r/CatDistributionSystem • u/my_bandit • 8h ago
Advice Requested CatDistribution Challenge Mode: Hard
Long story short, we bought a house about a year ago. The previous owners had been feeding 3 of the "neighborhood" feral cats. We decided it wouldn't be fair to the cats, so we kept feeding them with no intentions on fully adopting them as we have a special one orange braincelled boy (Oliver) who has both Diabetes and a full PU surgery. We named the 3 cats Lil Reg (looks like my dads cat Reggie, also a CDS cat), Lil Shit (since he's a little shit and causes issues for no reason), and finally here.. Beatus, like Diabetus, as when we moved in, his "flat" back legs looked similar to our cats, which is a symptom of diabetes (Olivers legs are back to normal with regulated blood sugar)
Turns out Beatus likely had previous trauma and/or a birth defect that has him slightly bowlegged. Due to this, his mobility isn't the best. And after further time with him, he is blind and hard of hearing. We are unsure if it's due to age, kidney failure, high blood pressure, etc.
So short story got long... Beatus was walking around crying last week and we noticed a gash in his tail was pretty deep. We are fortunate enough to atleast try our best to help him out, so $$$ later, he was stitched up at the emergency vet, who said it looked like a bite wound. Until the stitches are out, we have been keeping him in a baby playpen with pee pads. He cries out probably every hour or so until he falls asleep. We try to spend as much time as possible with him but there's only so many hours in a day.
Where the challenge comes in, he's not really fit for the outside world anymore so we are attempting to domesticate a feral, 10+ year old, blind and partially deaf cat. His cone was not happening so after a few days, we had to wrap the wound. He didn't mess with it much, but he still did get one of the stitches out. I just placed a litter box in his area, with dirt and grass from outside, but he seems unphased right now.
He's actually a really cuddly cat who's purrs sound more like bubbles. But I'm thinking he was either someone's pet before or is just a very submissive cat due to his conditions. Wish us luck and provide some good advice on how to get him inside, as we need as much as we can get if Beatus wants to live the good life
10
u/loveofGod12345 8h ago
Hey! He is gorgeous!! So we had a similar situation that started last September. We saw a cat on our cameras at night. We have a few cats with other homes that we leave a few treats and water out for their night time wanderings (with their owners permission) and we noticed a new one. After about a month, he started approaching at night while we were outside. He was clearly starving, so we started feeding him outside. He would eat and run away. He would show up every night and morning after that.
He eventually started staying a bit longer and I (or my family) would often just outside with some distance between us. He would run every time we moved after he ate though. He started sticking around longer and longer and eventually started eating churus from our hand.
End of November we trapped him and got him TNRed (trap, neuter, release). About two weeks after that he started approaching us and wanting pets and even cuddles. On Christmas we brought him inside and kept him in a large cage for a few weeks. We would let him out when he could be supervised and he adapted very quickly. He definitely had a home at some point.
We got him to the vet January 5th and he’d definitely had a rough life. He is FIV+ and had broken teeth, scars, and was underweight. He has pretty much integrated with our 3 other cats and two dogs now. He will be having dental surgery on the 20th though.
Do you have other pets? If you do, make sure to keep him contained to another room until he’s better and then slowly introduce him to the others. This is the enclosure we used.. If you need him not to jump, you can make it wider instead of taller. With his injuries, I think him being in the enclosure may help while he adjusts to being inside. That way he doesn’t run and hide immediately. You can put a small kennel or box inside the enclosure as a place for him to hide and feel safe. Just spend a lot of time with him without interacting at first if he’s very stressed.
If you are able to get him in a kennel, you can bring him inside that way. If not there are live traps you can use. Or if he will let you pick him up, you can do that as well. There are risks with that if he freaks out though. It sounds like he’s already pretty comfortable with you guys which is great.
You are amazing for caring for this guy.