Our Little Stray Cat

Just a few days before Thanksgiving a poor sick cat showed up, literally on our doorstep.

My husband had worked a night shift and it was morning.

Our cats alerted him to something at the front door.

He opened the door and here was this poor cat, not moving, looking like she was dead.

She was very near death, full of mites and the worst case of matted fur full of sticks,

stickers and dirt and she smelled like an old cow.

She was hungry and thirsty and ate everything she was given.

Who knows when the last time she ate was.

She must have been out on the streets for months.

She had so many thick matts under her tail we couldn't tell if she was a boy or a girl.
You can see in the photo a huge lump on her back thighs and under her tail.
That was solid hair and dirt, not to mention the mess from going to the bathroom.


She also had an upper respiratory infection.
After some Clavamox, the infection cleared and so did the loose stools.
The vet told us she was a girl and also she has only a few teeth, most have fallen out,
and what teeth are left are infected.
The vet also said she had never seen such a badly matted cat in her years of practice.

She only weighs 5 lbs.
The vets estimate of age is somewhere between 13 and 17 years old!
We will just call her 15, wow, an old gal.
She's had a hard little kitty life.

She got her kitty vaccinations and rabies shot and next was ready for the groomer.
It had been about a month since she had showed up sick.
We had to wait for her to be well before she could be groomed.

The groomers were able to leave the fur on top of her head and the skinny part of her legs.The rest of her fur was shaved off.

She was not a happy kitty.



Here she is a couple of weeks after being shaved.
Her legs are pretty stiff, probably arthritis.
The vet has me giving her some glucosamine in her food everyday.

We decided to name her Bitsy, as in itsy bitsy.





Here is Bitsy today!
Her fur is still growing back in, but she is moving better.
She is alert and curious.

Here is Mazi on the cat tree. He is curled up a bit in this photo.
Look how much bigger than Bitsy he is in the next photos.




Bitsy is about 5 lbs and Mazi is over 10 lbs, probably close to 12 lbs today.

Yes they actually did do a nose tap!

Mazi is our gentle boy, but we only let Bitsy out of the bedroom for short supervised romps around the house.
Kali doesn't want anything to do with her. Kali gets up on something high and watches Bitsy run around.
Simba follows Bitsy around and then gets scared and hisses at her.

In a couple of weeks she will be having her dental work.
After that we will work on integrating her with our family.

We have asked Forgotten Angels Cat rescue to help this poor girl out.
They have paid for some of her vet bills, but the sad truth is that she will be very hard to find a new home for. Most people want a kitten or young cat, not an older cat like Bitsy.