Ever since I went on sabbatical, I’ve been able to do things that I’ve wanted to do for a long time but could never find the time or energy to do. One of those is volunteer more consistently for the Cincinnati SPCA. The last two times I volunteered at the mobile adoption unit, I had about a 50% adoption success rate. Hooch didn’t get adopted but Destiny went to a great home with 5 kids! I think about Hooch all the time, though 🙁 I remember once hearing from someone who had dedicated his life to helping undernourished children in Africa. He had saved countless and helped hundreds but as he was interviewed, he said that the ones he couldn’t help tormented him. I didn’t understand at the time, because how can you feel guilt or sorrow when you’ve helped so many? But the heart has a way of reminding you of how you are human and therefore limited.
After volunteering and knowing that the dogs that don’t get adopted go back to the shelter (possibly to be put down), the one that didn’t get adopted DID follow me around and I found myself thinking about him. Dennis is not hot on adopting another dog when we have two so I decided to get crafty. With some Pinterest help I started working on “business cards” for the dogs that potential adopters could take home and have as a reminder of the doggy waiting on them. All that is still work-in-progress!
Recently the SPCA volunteers received an urgent email looking for foster families for kittens and their mothers. Apparently, kittens don’t survive at shelter when they are young given airborne respiratory illnesses. These illnesses don’t affect people or dogs but they do tend to spread quickly among cats. Add the fact that kittens have low immunity and you can understand why they want them out of the shelter for the first couple of weeks.
So the boys and I went to get the cats. Four kittens and one Mom. The funny thing is that I have no experience taking care of cats (had no idea of how to manage litter, for example). Well, well. So far the experience, or should I call it adventure?, has been pretty tumultuous. First thing that happened was that I got a text from Dennis the day after they were home which said that one of the kitties had a maggot coming out of its neck. That’s right, a maggot. In addition, the Mommy Cat was having diarrhea all over the house (I didn’t realize that she needed a separate litter box from the kittens).
When I came home, the maggot had fallen out and mercifully died. I immediately took all of them to our vet (since the SPCA vet wasn’t going to be at the shelter until 4-5 days later). The vet said that it was a very common thing – this fly (Botflies) lays their eggs in the grass and any animal that comes through gets them. The larvae waits under the skin until they “hatch” (gross, gross, gross). All of the animals were feverish and so had to be put on antibiotics (>$100 later we were heading home). The kitten is fine, the wound is healing but goodness gracious.
After that rocky start and once they started getting better, it was a lot easier to have them with us. While having to separate them from the dogs is a pain the behind, the boys seem to delight in having them. They are rambunctious and cute – playful and spirited. Such innocent little creatures.
While our cat fostering hasn’t been as incident-free as I’d hoped, it’s definitely been a learning experience for everyone in the family.
Te amo!