see all the booths once they're set up. Everything a pet could need will be there - including another pet. Lots of rescue groups and pet services.

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Tax Relief?

nobody@vox.com(krazycatlady) — Wed, 14 Oct 2009 15:12:23 -0700

http://abcnews.go.com/Politics/pets-save-taxes-congress-debate-happy-act/Story?id=8811927&page=1

Wouldn't it be great to claim all the dependents in your house? Especially the ones with 4 feet?

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A little help from my friends

nobody@vox.com(krazycatlady) — Tue, 13 Oct 2009 23:23:35 -0700

I don't think that anyone gets into rescue hoping that they can find out just how many animals they can fit into their house. I started innocently enough just helping with Santa pictures, then cleaning at PetSmart, then I took in a pair of kittens, then when they got adopted there were 2 litters looking for a foster home, so I said yes and it's just gone on from there. Saying no is hard, especially when you know that you are the difference between life and death for those pets.

People in rescue talk about their “number”, always striving for that perfect balance of trying to save as many lives as they can while giving all of the pets in their care a decent quality of life. Once you get above your “number”, you start warehousing instead of fostering and people get tired of doing rescue and quit. Responsible fosters try very hard not to go above their number, but sometimes it happens. Often it's just a temporary situation, like when you get a string of returns or you take in a litter of kittens (suddenly you have 6 more fosters just from one litter!) Most of the time a couple of adoptions will make all the difference and restore the perfect balance of saving lives while healing their souls.

I've only taken in cats twice this year, yet because of returns, the economy and slow adoptions I still find myself above that desired number. Just today I said no to one of our donors who found an abandoned cat in an empty apartment. That was so hard! And I have to board a pair of cats being returned because I have no room for them here. The cats here are fine and taken care of, but their lives could be better if they got more individual attention. They deserve to be pampered and played with instead of just cared for. So I'm going to do something that's really hard for me and ask for help. If you've ever considered fostering, this is a great time to try it out. We're not looking for families that want to see how many pets can fit in their house, we just want to see if you have room to let one or two crash on your couch for awhile!

So I'll be featuring pets looking for a more intimate fostering experience. It will help that pet get more love, help give me more time to give to the ones that are still here and you will find it rewarding beyond measure.

Taffy & Elizabeth, our first candidates for fostering, are adoption-ready and have fallen victim to an imperfect system. They were born at my house this spring and both were shy kittens. I worked with them as much as I could, but they needed time to come out of their shells. At my house, kittens are born in large cages – it gives mom privacy and keeps the kittens safe from the other fosters. As soon as they were ready, they moved to a cage at PetSmart where they got a lot more socialization from our wonderful cleaners, got to run around with other kittens, and made great progress, but they were still shy. They got passed over for the snuggly friendly kittens time and time again. Then one day they came down with a cold. A really bad cold! I was on vacation and our vet agreed to take them for us. They lived up at the vet for nearly a month so that we could keep their germs away from the other kitties here. Then to get reintroduced to my house, it was another cage. It's not supposed to be like this – the girls were six-months-old and lived in a cage for their whole lives. Add to that the medicine that they hated and no wonder they were shy!

Spooky5

So I did something about it. Much to the dismay of my husband, I let them live in my craft room. I understand his fear of cats taking over the house, especially since he has allergies. Part of our arrangement for me to foster is for me to have a lower “number” during the fall and winter when his allergies are the worst. But the move has been worth it. I've used my “krazy cat lady” skills on them to get them over being shy and now they greet me at the door, enjoy being petted and are normal, happy girls. They love that they have the bedroom next to the bird feeders!

Spooky7

They do have one special need – the cold that they got has left them with runny eyes once in awhile. They are on a really inexpensive supplement that gets mixed in with their food and if their eyes are sore, they can have some ointment. They should not be contagious to other cats that are fully vaccinated.

Spooky2

The girls would be fine if you could offer a spare bedroom or they would love the chance to get used to living in a whole house. As a foster you would have to bring them to PetSmart on Saturdays to give them their chance to be adopted, but this would be a great opportunity to give fostering a try because hopefully it will only take a few months. And if they had a different "couch to crash on", I could bring the returned cats home.

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How's your Monday?

nobody@vox.com(krazycatlady) — Mon, 12 Oct 2009 10:09:04 -0700

Having a Monday? Aren't we all?

Sometimes you just have to find the silver lining even though it means you have to search a long time to find it!

Warning: this post will be talking quite a bit about poop and bodily functions. I'm a foster mom and it's something that we talk about a lot! If you don't want to hear about poop again, then just skip to the next post with the who got adopted report.

But you know it's a Monday when you get pooped on by a cat and you know you haven't lost your sense of humor when you can find the silver lining in it!

I think about cat poop a lot, it comes with the territory. If there's something wrong with the poop, there's something wrong with the cat. In fact Bob is at the vet today because I've been thinking that he's been a bit "ADR" - short hand for the technical condition of "ain't doing right". Bob has litterbox issues and today when I cleaned his poop off the floor, I noticed that it wasn't as much as usual, which means that he's not eating very well as I suspected. So he's staying up at the vet for observation and possibly some x-rays. The first tests show that he has yet another bladder infection, so it's time to figure out what's going on with our poor boy! But had it not been for watching the poop, I wouldn't have had evidence to back up my gut feeling that he wasn't doing right.

The next poop stories involve happier outcomes and some big bellies and the silver linings.

As I was doing my kitty chores last night, I was cleaning some icky poopy off the floor, trying to figure out which kitty wasn't making it to the box in time. I was noticing that the litter that was sick (Delta Dawn, Proud Mary, Wild Thing) were starting to put weight back on again. Then Wild Thing waddled up to me and begged for more canned food. Standing directly over her, I noticed that her sides were quite wide. Two things came to mind - pregnancy and FIP. I didn't like either option. She's been here for just about 2 months, so if she got pregnant right before I got her it could be possible (I don't have any intact males here and she's not spayed because of this virus she's been fighting) I tried to hold on to that thought because the alternative FIP is fatal. I barely slept last night worrying about her, wondering if her illness would affect the kittens, trying to think of what drugs she's had and if they're contraindicated in pregnancy.

So as I'm checking her out this morning, wondering if she's the one having accidents, Delta Dawn jumps up on me and perches on my shoulder like a parrot. I gave her some petting and when she jumped off of me, she left something behind on my shirt, also much like a parrot. But the silver lining is that I now know who my culprit is!

At the vet there was more good news. Wild Thing wasn't pregnant, she doesn't have FIP, she has gas! Poor thing to be that gassy and bloated. I really feel for her, but at least it's not fatal!

And in more good news, she has coccidia. Which means that her whole litter probably has coccidia. Coccidia is a parasite that causes nasty poop, really stinky stuff that has a certain color and can have blood in it. Cats can get very run down from this if left untreated. So why am I so happy about this? Because they have a diagnosis! They're not just having "mystery poop"! I got enough medication to treat the whole bunch and now I get to dump out all the litter and bleach the boxes but I don't mind. I love that there is a protocol for this and that I can make them better!

So for a poopy Monday, things are going well so far.

In a similar story, we visit Poor Scary - just when she started eating on her own and doing really well, she got all stuffy again so she's back on antibiotics. I've been giving her a measured portion of canned food, but apparently it was too much, or she ate too fast, because she was quite a rotund little girl. I was worried that she wasn't eliminating, I was worried that it was FIP or worms. So she got dewormed again, a bit less food, a bit more running time and while she's not slender, she doesn't look like she swallowed a ball anymore! She's little enough that I could say she swallowed a tennis ball. Poor thing has spent her whole young life having food put in her mouth, now that she gets to eat on her own, it's hard to stop!

Scary is coming along very well though. Not sure when she'll be big and strong enough for a spay and a new home, but at least I'm thinking about those things for her! Amazing to think that I was worried about if she'd make it or not and now I'm wondering when she can go to a new home.

I guess Monday's aren't so bad afterall.

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