Abigail is cured!

Went for a follow-up visit to the vet today, and he was surprised by how much she's improved in one week. Her upper respiratory infection is gone, and so are the fleas. The reddish dots still in her coat are in fact dead flea bodies and eggs. So all I have to do is give her another bath tomorrow when she is less stressed. She still has a scab on her head that has not healed, so we've got some cream and antiseptic stuff to put on it.

Munch away! Her tail is quite the banner.

Top view. Her fur tends to fluff and so hides her scrawny frame well.

Front view. Face blur action.

Full tank! Then she flops.

Still wants some more food!

I guess I've been lucky so far with rescuing cats...Tuffie was no problem once her leg healed, the kittens did fine once the worms and runny noses were taken care of, and Abbie is doing well now that the fleas, worms and assorted bacteria have been eliminated. I asked the vet about her missing teeth and he suggested that it could be her baby teeth being replace by permanent ones. Lets hope they grow back. :)

Her Name is Abigail

Say welcome to the newly-christened Abigail, or Ah-Bie for short. Tuffie is Ah-Fie...hope they can keep their names apart :P Status update:

Abigail sez, "2 bowls of food ain't enough, please can I have some more?"

Actually the white saucer is for her meds, mixed with some canned food. Though she is fed twice a day she gets double portions each time. You can still feel the spine and ribs, but it's not as painfully obvious as before. She now has a nice padding of soft fur :) She's even growing fuzz on her bare butt! Her nose is entirely cleared up now. We still have to do something about the remnant fleas and that scratch though. One more visit to the vet this Sat I suppose.

New Cat Alert! Found on Halloween.

So me and Sophia were going for lunch in Gadong on Friday and we heard this mewing coming from the rubbish dump. This emaciated cat was crying with all its might, trying to get noticed. Well, we noticed. I didn't really think of bringing it home with me yet, but the idea just grew on me during the day, and at 5pm I decided that if I can still find the cat I will take it home with me.

Well, as luck would have it, it was still there. We confirmed it was a she and Sophia helped commandeer a box from the office to bring her back in. This was a truly miserable looking cat, she has been starving for a while and was all bones and skin. She was even skinnier than Tuffie was back then.

She was quite filthy and besides the skeletal appearance she also had a few missing teeth, sniffles with yellow-green snot (eew) as well as ear mites (double-eew) and a whole host of crawlies in her fur (eew-ack). Oh not to mention internal wormies too.

Day 2: Look at that bony leg! When we got home she just kept crying...definitely was one sick kitty. Before I brought her to the vet I gave her a dose of de-flea and a quarter of a de-worming tablet. She was as light as the kittens so I decided to go with a kitten dose. The vet suggested to dose her once every week for 3 weeks. He also prescribed 2 meds for her runny nose.

I decided to give her a bath after the visit to get rid of all the grime and crawlies on her...that was quite the experience. I've never given Tuffie a thorough bath as she was always very clean, but this was different. So I ran some lukewarm water, grabbed the flea shampoo and the cat. There was quite a bit of yowling and wriggling, and when I cracked out the hair dryer she flipped out. The sun chose that day to hide in the clouds, so there she was sitting in the shade shivering :( She had not eaten much during the day and her body temperature was a bit low while at the vet...

...but once she settled down, she managed to get the appetite for food, and I was much relieved. This pic was taken just after she got dried off. What a difference clean fur makes. :)

Day 3, Sunday: Starting to get a bit of caturday on us, eh? I guess she felt way better, as she could stretch and roll and yawn. She got rid of a huge worm and seemed much relieved by it ;)

Despite this I had to give her another bath, but the sun was out and it was nice and hot. I also made sure the water was warmer this time, as I want to really get rid of all the fleas. So ensues the second round of yowling and splashing, and the dreaded hair dryer again. But the second round was worth it, got rid of most of the fleas.

Well, here we are at day 4, still skinny, but her fur is finally fluffy and clean. :D Also eating for 3 cats apparently. She's got a lot of weight to catch up.

Goodbye Mr. Ginger Cat

Moar!

This is Mr. Ginger Cat. He was one of the strays that I have been feeding for over 2 months now. At the beginning he was such a scrawny thing, all legs and tail. His fur was sparse and his colour was pale. I brought him to the vet to be vaccinated, de-wormed and de-fleaed. Also to make sure he wasn't harbouring an illness or something. Well, the vet said he seemed fine other than a bit undernourished, so I would feed him and 2 other strays regularly in the evenings.

One wiry cat and one wiry brother (legs).

He's extremely affectionate. Here he was rubbing snot on my jeans.

Ginger Cat face-off with the Sick Cat. Here was another stray that was in worse shape than he is - he had a perpetual bleeding nose, possibly cancerous in origin. I have yet to be able to feed him or bring him to the vet as he makes himself extremely scarce.

Last Thursday I went down to feed the cats as usual. Later I will have to make a proper introduction for the motley bunch of strays that wander about my apratment. Anyways Ginger Cat is always first in line once he smells food or hears me calling, so I was a bit weirded out when only Tortie and Cute cat appeared. Well, it was heat season, so I thought Ginger had gone off exploring and didn't think too much of it. He had begun to show improvement in that his coat was growing back and his colour was much better. He has also bulked up a bit.

Well, 2 days passed and still no sign of the Ginger cat. We didn't see him until Saturday evening; me and my brother found him in a drain drinking. But when I offered him food he did not seem interested. Then he started coughing and retching. I couldn't help him as the vets were closed until Monday, and he still looked ok despite the dry heaves...

...but come Sunday morning he was dead. :( It must have been something internal, I have no clue. It was so sudden too, as he did not seem sick, but then cats have a way of hiding their discomfort that could be detrimental to getting them swift treament. I miss this guy :(. Every morning if he sees me before I go to work he'll come and get a pet or two. I miss his boisterous presence when I go down to feed him in the evenings. I was planning to get him fixed, then find a permanent home for him (since Tuffie is adamant that she is to be the only cat in our household). I wish I could have hugged and spoilt him more, but at least he is not suffering anymore.

R.I.P. Mr. Ginger Cat.