Trapped young stray. What to do next?

Some updates about fireball:

things are going very slowly since he's been neutered and moved indoor.
 

He only eats once a day, in the evening/night after we put food and leave the room. During the night we can hear him jumping around so we know he inspects the room. A couple of times I entered to get something and found him hiding behind a computer screen in the corner on top of the desk.

When he was outside he would eat twice a day, but now, even if I provide new food in the morning and leave the room he doesn't eat it. (maybe once or twice he eat half of it). My guess is that he is afraid we come in the room during the day, while maybe in the hutch he felt more safe. I am a bit concerned about whether eating only once is too little. I give him a 3 oz can and he also have a large bowl or yummy dry food. He sometimes eat all of the wet food and looks like he also eats some dry food. He has fresh water all the time and he is using his litter box diligently. I have a very large storage plastic box with high walls as a litterbox. 

He spends the most time hiding in a small corner tv/cabinet, where he can enter a small drawer from the back. I have been opening the drawer to expose him sometimes during the time we spend here. I also moved that small cabinet on the opposite side of the room, so he can see us while he is hiding there.

Sometimes if I leave the drawer open he goes hide in the closet on top of a furniture and he hides behind some hanging clothes storage bags.

Other times he simply hides behind the open drawer in the triangle of space between the corner-tv cabinet and the walls. At which point I usually remove the drawer so he can clearly seem me where i sit. (you can see this in the picture, the small drawer was removed and is sitting on the ground on the right. I usually put it back in, so he can go hide and rest in his favorite spot when I am gone)

Once a couple evening ago I noticed him rolled on his back, and belly-up sleeping in that triangle of space. It was very cute and filled me with joy to see him so relaxed and comfy.

We still cannot get him to eat from a long wooden/rubber spoon, even with gerber yummy turkey or chicken baby food. Once or twice he ate some of it, but only after we propped it there in front of him and moved back to out desk chairs. We have been trying to repeat the spoon offering every evening to create a routine.

Sometimes in the evening I leave the door open and my cats walk in. They look at each other, if my cats approach him I stop them, caress them and tell the to leave him alone, otherwise if they manage to get close, they simply hiss at each other. A couple of times fireball managed to sneak out of the room and went to hide under my bed in my bedroom. We used a broom to make him move back to his 'office' room.

Sometimes I feed my cats in the room in front of fireball, I caress them in front of him, I also make sure to offer him some of the same food by putting it on the rubber/wooden spoon and prop it close to his hiding spot. Is this good thinking?

We have been very busy so we had little time to routinely approach him but in the next month we should have more time.

If possible, leave him in the room by himself for awhile longer. Go in and visit. You can sit and read out loud to him. The sound of your voice will get him used to you. If he is eating dry food, in addition to the wet, he is probably getting enough. If you want to, remove the dry food and I bet he eats more wet. I would delay the introductions to the other cats - it may be too much for him. One thing at a time. If you plan to keep him indoors, there is plenty of time for him to meet the other two.

It does sound like things are going well, even though they are going slowly.

Some updates on Fireball.

He's doing great, he started to become friend with my cats.

At start I though he was scared of my cat because he would only meow when he sees him. One day I realized he's simply asking him "Hey you! When you go out, I want to come with you!" Because basically I had started to leave the room's door open to the hallway at night, and one night my cat was trying to open the hallway door by pushing his legs under the gap under the door and Fireball was standing right next to him. By the way, I started leaving the door open at night because he had started to meow at night, from inside that room, and it was breaking my heart. So I tried and he seemed to like to be able to come out and seemed interested in my cats, so I assumed it was time.

Eventually I saw fireball approaching my cat with his tail up and rubbing himself to him, my cat didn't seem to mind much. He's not aggressive to him. My female cat does still hiss a little bit to him, when he tries to follow her around, but he doesn't really get scared and doesn't give up at trying to follow her around and become friend with her.

So we started to leave door open so fireball can inspect hallway, and our bedroom. I saw him inspecting my room at night jumping on all furniture and checking out where my other cats sleep.

Then he started to come in the bedroom and hide under the bed. Yesterday morning he joined my cat on top of the drawer and slept next to him for a while while I was still in bed with my laptop.
He hides under the bed and plays with a squeeky-bird toy which is very fun to hear. Sometimes he plays with the kittens I am fostering. I guess the kittens had helped since they were the first to start to approach him and wanted to become friend. I would let them come inside the office room every day in the late afternoon for an hour so they would slowly become friend with fireball. They often would go and eat the food I had given him which would be sitting right in front of his cave/hiding spot. Or they would chase each other around making him very entertained at watching them.

He is still scared of us, humans, but we did not try to do much interaction with him in the last month. I give him food, I talk to him. But did not try to caress him lately. He is certainly less scared, and every day I see improvement. He really wants to get out in the backyard when my cats do. One day he almost managed because I was outside and my cat opened the sliding door and came outside. When I realized I ran and found fireball on his way to the back door. He got scared of me and went back inside the bedroom.

He also looks very clean and groomed compared to when we found him.

That is wonderful news! It does take time, but he sounds like he's really adjusting. So glad you resident cats are helping him. Thanks for sharing the good news.

Fireball has now moved to the outside. He's been hiding under the crawlspace of my neighbor home for a while. He would stay there all day and only come out at night. He would come to my backyard to eat. This was due because one of the vents to access that crawlspace was open/broken. The neighbor has recently fixed it (it was broken for 2 years), trapping Fireball inside! Good thing I noticed the new closed vent and went to rescue Fireball out of there! I did panic at start because it could have been several days, I still don't know exactly. In the end he was fine, came out a little hungry, went for the food immediately instead of going for the water, made me think there is leaks under that home.

Well since then he cannot hide under that crawl space any longer, so he found a better place: my garage. He is there all day, sleeping and being cute. He enters and exists as he wish through an opening I had made for my rabbit, which also lives in there in and out. The opening connects to a fenced area of my backyard. Sometimes fireball enjoys the outdoor during the late afternoon, I see him laying down behind my side fence curiously watching what happens in the front yard.

He is extremely cute and is starting to get used to me going to bring him food however he still hiss at me when I get close to him.


 

Oh, thanks for the update.  It sounds like Fireball has things set up just the way he wants!  It's really neat that he and your rabbit get along.

I just took in a cat not too long ago, and she is going to be inside only.. though she was a little less temperamental than Fireball. I was angry for a while that someone could abandon a cat like this.. but talking to people on the forum made me happier. Then I came across your post.. and saw the lengths that you went to to figure out how to best make that cat happy, and I just wanted to say thank you. Thanks for caring about animals, and taking lil Fireball in.. It's so wonderful to read about how happy it makes you to see a cat happy. I feel that people with good hearts need to stick together and support each other.. so again, thank you. And I hope you enjoy caring for Fireball in whatever capacity that he will accept.

Thank you! I do enjoy him a lot. Even just looking at him.

We were driving to go have sushi dinner the night when I first saw him. He was right by the highway, on the side of a 4 lanes main street sneaking under a broken chain link fence to enter dennis parking lot. I had to beg my husband to turn the car around to go find that cat. I had to insist. I convinced him partially by claiming that most likely we wouldn't be able to find him, and that even if we would find him we would fail at helping him. But we did find him, and we did manage to feed him and then my husband drove home and came back with the trap. We had to skip the dinner we had planned, though .

I was sad after we trapped him since he was upset but now to see hims relaxed in the garage is giving me back a lot of happiness. He is very soft, although I only caressed him few times. Once when he was distracted eating together with my cat. He noticed I had caressed his back & tail and turned around to spank my hand a couple times. I actually let him and didn't retract my hand at all, I only got a very small scratch. One time when he was under the bed he touched my foot as I was standing by the bed and had my foot sticking under.

The fact is he hisses when I first get close makes me think he must have been a little traumatized/scared. Because otherwise after the first hissing he stretches himself and licks himself in my close presence and seems quite calm. Maybe he was adopted by some people with no experience with cats. Maybe they couldn't handle once he went in heat and started to meow/spray. Maybe they eventually kicked him out or he escaped. I think that he does like to be caressed but he still gets scared by being approached so I will have to wait some more and then sometimes I will make a new strategy to start interacting more with him. Or I will simply let him be, happy. Sometimes when I am home alone I go join him in the garage while I eat my sandwich or something. Just to hang around with him a little bit.

Fireball enjoying the sun

 


Fireball spotted as he enters the garage

 


Cute


We are planning on having the exterior of the home remodeled, and for this, I have planned to take fireball back inside the house for a week or two, due to the fact they will open up the siding on the garage and it doesn't have sheet-rock inside, so fireball would get probably pretty stressed out of the work going on if I leave him the garage. So I am very excited at the idea of having him inside and maybe I will try to make a move at becoming more friend with him.

He is absolutely gorgeous!  Very wise of you to bring him in while the work is being done.  It will freak him out, so it's good he'll have a safe place to hide out.

Being back inside is helping him to re-connect once more and again with my other cats, especially with the little Sissi (now 8 months&spayed) that was a kitten back in April. They became somewhat friends. We got to keep her so she and Fireball play together almost every night. When he was in the garage they were probably not spending much time together although she goes outside sometimes and she would visit him, she sleeps indoor most of the time. He seems to have enjoyed the cozyiness of being inside so far and is making progresses toward trusting ourselves, we are being very cautious and respectful of his fears.

One time I played with him through the gap under the -almost closed- sliding door. I would stick my fingers under and he would come touch them from the other side. He sleeps most of the time under my bed - right below myself-, so sometimes I bend over and try to play with him a little. I am getting him to want to smell and touch my hands -almost without scratching me- So I was on the bed and dropped my hand against the side, and he came to first smell it and then did these kind of leg stretch where he would stretch his arm(s) and reach to put his paw on top of my hand. He has the sharpest nails I have ever had the pleasure to be scratched by.

Other times I put a pair of socks on top of my hand and go push my hand under the bed to let him come and have him play with it. Yesterday he would grab it and be somewhat playful, he also comes like wanting to gently bite it but doesn't really bite. If I do slowly enough and stop at a distance and let him come grab them he doesn't hiss. But if I try to reach close to him sometimes I still get hissed at And probably if I were to move too fast he would get scared.

What a wonderful thing you did - taking a chance on such a kitty !!! He was obviously not feral - and quite probably someone's "dump" -----and it boils my blood to think that someone could dump such a gorgeous, regal yet helpless  animal - so dependent, and I;m sure so lost. You saved her! She's stunning - and it sounds liek you're doing the right thing. SHe's actually coming along quite fast! And this is the forum for questions - so ask away any that you have. Yeah for you!!!! One more poor soul off the streets!!!!

Thank you. Fireball is really such a sweet cat which simply had a bad experience in the past.

He really shows me that he wants to become friend, yet he gets still scared. He is doing good progress and we are happy we helped him. He started to allows us to be much closer to him, yesterday I sat on the ground in front of him and I extended my arm to let him check my hand. I would move my finger like it's a prey he should come and get. He eventually came closer and extended his arm and touched my finger for a moment, then he rolled himself belly up and showed me how cute his feet are and how fluffy his belly is. I was speechless.

With the work going on outside and partially inside, we have plastic wrapping and paper masking floors and the cats love to play with that making noise. Fireball likes to tear the paper and make paper noise. I make little balls with paper and throw them, and they play with it for long. He surely wants to get outside and meows a little in the evening. Yesterday night my other cat and Fireball managed to escape outside by opening a kitty door that was supposed to be locked -for a few more days until the work outside is complete-  When we realized the cats were out, we rushed to get them -we had concrete poured the same day and didn't want the cat to leave paw prints over it. Somehow I ran into Fireball outside in the yard -I was sure he would run inside the garage which also has a new opening for him, but instead he run back and I cannot quite believe but he ran back inside the house through that same kitty-door opening they just had escaped from. I didn't know until I came inside and found him back inside. That also left me speechless! 

I noticed today that Fireball has tapeworms, I was wondering if anyone can suggest a product and a strategy to give it to him. Since I cannot grab him and force him swallow it like I would for my friendly cats, and I am afraid that mixing it with food  won't work either since he might very well avoid eating it.

Thanks. 

I also would like to de-flea him and have the same problem, I cannot give him advantage or similar but I have heard there is some product that works if they eat them, such that I would mix it with his food.

I have used Dontral which you can get at Vet Depot.  It's very very nasty nasty tasting and hard to disguise.  I find a yummy pill pocket is the key.  I often have to cut the pill up into 4 sections and give it in 4 treats.  If you crush it and try mixing it in food, it just doesn't work.  Make sure you order enough for the size of your cat.  It comes by the pill.

http://www.vetdepot.com/drontal-feline-one-tablet.html

There are also homeopathic de worming drops.  Unfortunately they take 7-21 days worth of medicine.  You can do it in 7 days, if you can feed it 3x a day.  It usually took me 14 days. 

http://www.vetdepot.com/homeopet-wrm-worm-clear-15-ml.html

As far as fleas, I have read you can use Diatomaceous Earth.  Yet it needs to be food grade.  Other grades have chemicals in them that could seriously hurt your cat. 

Yes, food grade Diatomaceous Earth works well.  It literally shreds the tape worms (don't you just love that image?)  Used in conjunction with a topical, it gives the fleas a one-two punch.  If you can't use Advantage, Revolution works well too.  If you can't use a topical at all, can you bath him?

Fleas have a symbiotic relationship with the tapeworms.  I don't know what it is and don't even like to think about it.  But if you have tapeworms, you probably have fleas somewhere.

You can get food grade DE on Amazon.  Food grade is essential.  Like ShadowsRescue said, the other types have chemicals added that can harm the cat.

Glad to hear Fireball is doing well...

I cannot bath him, I cannot touch him basically, which is why i cannot use frontline or revolution or advantage or such. I am actually training him not to be scared of us. Even though it might be possible to grab him by force to give him meds, I believe this would simply scare him and waste all that I have been doing to make him trust us. I was able to give him few caresses a couple of times (while he was sleeping on the cat tree with my other cats on other cat-tree shelves) and he liked it, but sometimes he still gets scared and hisses and tends to scratch my hand. It really seems like an almost involuntary reaction.

I was looking at this product, it has pyrantel pamoate and praziquantel, so I am not sure why it would not work for cats other than one needs to correctly dose it. I guess the problem with that is that it requires a prescription.

So you are saying that Diatomaceous Earth works for both the fleas and the tapeworms?

*edit* And yes, by the way, he is doing great and loving to stay cozy inside. He has had opportunity to get outside but only stepped out as long as he knew he could come back inside before we do. He is very interested in the new installed kitty door, which my other cats are already using daily. He is not using it but is interested in figuring out how it works. He has learned to "Ask for food" as he stands and looks at me when he is hungry. He also stays close to me as I get up to serve him food and he comes eat it straight away. One time he came to smell my hand as I was scooping the food from the can. 

He usually likes to hide inside the couch (there is a hole in the fabric in the underneath, and they crawl down there and enter the space under/inside the couch). Then he comes out in the evening and spends the night in the bedroom with the rest of us, with trips to the office room or bathroom for litterbox or food. He also has learned to come out of the couch when I call him, if it is evening/food-time. Maybe is simply that I am waking him up and he realizes it is the time he would come anyway.

I think that his nails are very long and sharp. He makes a clicking noise as he walks on the hardwood floor, which sounds like it's his nails tapping the floor. My big male cat Bibi has become much very more friendly to him, and the young girl Sissi also loves him. I have seen Fireball licking Sissi on her head. Sometimes they play and they wrestle. She is actually larger that him although younger.

Here is a bad picture of them sharing the cat condo: - from the top down: Bibi, Fireball, Sissi.

What a pretty boy!

He makes a lovely picture with your other pretty babies.

You have done a great job, your patience is fantastic!

When we moved in to our house, it was infested with big, nasty, dog fleas.

We had good luck with sprinkling Borax on the carpets, brushing it in, and vacuuming it up a few hours later.

It can irritate cat respiratory systems, so keep cats from the rooms you are treating till after you have vacuumed well.

Our cats never seemed to be bothered by it, but err on the safe side.

We also have had good luck with Pyrethrin. The stuff we have used is not refined, it is just ground up dried Chrysanthemum plant. We got ours from San Francisco Herb company.  Since it is a green powder I have used it around the outside of the house and on the lawn as well. (I wouldn't use Borax that way). A friend said her grandma used to get Pyrethrin from a plant nursery for her roses (one without added chemicals).

I also once found a cat litter that was Diatomaceous Earth, with no added chemicals.

Our cats used to be indoor/outdoor so fleas were a constant problem. As our seniors aged and passed, we have shifted to indoor only, so have less issues. We still have flare ups, but everyone we know has cats or dogs, and we take our cats outside on a leash.