Newsletter No 69
To encourage your cats to drink during this hot weather, our vet has suggested that you make up a dilute stock and freeze it into ice-cubes before putting it in their water bowl, as apparently just water tastes horrible if their body temperature reaches a certain level.
Another tip is to mix a little water in with their food, not too sloppy but enough to increase the water content.

ESSEX NEWS FROM THE CAT HOUSE
Well, summer is upon us and so is the kitten season, with a vengeance. Last year was our worst for kittens and this year looks like it is going to be even worse. We started taking in pregnant cats very early this year and since then there has been a stream of mums with kittens and just kittens from owners who could not find homes for them. At the moment we have 25 kittens aged between 8 to 12 weeks, although we have had up to 36, but it is getting harder and harder to find responsible owners for them all. The adult cats are spending an average of 3 months with us waiting for a home and we have just homed a pair of adorable 2 year olds that had been with us for 4 months. When there are kittens around the adults just get overlooked. Once again our waiting list for cats to come in is getting longer and longer as the cats are taking up our pens for so long. If a cat comes in pregnant we have to wait for her to give birth, then the kittens have to be 8 weeks old before we can home them, then mummy has to find a home, so sometimes one cat can be using a pen for 4 months. Sadly the message that all cats need to be neutered at six months is just not getting across and cats continue to suffer as a result.

Here are just a few stories of the lucky cats we have been able to help, sadly there are thousands more out there just like them without any chance of getting the care they need.

The Dagenham 17.
Just as the last newsletter was about to be printed we got a call from a man saying his brother- in- law had died and he had 12 cats in his 7th floor flat in Dagenham that he needed to get re-housed. Luckily it had been a good week with homing and we had 4 empty pens, it would be a bit of a squeeze for the cats, but they had to get them out of the flat before they handed the keys back to the council. They started bringing in the cats a few at a time, they were very nervous and all in a very poor state, under-weight, full of fleas and upset tummies. By the third day we had taken in 9 of them, with just 3 more to come, or so we thought. When they arrived on the fourth day they said they had got all of them, but as we got them out of the carriers and did a count we were up to 15 cats. I suppose you could forgive them for getting it wrong when they first counted, as 13 of them were black and fluffy and did all look very alike. Anyway we thought that was the last of them until 3 days later when they rang to say they had found another 2 hiding under the bath behind the panel. Well, in came 2 more very nervous black fluffy cats, making a total of 17 altogether. One of the two oldest cats, an elderly tabby and white who had been the man’s original cat and who he always called Old Faithful, took the move all in his stride and was soon playing with the toys in his pen. The other older cat, who was black and white  and who we named Charlie, was much more upset by the move and hid in a covered bed for 2 weeks before he felt brave enough to come and say hello, but once he got to know us he was a very friendly boy. The 15 black fluffies ranged from nervous to almost semi-feral, they obviously had very little handling and had just been left to do their own thing. All but three of the cats had to be neutered; some needed dental treatment, not because they were old, just due to a poor diet, and most needed antibiotics to get their tummies right. After we had got the cats back to full health, which took a few weeks, a local newspaper did an article about them and the offers of homes started to come in. We are very grateful to all the people who gave them a second chance in life, most now have a home with a garden to explore and two now live on a farm.

Jake
It was late on a Saturday afternoon and we were just about to go home when a lady turned up carrying a little ginger kitten in her hands. She said she had found him walking along next to a very busy main road. He was only about 8 weeks old and he had half of his back left leg missing, he was either born this way or it had happened when he was very young as it was not a raw wound. It did not affect him in any way and he was a real little character. The vet did recommend that the stump be amputated to prevent it getting sore as he did try to walk on it sometimes. He is now in a new home and he has had the operation on his stump. He is doing fine and gets on well with the other two cats who live there.

Albert
One night at about 10.45pm someone dumped a very elderly white and black cat in a carrier at our front gate. Fortunately someone was just coming home and saw the security light on and noticed the carrier by the gate, otherwise he would have been there all night through a thunderstorm in just a wicker carrier. He was very grubby and painfully thin but such a loving, happy little boy who just loves cuddles. We took him to the vets the next morning and they ran lots of tests. He has an over-active thyroid, which is why he is so thin, and he has terrible teeth so will need a dental when he is strong enough. He also has skin cancer on his ears and nose so will have to have them operated on in the future. We decided that as all this treatment is going to take so long and there is little chance he would ever find a home; he will become one of our permanent residents. He has met all the other resident cats and he fits in perfectly with them all.

Alice
We have been helping a lady who has been feeding a small colony of feral cats get them neutered and last year we took in some of the kittens that were born there. She rang to say that one of last year’s kittens that she just couldn’t catch had given birth to 6 kittens, some had died very soon after birth and she asked if we could take them in, which we agreed to do. When she brought them in, only one kitten was still alive but it was the tiniest kitten we have ever seen, it was the size of a mouse. It battled on for two days but very sadly when we came in one morning it had died through the night. When Alice (the mother) had recovered from the birth and the loss of her kittens, we got her spayed and the lady was willing to take her back and continue feeding her. When we took her back the other 2 cats there were watching us. One, a young black cat, watched from the long grass as we let Alice free. Alice jumped up onto the fence and started calling, then she spotted the black cat in the grass and jumped down and ran over to it. They immediately started rubbing heads and talking to each other and we watched for ten minutes while they just rubbed around each other. They then slowly strolled down the garden side by side and into the field at the bottom of the garden. They obviously had a very strong friendship and had missed each other and not forgotten each other despite Alice having been away for about 3 weeks. It was so beautiful to watch them being reunited.

Timmy
We had a call from a man who worked next to an RSPB nature reserve on the Essex/Herts. border saying a cat had turned up on the reserve and if it was not removed by the weekend, the cat would be destroyed. We agreed to take it and the cat duly arrived. We scanned it to see if it was micro-chipped and to our surprise it was, as this is only the second cat that has come into us that was chipped. We got the owner’s details from the chip company, but the phone number no longer existed. We then rang the vet that had chipped the cat and he gave us a more recent number for that address, but sadly the people who now live there knew nothing about the cat. The vet had not treated the cat for 3 years so could not help us any further. What we did find out from his chip details was that he was 20 years old. He was a sweet, loving cat but when we took him to the vets as he had a very upset tummy, they found he had a massive tumour and recommended that he be put to sleep as it was causing him a lot of pain. So obviously we had to agree, as much as we hate making that decision, we don’t want any cat to suffer and the only consolation was that he wasn’t left out there to endure a long, painful death.

If your cats or dogs are micro-chipped, please ensure if you move or change your phone numbers that you inform the chip company, as your cat’s and dog’s micro-chip is only as good as the information held for it.

We micro-chip all the cats and kittens before we home them and it reunited one cat we homed as a kitten with its owner. Last year we got a call from a lady we homed 2 kittens to about 18 months previously, she was distraught that one of them had gone missing. Despite searching the streets and calling rescue centres and vets and putting up posters, she just could not find him. She rang about a month later to say he had been found in Ipswich, Suffolk, a good hour’s drive away from where she lived. He had obviously got into a car or delivery van and ended up a long way from home. We know if it was not for his micro-chip, he would have just been another stray in a rescue centre looking for a new home, while his owner was pining for him many miles away. So please get your cats and dogs micro-chipped as it could save you and them a lot of heartache in the future and it is also a good way to prove you are the owner as so many cats and dogs are being stolen now.

George
Yet another very old, painfully thin cat was found wandering the streets last week. Luckily we had a spare pen as we had just homed a cat, when a very concerned man rang about the cat. He brought him into us and we were shocked at just what a terrible state he was in. He was a walking skeleton; he had an abscess on the side of his face and his long coat was matted and grubby. He was so friendly and just seemed so happy to have a comfortable bed to sleep in and food whenever he wanted it. We took him to the vet to be checked over and again they found tumours in his stomach and advised he be put to sleep to save him from any more suffering. Why are so many old sick cats just left on the streets, we are seeing more and more of it and it is just breaking our hearts as we know this is just the tip of the iceberg. How many suffer without any help?

The scrapyard family
We had a call from a lady to say a cat had given birth to 3 kittens in an old camper van at the scrapyard where her husband worked. She was getting in and out of the van through the floor where the gearbox had been removed, but fortunately the kittens had not ventured out yet as they were about 6 weeks old. We took traps and set one in the van and managed to get 2 of the kittens quite quickly. Then mummy went into the one we had sent up under the van as they said that was where she would lay through the day. Keira (Mum) was a white cat with just a tabby tail and a patch of tabby on her head, but she looked more like a grey cat as she was filthy from all the oil around. We left a trap set in the van overnight as the third kitten had gone into hiding and after waiting a few hours, we realised that it was just not going into the trap.

We returned early next morning to find a big black tomcat in the trap, daddy, and then we found the third kitten hiding under a shelf. We managed to grab it so we now had the whole family. The people were happy to have the cats back once they were neutered, but no-one was feeding them there and there were puddles of oil everywhere, so we decided to find a farm or stables for them as we just could not take them back to that. Apparently Keira had been around for about 5 years and had kittens every year but they never survived, which is not surprising if no one was feeding her and the conditions they were living in. Just this weekend we took both Keira and Dad to a beautiful house and stables in the Margaretting countryside where they will now have regular food, hay barns to sleep in and fields to roam instead of an oily scrap yard. The three kittens are taming up well, one is already looking for a new home and the other two should soon be tame enough for homing

LONDON MARATHON
We are delighted to tell you that John finished the Marathon in four hours and Al came in fifteen minutes later. This was John’s 21st London Marathon and we are very grateful to both him and Al for their tremendous efforts and to everyone who supported them so generously. So far, we have received £1018.00 in sponsorship monies and we will let you know in the next newsletter, the final total raised.

A big “thank you” must also go to Nicola, who has donated her two guaranteed entries for the Marathon to us for the last few years, which is a very generous gesture because these entries are like gold dust. This time Nicola also sent John and Al V.I.P. tickets for their families, which provided them with a champagne breakfast at the start and a good position at the end of the race.
Hertfordshire News

Karen has homed all the cats mentioned in the last newsletter, apart from Lee who is staying for the foreseeable future because he is very fond of Dolly and gives her confidence (Dolly is the young feral who had four kittens last year and who is one of our nine new sponsored cats). She has also homed Petal, Betsy, Brutus, Molly, Zeta and two eight-week-old kittens.

The kittens came in with their littermate, Toby, two ten-month-old cats (Sox and Sonic) and a year-old cat called Shadow. Sox and Toby were great friends and they have been homed together, but Sonic and Shadow are still waiting for a new home. Sadly, their owner could no longer keep them due to a change in circumstances but she was keeping their mother and a thirteen-year-old tomcat, whom she had not had neutered because she thought he was too old. She refused our offer to get this done but agreed to let us take the mother cat to be spayed, but our vet could not do this straight away because she had a lot of milk and he feared she might be pregnant again.

Karen took her back the following week and the vet confirmed that she was not expecting and the milk had dried up, so Buffy was duly spayed. She stayed with Karen until her stitches were taken out and she was given rest, cuddles and kitten food during that time because she was very run down after all the kittens. She has just returned to her owner and Karen will be keeping in touch, because the lady has now got another kitten and has promised to have both the kitten and the male cat neutered.

Brandy is a young male Persian who came into Karen’s in a very poor state. His fur had to be shaved and he needed lots of TLC and several trips to the vet. He has just been homed with a lady who already has a Persian, so who knows how to look after them and keep them well-groomed. We are so pleased that Brandy has got the chance he deserves after such a bad start in life and apparently the two cats have accepted each other very well (so far!).

The latest arrivals at Karen’s are two sisters aged eight years, who escaped from a house fire in January where their owner tragically was killed. The cats have been living rough since then with neighbours feeding them and they were both very frightened when they came in. One of them has a wound from her collar and both cats were still very grubby from the smoke, but they will be going to the vet next week before they start on their long road to recovery.

Karen has many other cats looking for new homes, many of them middle-aged. All of the charity’s cats for rehoming are on our website and if anyone is interested in offering them a loving home, please contact Karen on 07971 031699 or email her at kodydog3@yahoo.co.uk.

RESIDENT CATS
Many thanks to everyone who kindly sponsored our nine new resident cats. They now each have a few sponsors so thank you very much for supporting them.

Very sadly, we have lost three of our feline family since the last newsletter. Syd was diabetic but her condition had been quite stable and when we saw her a few days before she died, she was looking very well. Syd passed away early one morning having gone to bed perfectly normally and everything indicates that she had a heart attack. Megan and Stanley, who looked after Syd, are understandably devastated to have lost her and they miss her a great deal. They loved and cared for her so well and never missed giving her insulin on time, even if it meant cutting short an outing to make sure that Syd was not late with her medication. In return, Syd adored them and although we wish she could have spent longer with them, we are so thankful that  her last years were happy and that they were with her at the end.

Parsley had lived on Mardyke Farm for over five years and he enjoyed life to the full with his great friend, Basil. Like Basil, he remained semi-feral and was never interested in living indoors, preferring to spend his days on the farm or in the barn when the weather was cold. Three of the cats (Eddie, Jelly and Leo) who came from the same place as Basil and Parsley, still live with Roger and Veronica in Tonbridge. We were all very fond of Parsley, but it is Carol and Jan who miss seeing him every day and Basil is feeling quite lost at the moment. Thankfully, Basil is still eating and coming to the barn for his daily treats, but he is definitely looking for Parsley and we can only hope that eventually he finds another friend to share his days. Buster loves Basil and he is trying to be friends, but Basil is not too sure at the moment.

Ernie came into our care about two years ago and he was not offered for sponsorship because he was elderly and not in the best of health. Carol took him in and looked after him at home, where he enjoyed all the comforts and the occasional stroll down to the “Cat House”. We knew that Ernie’s health was failing and he had been to the vet for another check-up only a few days before he passed away, but it is always very sad when we lose any cat, whether or not it is expected.

We are very grateful to everyone who chose Syd or Parsley as their “special” cat because without all our generous sponsors, we truly could not support the resident cats. We have written to everyone involved and we hope that eventually you will feel able to choose another cat for sponsorship, although we do understand if you prefer not to do so.

Charity Homing Figures
(Essex & Hertfordshire)

                                       CATS     KITTENS
JANUARY                        23             2
FEBRUARY                       16              0
MARCH                            24             3
APRIL                                17              2
MAY                                    4             5
JUNE                                 14            10

 

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