New Owner of a Shelter Kitty!

Hello all! 

I am new (again) to cat ownership. I'm usually more of a dog person, I am loved by three Labrador Retrievers, who are all curled up around my chair as I type this, but my daughter recently realized that she was legally able to adopt a cat from the shelter without parental permission and brought home a gray tabby, after I'd told her that we'd discuss adopting a cat at dinner. From what we can gather, Porter has had a rough life up to this point. He is elderly. My vet thinks between 8 and 10 years old, at the youngest. We believe that he lived much of his life outdoors. He has several small nicks in his ears and the shelter's intake form says that he was wounded when they picked him up. My vet thinks this was from a fight with another male cat. He won't be going through any of that here. If he goes outside, it will be on a leash. I don't think he's interested in being outdoors now though. He's ready to settle down and sit on a few laptops. He has a few scars, but I still think he's beautiful. Fortunately for Porter, my daughter knows her mom pretty well. She knew that I would forgive her for bringing him home because I'm an animal lover and I have a particular soft spot for sad cases. All three of my dogs are rescues, so I know that Porter had very little chance of making it out of our local shelter system alive as they are overloaded with cats. The shelter didn't do a very good job of making sure his wound on his shoulder had been treated properly and it reopened after he came home. My vet is taking good care of him, but he's living in my son's bedroom in the basement right now, because I don't feel that it's fair to expose Porter to three 70 pound dogs while he's wearing the cone of shame and has stitches in his shoulder. He has enough stress as it is.

It's been seven years since I last owned a cat. I was told that Porter was socialized with dogs, but I have the facilities to keep them separated if necessary. I also promised Porter that I would be a better cat owner to him, than I was to our last cat. So, I'm here to learn. I've already settled on a diet for Porter, based loosely on the research I did on dog food. I feed grain free, holistic food to my dogs, I figured Porter deserved the same. I would love to learn the basics of training my cat and cat behavior, and I would like to learn a bit more about cat litter and am considering an automatic litter box, because one of my dogs already eats poo in the back yard. I'm sure kitty litter will be a fun experience with him. It would be nice if it could stay scooped and out of Jet's mouth. 

It's very nice to meet you all! 

Welcome to the Cat Site! I just wanted to thank you for giving this poor little lost soul a home, your daughter is an angel. If you need any advise, this is the place to come! Good luck on all the introductions with your dogs, bless you for giving him a chance!

Thank you for your comments and your support! Like I said, I have a soft spot for lost and lonely pets. Jet, my youngest dog, had been in the shelter for a month. He barked way too much to get adopted. My elderly girl, I adopted from a guy on Craigslist who'd lost his house and had his wife insisting that she be put to sleep and my yellow girl came from a long line of six previous owners that dumped her at shelter after shelter until the last animal shelter she was in, caught fire while she was inside. She managed to escape with just a scar on her side and got picked up by a rescue group that eventually placed her with me. 

My daughter tried to feed me a sob story about Porter, that his owner had died and he'd been at the shelter for two years... and it might have worked, if I hadn't read his intake date on his shelter paperwork. LOL! 

Either way, I know Porter's had it rough. Even if the introductions don't go well, he can have the run of the basement and sleep on my son's bed, which is what he's doing now. I can keep him safely separated from my dogs if I need to and still give him a happy life where he is loved and warm. So far, he's met my elderly dog and they ignored each other, so I'm taking that as a good sign. 

Welcome! Sounds like porter has got a great home now!

Hi, welcome to TCS!  Bless your daughter for adopting a shelter cat...and you for letting her keep him.  Your story has put a smile on my face.

Everyone here is so welcoming! Thank you so much! 

I was totally played on this one. There was no way I would send him back to a kill shelter and my daughter knew it. I did want to get a cat again, eventually, but I was making a plan and had things I'd wanted to put in order first, like learning more about cat behavior and rigging up some sort of method to keep the dogs out of the litter box and I have none of that done. I'm annoyed that I didn't have time to prepare, but Porter's so sweet. I'm already over it.  

Porter's stitches come out on Wednesday. I can't wait to start introducing him to the house!

Hi! I'm a fairly new owner of a shelter kitty myself. I adopted Zoey from a local shelter on 1/18/13. Zoey is a marbeled tabby with white feet, estimated to be around a year (we'll be celebrating her birthday on her adoption date). Zoey's need a little extra care because very soon (2 days) after I adopted her I found out she likely has Feline Herpes, the stress of moving to her new home caused her eye to swell up, and she then scratched it. So she spent more than 2 weeks in an e-collar, receiving ointment in her eye, and given lysine. At her last visit to the vet she was given a clean bill of heath and I was told to administer lysine only during flair ups!

She's the sweetest thing on Earth, even though she can be a bit demanding when I'm not out of bed yet! I don't know what could have made people give up this amazing girl, but I'm so lucky to be her human

Zoey looks like a younger version of Porter! What a cutie!
 

Ah ha! I have figured out how to post photos!! This is a picture of Porter before the abscess on his shoulder opened back up. My vet believes that the shelter didn't treat the wound properly. Poor guy. His drain came out yesterday and his stitches come out next week, so hopefully we won't have anymore issues with that shoulder. 

Anyway, this is Porter MacGillikitty. Sometimes known as Evil MacGillikitty, when I have to put the cone of shame back on his head. 

Hi, I am new to this site.  four of my cats came from a shelter, the other 5 were rescued kittens I ended up keeping.

Cats that have been in a shelter for a long time may adjust to home life slowly. Be patient.

My four were considered "unadoptable"! They are now sweet affectionate friends, tho still a little nervous around strangers. Be patient with the new kitty.

There are solutions to the litterbox question. One is a system with a collar on the cat that allows a litterbox door to open only for the cat. But that's pretty expensive.

I no longer have a dog, but when I did, I had the litterboxes behind furniture where she couldn't reach them. A bit inconvenient for me, but worth it. You could also try an enclosed box (get a large one) that the dog can't get into.

Be sure to provide a scratching post!

Cats are carnivores, so a holistic grain free food is ideal. I leave dry food out all the time, and give a small amount of wet food as a daily treat. When I had a dog, I put the food on a table out of her reach, where the cats could get at it undisturbed.

Thank you for adopting an adult shelter cat! Everyone wants kittens. Even 80 year old people who know the cat will outlive them want kittens. Adult cats are infrequently adopted. So kudos to you and your daughter!

A friend of mine adopted a kitten from the shelter last year. I honestly don't think I could handle a kitten. Her stories of him climbing up her blinds and trying to knock over her Christmas tree were hilarious but I didn't have to live through it. LOL! I think an older cat is definitely more my speed.

Porter is just about perfect. He seems to be really laid back, he's very curious and his favorite thing is having his head scratched. He'll forgive you for almost anything if you scratch his head after you're done. I think once his stitches are out and the cone of shame is off of his head, he'll come around pretty quickly. I won't rush him. I plan to just open the door and see what he does. I have the stairs gated so the dogs can't race around after him and freak him out. We'll just start with him exploring the basement and see if he wants to come upstairs on his own. We can move forward from there. 

I don't feel like any of them should ever be homeless, but it seems worse to me when a senior pet ends up without a warm bed and a safe place. I adopted my almost 14 year old dog when she was 11. I didn't even think twice about her age. I knew she needed us and, as it turns out, we needed her just as much. I think the same thing will be true of Porter.

It sounds like you've got a pretty good plan in place.

As was mentioned by RafiCat, cats are obligate carnivores.  That means that their systems are developed to get 100% of their nutrients from prey animals (meat, bones, organs).  So, a high protein, grain free diet is definitely the way to go.

FWIW, I would recommend more wet food as part of the diet. 

The reason is that cats are generally considered desert animals.  They have a very low thirst drive, and would get most of the necessary water from their food (prey).  Kibble, of course, doesn't have nearly enough moisture to support a healthy system, and with a cat's natural low thirst drive, it's difficult to get them to drink enough water on the side. 

I am feeding him wet food twice daily and leaving dry food down for the rest of the day. I'm still working out how much to feed. I've started with a half can of wet per day (about 3 ounces) and a half cup of dry food. Porter also had two teeth pulled while he was at the shelter, one of them was a lower canine and he seems to have trouble eating without it, so I moisten his dry food with water. Once I started adding in Orijen to the dry food he came home from the shelter with, he started picking out the Orijen kibbles and leaving behind the other stuff.  I'm not sure if I'm feeding him enough or too much of anything. He leaves a few kibbles behind between breakfast and dinner, so I think that Porter thinks he's getting enough. 

d'awww...

yes, lower canines actually play a part in guiding the tongue when eating. 

Our 17 yr old had to have one of her lower canines removed, and it was a few weeks before she developed a new technique for eating.  Poor girl would look at me, look at her food, look at me... as if to say, "Well, yes I'm hungry, but how the heck am I supposed to eat that?".  She did eventually figure it out. 

Welcome and congratulations on being a new cat owner.  I am another one that got a cat recently from the Humane Society.  They are such sweet cats and seem to know that they are very lucky now to have homes.  Porter looks like a perfect gentleman.  I am so glad that you know how to keep him in or at most on a leash outside.  That is the only way they are truly safe.

Your daughter seems to have gotten her mother's love for animals and you can be very proud of her for that.  

I hope you enjoy the forum and know that there are many people here that can help you and give you information on all things feline.  

I hope to get to know you better and hear how Porter gets along.

Porter seems to be doing really well now. He's opened up quite a lot since we adopted him, I bet he feels better now that that drain is out of his shoulder. I'm sure that couldn't have been comfortable. He spent most of the weekend purring at me every time I walked into the room. I love his purr. It sounds sort of like a harley idling at a stoplight with this low rumble and a few pop pop pop sounds. I wonder if his name was Harley in a previous life. I'm already in love with the little guy. I can't wait for those stitches to come out and the cone of shame to come off! I'm really excited to start trying socialization again. I don't want to push Porter too hard, but I can't wait to see what he does. He's a very curious kitty, I have a feeling that he may be a bit of a trouble maker too, which is just perfect for this family. All of our dogs came to us, because their previous owners couldn't handle training a dog to stay out of trouble. So Porter will fit right in.  

Porter has started eating a bit better around his missing lower canine. It turns out, I just needed to find the right flavor of wet food. Porter loves duck. He eats the stuff like it's going out of style and then he licks the bowl clean when he's done. I think he just had to get enthusiastic about his food in order to figure it out. I love seeing him eat like that. He's been sort of hesitant about his food up to this point. 

Shoshanna, nice to meet you too! He definitely is a gentleman! He asks politely for pets and he'll sit for his food. I've experienced that my rescued dogs seem to know that they have a forever home here and I think they're grateful for that, Porter seems to be too. I think he really just needed someone to love him again. When I sat next to the bed he was hiding under, he would grab my hand and drag it toward him so that I would pet him and if I stopped before he was done, he would grab my hand again... even though he was hiding! I think it's been a while since he's had a family. He's warmed up to us a lot quicker than I expected him to, given that he came from a shelter situation. Dogs are much more out there with their personalities, but they take several months to settle in and show you who they really are. I feel like Porter has already settled in.  

 

Awesome update!