Our six Maine Coons: Part One (Intake)

Two weeks ago, we got a message from a breeder friend about 199 Maine Coon cats that had been seized by the Buffalo NY SPCA out of one single home. Because these cats had a myriad of infectious diseases, the SPCA was only willing to transfer them to veterinarians. Because of their diseases, the SPCA has no where to put them, so it's imperative that they get moved to vets as quickly as possible. Jane, a Maine Coon breeder, has been helping the SPCA and doing a lot of the traveling back and forth between Buffalo and the final destinations for these kitties.

Since we have a veterinarian on staff, we were game to step in and help however we could. After talking with Jane and with the SPCA, we learned that these kitties had Tritrichomonas foetus (a protozoan parasite that causes severe and prolonged diarrhea) and ringworm (a fungus that causes skin lesions and itching), as well as ear infections and upper respiratory infections. They had also been covered with fleas when they were seized and had many intestinal worms.

We opted to take six of these kitties; since the cost of treating these cats is pretty substantial (they all needed to be spayed/neutered, treated for ringworm, and treated for trichomomas, plus treated for any other infections), we felt we could safely cover a few cats, put probably not more than that...

Jane and the SPCA were thrilled, and after jumping through a few logistical and bureaucratic hoops, we had a date (Thursday, April 28th) to meet Jane in Northeast Philadelphia (close to her home) on her return from Buffalo. We were so excited to be able to help these guys, but so appalled at how terrible they looked when we got them. We immediately drove them to our veterinarian for their intake exams.



Dr. Sprowls deemed the four girls healthy enough to spay the next day, but wanted to wait on the two boys, who both had pretty nasty sounding lungs from their respiratory infections. The next day, all the girls got spayed. They were all in heat, so very lucky for all of us that the SPCA had gotten into this home when they did, otherwise there would have been a lot more cats in a few months!

One of the girls, who we named Persimmon, had a tumor on one of her ovaries. We opted to send it out for biopsy, and are hoping that we get lucky and it's not a metastasizing cancer. We'll be holding our breathe until next week!

Here's a few pictures, day 1 and 2, of our six beauties...

Persimmon, female, is very shy, but so very sweet when you pick her up. She's the one that we're crossing our fingers for and hoping that her tumor is benign.




Kiwi, male, only around 8 months old, has a big personality and is a total charmer. He's a little boy, but he makes up for it!



Guava, female, is a little spitfire in all the right ways! She hates getting her medication, but is very sweet (when you aren't trying to stuff meds down her throat). She clearly thinks she's a princess, and she might well be!



Papaya, female, is the most scared of the bunch. She doesn't understand that we just want to help. It's hard to convince her we are good people when we're constantly medicating her, but since her upper respiratory infection is so bad, we don't feel like we have an option.



Fig, male, definitely in the worst shape of the bunch, he is literally all skin and bones and has terrible diarrhea. Despite feeling awful, all he wants is to snuggle with you.



CoCoNuts, female, is also a lover, but has a head tilt from her terrible ear infection. She feels pretty cruddy, but still purrs when you touch her.



We'll be keeping you updated with their progress over the next few weeks. If you'd like to support these kitties directly, consider joining us on May 12th from 6-8 pm for a special happy hour at Tabu lounge and bar in Center City Philadelphia. The happy hour proceeds will go directly to these kitties. And as always, if you'd like to donate directly, please feel free to use paypal or mail a check to our PO Box.