To The End

I try to keep track of my fosters and I feel sort of responsible for them the minute they are picked to be under my care.

Since Panda, that has meant being there with them when its only to say good bye.

Regrettably an outbreak of ringworm has claimed a few of my fosters. They were covered in lesions and due to it being a highly contagious fungus (not a worm despite its name), that can easily spread to other cats and even humans, the decision was made to put them down.

Despite looking like a healthy cat apart from those patches of fur missing I really don't know many people in the world that would adopt a cat that had a fungal infection that could make them or any one else in their family contract the same thing.

As with many of the problems ringworm can be treated. There is a absolutely massive BUT to that though.

Being in a shelter there isn't a full on quarantine area to house one cat and when at least ten get it how does one try to contain a highly contagious infection when you're in a facility that has hundreds of animals and quite a few people handling them.

A cat doesn't necessarily have to touch another cat, something in its bedding may touch something that is put in a different cats pen and then before you know it then that cat has lesions appearing on its body too. In a shelter environment its so much harder to contain and treat.

Bieber did have it but was put on medication because there was only possibly two kittens at the time displaying symptoms. He seems to be over the worst of it and managed to sneak a reprieve today.

Unfortunately Onyx, Jinx and Pixie three of my Black six had many big patches of fur missing. They have been out at the shelter for quite a few months now and although Harlem found her forever home the rest have struggled to be picked.

Baby Onyx

Grown Up Onyx

Baby Jinx

Grown Up Jinx

Tiny Baby Pixie

Pixie all Grown Up

They went quickly. I held them, stroked them (with gloves) and said my farewells.

It wasn't the ending I had wished for them. In the perfect world when they were on the adoption floors I wished someone could have fallen in love with them, taken them home and loved them well into their teen years.

That wasn't to be and it's heartbreaking.

I comfort myself that even though they are no longer roaming this earth while they were here they knew love, they knew warmth and I'm sure they had an absolute ball.

From the moment I brought them home they never knew an empty belly, they never had to shiver with cold and they had so many things to play with.

They went from tiny weeny critically small kittens (that probably wouldn't have made it if they hadn't been put on foster care) to big lanky kitties that would climb all over people for attention. In fact the only one that has so far made it into a home was on deaths door.

So in the end they had many more months than they would have if they had not been brought into the shelter in the first place.

Run free my little Blacks, show those in the second life that you were just too good for us down here.