Furry Friday: Hope survived the night
While I was working on a video camera at the Receiving computer in Saint Paul on Monday, someone tried to drop off with me (alone at the desk) a kitten that looked nearly dead. It laid flat on its side, it was cold, it didn’t open its eyes more than a slit, and it couldn’t make a proper meow. Its voice quivered so much that attempts to meow didn’t sound feline at all.
I'm just an I.T. technician, so I work with computers rather than customers and animals. I hurried deeper into the building to get staff who could help. I found someone, and she put the kitten on a heating pad and applied karo syrup to its gums. The staff named her Hope, and she weighed in at 1.13 pounds. They noted later that she “came in very cold and lifeless”. Hope survived the night, though, and is recovering nicely.
She stayed under vet supervision for a few days, and I picked her up yesterday afternoon for a 3-week foster. After that time, we expect that she'll weigh enough for spay surgery, and then she can go on to adoption.
This experience is my first time fostering any animal. I was worried last night that Hope wasn't eating anything, but this morning she finally ate several pieces of canned cat food. She tried to eat one of the dry food kibbles too, but that hard stuff is still a lot of work for her tiny mouth.
She's prescribed two medicines (Clavamox and Panacur) while in my care. I've never given a cat medicine before, but it went rather well this morning. I slowly squirted the stuff into her mouth, and almost all of it actually stayed in her mouth. She forgave me quickly. She started purring again after just a little cuddling.
I'll feel a lot better once I see her drink water. I'll go somewhere today to buy an old electric heating pad that doesn't automatically shut off. (It's still possible to buy them, as I learned at the Wildlife Rehabilitator conference several months ago.)
She's staying in the basement of the house, sequestered from my cat T'Reese. So far T'Reese has been very curious, wondering what exciting things are happening on the other side of the closed door, out of her reach.
Time to shower and get ready for work this morning.
I'm a (foster) mommy!