Dear Sally
I've been carrying your letter in my bag for almost a week....my
apologies for not replying earlier...I want to thank you so very much
for your kind words, and for taking the trouble to write...I so
appreciate not just this wonderful email you sent me but ALL your emails
you send to us all. They are always so supportive and so informative.
For my part, my condolences email to you when your horse passed away in
the middle of January slipped through the net. I hope late is better
than never, to say I'm very sorry for your loss of your dear old friend.
Thanks too for the info on the San Francisco program. We need a
similarly "dynamic young attorney" and a Dr Dana Gleason here in
Chicago. What San Francisco has achieved is so impressive, and truly a
model for the rest of the U.S., not to mention the world.
I'm still pretty cut up about Levi, and I still have questions that I'd
like to put to the group. I'll try and do so in the next few days.
Luckily the remaining 3 positive kitties and Momcat (negative) are all
doing well, and look the picture of bouncing health. I'm appreciating
every day I have with them.
Your email of 2/21 to Chris ("Hills food question")is timely for me too,
as I'm trying to get a handle on how much they're eating v. how much
they should be eating. Even allowing for the fact that we've lost
Caramel and Levi, it seems to me they're eating significantly less since
Caramel went. (Having said that, they look plump enough. Re-reading your
email, perhaps it's because they're that bit older now---17 months, now)
Anyway, I've begun recording how much they're actually eating. I've been
trying to get them to eat more wet and less dry---I give them Petguard
or Wellness wet in the morning, and the same in the evening with the
addition at the end of the evening of Wellness dry. They adore the
Wellness dry, and your email gave me an insight into why. I think
they've got into the habit of cutting back on the wet because they know
the dry is coming!
You mentioned the difficulties of taking care of ferals who are not
cuddly and cooperative, and you are right that they are completely
uncooperative; and of course they are not cuddle-able. The frustrating
thing is that they are so darn cuddly-LOOKING, especially the two little
tabbies, Mickey and Flavia--I long to give the scamps a cuddle, but they
play so hard to get 365/24/7! One day.....
Thanks again for all your fantastic input, Sally. I so appreciate it.
Kerry
-----Original Message-----
From: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
[mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of
[EMAIL PROTECTED]
Sent: Friday, February 18, 2005 3:43 PM
To: felvtalk@felineleukemia.org
Subject: Re: San Fran & feral champion
Hi Kerry...
I can't remember if I ever sent you a message after Levi passed away.
That
was a crazy weekend for me and then we were having so many problems with
the
list and I was enduring my own kind of AOHell. When I couldn't log on,
an
outsourced consultant told me my AOL software was damaged and my disc
drive, for
whatever reason, could or would not read a disc to reinstall it and they
told me
nothing could be done. But I started digging on my own, computer dummy
that
I am, and decided to try defragging the drives, even though only one
drive was
16% fragmented. That seemed to do the trick and I was able to log on
again
to find an overflowing mailbox.
You have my utmost admiration for all your efforts dealing with FeLV+
ferals
who are not cuddly and cooperative with regards to getting meds. It is
difficult enough when you are trying to dose a cat who is even halfway
cooperative.
You did the very best you could trying to help Levi. Perhaps he tried
so
hard to stick around even though it was apparent he was not going to be
able to
get well because his alpha personality made him think he had to try and
be
there for his remaining siblings. He was sure a gutsy little guy and you
did the
best you could to try and help him. Sometimes our best is just not
enough, and
this is so often true when dealing with FeLV. If we can keep them
stable
with immune support and a good diet and try to minimize the stress in
their life,
that is about the best we can do until it is better understood what it
is
that causes the FeLV-A subgroup to mutate into one of the more virulent
subgroups, and a way can be found to stall or halt that process (better
yet a cure for
the whole damned gamut of FeLV and its subgroups!) Levi and his
littermates
were so lucky to have come into your care, and I am sure he and the
others
know that. The pain of the losses may never go away completely, but we
have to
put it in perspective and go on trying to help the others still in our
care.
I could really feel for what you have to go through after I rescued a
little
5 mo. old off the E-list at the local shelter to be a playmate for
Purrki, my
miracle bably who retested negative for FeLV when he was neutered in
Dec. '04.
She was on the E-list because she had a minor URI and the new Shelter
is not
yet set up to hold and treat cats symptomatic for any length of time, so
if
whatever symptoms they have don't clear in a few days, they go on the
list to
be PTS. I was not able to isolate Purrla successfully and ended up with
a URI
epidemic among my indoor cats. URI's are more annoying than a real
threat to
healthy cats. But even my two FeLV+ furkids isolated in a back bedroom
were
affected and they are still semi-feral. Tango, the brother, did very
well and
I only had to wrap him up in a towel the first two times and he was OK
after
that about getting his meds. His sister, Macarena, however is still so
very
shy, I as really worried it would set back her socialization and
acceptance of
me that I've worked so hard to achieve. When I had to go out of town
the
weekend of the 5-7th, I was worried sick about having to go away and
being able to
find someone who could come give meds to them. Luckily, I was able to
find
two ladies through the local network of rescue groups and both kittys
actually
did much better than I thought they would and neither of the postives
became
seriously ill. By the time I got back, no one was still couging or
congested,
just a bit of sneezing, and all were eating on their own.
With regards to the San Francisco program, I will try to find copy of an
article about that which listmember Denise Uriarte (also a boardmember
and
volunteer with PFOF, which stands for Peninsula Fix Our Ferals) shared
with me. They
have a dynamic young atorney who is or was the director and he lays it
out in
dollars and cents to demonstrate that an aggressive TNR policy with the
bulk
of resources dedicated to S/N is more cost effective and better at
controlling
feral populations than is TPTS. San Francisco is the only large city I
know
of which maintains a no kill policy at their shelters and are not having
to
euthanize healthy, adoptable cats as so many shelters must do.
The vet who has spearheaded these S/N "events" and gotten her colleagues
to
donate their veterinary skills and time to the effort is Dr. Dana
Gleason. She
has a practice in the East Bay area but I don't remember exactly where
offhand...will have to dig into my offline saved mail for that. She had
been doing
it for a while in the E. Bay and this past August began an effort to
include
the Peninsula (West Bay area) and down south to San Jose, as well. I
have
worked with three of these events so far and I can't tell you how
impressed I am
with the way she has managed to get the events organized and running so
smoothly. These ferals would get no better care in the most prestigious
private
practices (which would probably not accept ferals, anyhow). Because of
all the
labor being donated by vets and other volunteers, the only costs are for
the
supplies and meds, so we can keep the cost very minimal: $15 is the
minimum
donation requested per cat for a spay or neuter, with vaccination for a
3-way and
rabies, treatment for fleas or ear mites and worming, if necessary, and
whatever else needs to be done while the cat is under anesthesia, such
as extracting
obviously infected teeth. It is a one-shot deal with most ferals, who
are not
likely to walk into your traps a second or third time. We are now
trying to
push hard to get as many ferals microchipped as possible (cost for S/N,
etc.
plus microchipping is $25) as we have issues with local Animal Control
facilities who routinely euthanize all ferals brought in. So far, we
convinced them to
get a scanner that can be used to scan ferals while still in a trap and
they
have assured us all ferals will henceforth be scanned, and if they have
a chip
will be released to the colony caretaker to be returned to their colony.
We
still haven't got a workable line of communication for dealing with
"managed"
ferals who are notched but unchipped -- it is really hard for me to go
and see
notched ferals (which means someone has cared enough to get the cat
S/N'ed
hoping to give it a better chance for some kind of life) on death row
waitng to
be PTS and know that our efforts on their behalf have been for naught.
Thanks for caring about the fate of ferals, though you would, of course.
But
not everyone involved in rescue efforts does give much thought or effort
in
that regrd.
Sally in San Jose
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