When Kitty Rescue Comes Close to Home

Most of you know my husband and I have horses. We board them at a farm not far from our house. There are a lot of barn cats there, and a number of our cats came from the farm when they got sick or hurt and we took them home. Every Spring and Summer, idiots who think a farm automatically needs cats dump kittens at the barn. Sometimes we get these poor lostlings and find them homes, sometimes they are too feral and run away. Josephine feeds them so they don't starve, but still, it's not the life of a loved pet.

Normally I am not at the farm during the late morning/early afternoon, but because my afternoon client was in Ohio this past week, I'd been going out there after my morning client. As such, I was there when Jo fed the cats, and I noticed one very small cat that was very sick and thin. Jo said it was one of the older kittens that was born at the farm, and she'd been sick a while.

The following day I came prepared and I trapped the 1/2 wild cat. Luckily, she didn't give me too much trouble or try to kill me when I pushed her into the crate I'd brought. I got her home & made an appointment with my vet to look at her. He is used to me bringing my rescues to him.

It turns out, she was damn lucky I'd caught her. Not only did she have a nasty URI, but she also has pneumonia and tapeworms. My vet said she would have been dead within a week if I hadn't caught her. She weighs a pitiful 2.8 lbs. But that's not all. My "kitten" is not a kitten at all. She is at least 2 years old based on her teeth. She isn't a kitten born at the farm. This was a cat someone dumped, and the more I spend time with this poor baby, the madder I get.

At first this kitty hissed and shied away, but now that I've been caring for her for a few days, she purrs and kneads my shoulder when I hold her. We gave her bath because she was filthy and had fleas. Now that she is clean and feeling a bit better, she is really coming around. She thrives on attention, but she still shies away when you first approach her. It's so sad and infuriating.

This poor baby is pitiful. She is so tiny and thin. She was someone's pet and she got dumped. Right now I am nursing her back to health. Then I will get her spayed (if she isn't spayed already) and try to find her a home. I am resisting naming her because as sweet as she is, I do not want to keep her. This means I need to get her well and get her out before I name her and convince myself that having 19 cats is perfectly OK and normal. O.O