Smoochie and Bear

Bear & Smoochie - DW

When new cats come in at the City Shelter – either as surrenders or as trapped cats – one of the first things that happens is a quick trip to the vet for a checkup.  Blood testing comes first, a spay/neuter if necessary, and then a decision about where the cat will go.  For a cat that has spent any time in the wild, one of the dangers is always that they may have contracted feline leukemia virus (FeLV), and if that is the case, we are just thankful they have come to us at RAPS. FeLV is transmitted in saliva, and is dangerous to the immune systems of other cats; our own FeLV cats live in an area separated from the general population, both so that we can ensure that nothing in their saliva can contaminate anything the other cats touch, and also so that we can keep their area as safe as can be from anything that might affect their fragile immune systems.

Smoochie - DW

Many other shelters and sanctuaries are unable to create this dedicated area, and it is a sad fact that a cat infected with FeLV is more likely to be euthanized because it’s considered unadoptable. Of course, is is possible to have a FeLV cat at home, but only knowing that it should never go out, never be in touch with an uninfected cat, and knowing that its life-span is likely to be much shorter than usual. Faced with that, most people shy away from the commitment.

RAPS is dedicated to a no-kill philosophy, and leukemia cats coming to us mostly live in what we call the “Old Aids” area, now extended to the Val Jones corner.  For some time there has also been a Leukemia room tucked away at the back of the Single-Wide, but with the death of our lovely Harry, the population there was reduced to two cats, and the decision was made to transfer them over to the Val Jones area, where we have also lost Jerry, Foxy and GusGus in the last six months.

Smoochie hiding - DW

Smoochie was trapped and brought to us some four years ago; the family that found him would have kept him, but for the FeLV diagnosis. His tidy black-and-white and little Charlie Chaplin 'tache disguises a very shy boy; he was pretty scared when he arrived; it’s taken a long time to get to the point where he will comfortably accept petting, and I suspect it was Harry that taught him that humans could be trusted to give good cuddles!  He’s still shy, but now he looks for his favourite people, knowing that he’s safe with them.

Bear - MW

Bear was one of two cats surrendered together at the City Shelter; it turned out that he tested positive but his housemate was negative, and the two were split up, with Bear coming to us at the Sanctuary. “Shy” is not a word to describe Bear; he is pretty vocal, not really cuddly, but ready to throw his weight around when needed.

Smoochie - MW

Moving the two of them to the Val Jones corner was much as expected; Smoochie found corners to hide in and had to be coaxed out; Bear swaggered around with lots of confidence. Their pen-mates are Mocha, Suga, Henrik and blind Chip, and all seem to have settled well with the newcomers.

Blog by Brigid Coult

Photos by Debbie Wolanski and Michele Wright

Heartbreak Harry

I try to keep the Neko Blog focused on the joys of the Sanctuary – and there are many joys.  But for all of us, staff and volunteers, the hardest part is always when we lose a cat.  I blogged when we lost our beloved Cookie almost two years ago, when we lost beautiful Kojak (with a memorial to our other leukemia cats) and when we lost sweet Daisy last month.  Lee asked me last week to post something about Mindy, and I hesitated, because she wasn’t well known to a lot of people – I ended up posting Lee’s tribute on Mindy’s blog page.
But this week has dealt a blow to many of us with the death of our beloved Harry, and I’m breaking my own rule and offering a cat-obituary.

MW

Harry came to us just over four years ago.  We like to call ourselves Richmond’s best-kept secret – our address is not posted, our entrance is not signed – people wishing to surrender cats take them to the No 5 Road shelter, where it is decided if this is an adoptable cat or one that needs to come to us. Harry’s owners had obviously done their detective homework; he was found in a cage at the door by the morning med staff, and attached to the cage was a note that let us know that Harry had a peeing problem, and that in spite of surgery, the problem continued – to the ruination of their floors.

The Sanctuary exists for cats like Harry. We instantly fell in love with him – and it was mutual. After a short cage-stay to acclimatise him, Harry ventured out and made slaves of us all. 

JP

Sadly, he was either carrying the leukemia virus latently, or picked it up; a blood test let us know that Harry had to be moved into the Old Aids area with the other leukemia cats. 

Leukemia cats are very susceptible to every random germ, and it hits them hard, since their immune systems are down. Not only did Harry catch every upper respiratory infection going, he was also stressed by other more dominant cats in the enclosure. 

DW

It was decided to remove him into the Leukemia room at the back of the single-wide trailer. There he shared with no more than four or five other shy cats, and rapidly settled down.

There are all sorts of jokes about “dogs have owners; cats have staff” and “in ancient times, cats were worshipped as gods; they have never forgotten this”. And there’s a grain of truth in it – many cats will accept our love as long as they please, and then walk away when something else is offered. But Harry was a lover; he gave back love to those who loved him, and he was never happier than when sitting on a lap, and looking lovingly into the eyes of his friend. And everybody was Harry’s friend. Many people made a point of going to the Leukemia room any time they visited, to have Harry-time, and there was no better way to spend an hour.

PH

One thing we always know about our leukemia cats – we lose them too soon. Over four years with us, Harry had fought off a series of infections and renal problems and always pushed through. This time it was too much for that tired body.

CF

Many of us will be holding you in our hearts, Harry, and looking for you when we, too, get to the Rainbow Bridge.

Blog by Brigid Coult

Photos by Claire Fossey, Phaedra Hardman, June Price, Debbie Wolanski, Michele Wright

“…to pee, or not to pee; that is the question…”

Visitors to the Sanctuary are always reminded that most of our cats are non-adoptable because they may be feral, semi-feral, have health problems or behaviour problems. And most of the latter cats have usually been surrendered to us because of “inappropriate urination”.  But there are various reasons for that situation. In some cats, it’s their way of saying “I’m really stressed”. What that stress may be will vary. Perhaps the people next door have got a dog barking at all hours.  Perhaps there’s a new baby in the home. Perhaps there’s a new boyfriend or too many loud arguments.  The cat lets the owner know that it’s not happy by doing its business in the middle of the bed, or wherever – and next thing it knows, it’s being surrendered to us.

Leland - MW

We don’t know why Leland was left at the vet, but we do know that the kindly vet-tech who took him to her home hadn’t allowed for his degree of stress, or for a well cat-marked apartment. Poor Leland is still stressed, living with us, but he does have some people to love, and we just mop up after him as needed.

Nina - MW

Some of our older cats don’t handle stress very well; Nina has just come to us, rescued from being put down after things changed in her home.  It’s quite possible that when things are calmer for her, she might make an adoption prospect to the right person; she has shown no signs of peeing in her bed.

Tugboat - ML

For people who have multiple cats, having one or more cats acting out by peeing is common. Sadly, it’s all too often human-generated by there being too few litter-boxes, or boxes that aren’t cleaned often enough. Sometimes one cat will ambush another and create a situation in which the subordinate cat associates fear with the litter-box and decides it’s better to go elsewhere. We have had cats brought to us from hoarding situations, or just from multi-cat homes because of this problem. These are all what I would call the situational pee-ers. And there is very little doubt that most often the original problem-solving needs to start with the human – whether it’s an emotional, physical or medical problem – because there’s very little the cat can do…  But just occasionally someone will fall in love with that cat, and take them home to be a one-and-only, and the cat behaves perfectly – as was the case with a lovely Siamese called Tristan a few years back. 

Harry - PH

 We have our share of cats that have the best reasons for being with us.  Harry was left at our gate with a note that let us know that he’d had surgical treatment, but still ruined two floors! 

SweetPea - MW

Our darling SweetPea has no control over her sphincter muscles and leaves a little trail of drips (and the occasional “egg”) for us to clean. Noonie (in the Moore House) and Brady (in Old Aids) are both fragile cats and when weakened, it’s easier for them just to pee than to get up and find a litter box to use.

Jake - MW

And then there are the incorrigible pee-ers – Jake, in the front courtyard, who is everybody’s friend and loves to be carried; Jake wasn't surrendered for peeing, but has taken to it with great enthusiasm -

Elliot - MW

and Elliot, who likes nothing better than to find a lap and be fussed over – in both cases we have to warn visitors not to put anything down because it will immediately be marked! In fact, occasionally Jake likes to mark his favourite people! 

Lucky - MW

Our elegant Bengal, Lucky, probably has a pedigree and cost his purchaser quite a lot;  but once he started peeing around the home, the pedigree doesn’t count! Handsome Tugboat, cuddly Yoda, noisy Booster, elderly Bluebell – they’ve all just got into the habit of “going” wherever they are, rather than finding one of the many litter-boxes around.  It’s hard to know if it’s a habit that could ever be broken, or if it’s so ingrained now that even the most loving private home can’t deal with it.  So instead they have a loving home with us – and we smile and mop up after them!

Leland knows he is loved

Blog by Brigid Coult

Photos by Phaedra Hardman, Moira Langley & Michele Wright

Wherefore art thou, Romeow?





At the back of the single-wide trailer is a small room, used as the Sanctuary office, but known to all as the Leukemia Room. Most of our feline Leukemia cats now live in what’s called the Old Aids / Val Jones complex, and there’s usually a little juggling around to get the best combination of cats that will get along together: who can cope with bossy Merlin? who can stand up to aggressive Jerry?

But the Leukemia Room is home to just a few very quiet cats, who benefit from the calm space, and also from the removal from all the feline cold germs that get passed around. They get no casual Sunday visitors, though on other days there are always volunteers who will go in and spend time with them.  Smoochie has lived there for some time; he was joined by our lovely Harry and most recently by big fluffy Bear. And if you’re lucky, you’ll get a glimpse of shy Marlowe.

Smoochie - Harry - Bear (MW)

Marlowe (MW)

The single-wide trailer has no access to the courtyard for the cats – these are all essentially indoor cats, though on the east side there’s an extensive covered deck where cats can get their fresh air and a little separation from the activity inside. And the Leukemia Room, too, has its little deck, with a double-locked entrance from the main deck.
Volunteers know that working with leukemia cats means careful hand-washing before and after – but Leukemia Room volunteers also know that working here means watching carefully for a small black cat, who paces the floor outside the doors of both entrances.

Harvest (DW)

Harvest  is usually a pretty easy-going guy who gets on well with the other cats – especially his buddy Babylon. But he REALLY wants in to the Leukemia Room, and we think that the attraction is Marlowe, who lives on the other side of the door. And the two can never be together; she’s leukemia-positive, and leukemia cats can transmit the virus through their saliva. For his own safety, Harvest must stay out. Every now and then he tries to do a jail-break in the wrong direction; he has actually managed it once, and had to be quarantined until his blood-tests showed him to be leukemia-free.

Harvest & Marlowe (DW)

That was the simple beginning to a thwarted love-story I was going to call Romeow and Julicat.  But it’s not as simple as that,
I had finished my Single-wide shift last week, and was sitting in the outside area of the Leukemia room, cuddling with Harry – who, as volunteers know, is a very single-minded cuddler!  Marlowe emerged from her bed on the shelf and sat glaring at me; Marlowe is not a cuddler, and doesn’t see why anyone else should be.

Marlowe (DW)

There was a flurry of activity from the deck beyond the door, where a plate of food was being served, and then a little black cat detached itself from the crowd and came over to the door.  Marlowe perked up; eyeing me cautiously, she descended the ramp to the door, and the two cats had a rubbing-and-posing conversation for about five minutes.

Harry was miffed – my attention was clearly divided, and he went off to do something else. I took a chance and slipped through the door, hoping to get some pictures from the other side.

 

 

At this point it became obvious that it wasn’t Harvest that was weaving and flirting and saying “I want to be in there” – Harvest has a white spot on his front, and this was an all-black cat. I got some pictures and went to find med-staff Leslie, who knows all the cats. Who was this, taking Harvest’s place in Marlowe’s heart?

 

It turns out that the alternate black cat is Clyde, the sister of our beautiful Bonnie Boy (check his link for the story of their names).

So does Marlowe swing both ways? Is she just a sucker for any black cat? (though she’s not particularly interested in either Smoochie or Bear). Is she the feline equivalent of a sailor with a date in every port? – she has a flirt at each door…   It’s certainly not the simple love-story I’d envisaged.

Whatever lies behind it, black cats pace at both the Leukemia Room entrances, and volunteers entering have to keep a wary eye open for a shadow trying to slide through on their heels.

 

Blog by Brigid Coult

Photos by Brigid Coult, Debbie Wilcox Wolanski & Michele Wright

Flat Cats

Once again the Cat Sanctuary is basking in the best of BC summer weather – and most of the cats have decided that activity is OUT.

Latte

Wherever you go, little patches of shade each hold a cat. The front courtyard has been rigged out with an awning, the new trees (thank you to Purina and Evergreen) are giving green respite and the gazebo is popular.

Puffin
In each building the fans are going, and cats have plastered themselves on shelves, so that often only the toes can be seen.

unknown toes

The barn cats find a convenient umbrella and stay out of the sun

And everywhere there are sleeping furry bodies...

Ash

Emily

Harry

Leland

Tommy

Thanks to Michele Wright and Moira Langley for the pictures

Graceless kitties of June

It's been brought to my attention that we're long overdue for a "graceless kitties" post. The cats must have heard about this too, as they've generally been refusing to be silly for my camera.

Here are a few shots I did manage to get with, as always, a little help from some friends.

Booster

Chip

Greyson

Grubby
photo by Phaedra

Val and Harry
photo by Ed