Weird Face and Dewclaw Injury

Hello everyone, this is what my cat Copernicus usually looks like:


Laying on my sketch book of course.

He's a beautiful red-and-white bicolour shag monster, super gentle, awesome temperament and he lives with two other kitties, my three year old fluffy orange-and-white tabby Casper and my female grey-and-white short haired 17 year old tabby Smoky. They all generally get along and I have never heard them get into a serious fur flying, yowling fight. I keep all of my cats indoor where they should theoretically be safe from most harm.

Thus his current facial and dew claw injuries (?) defeat logic to me. I don't even know if they ARE injuries but something else. We've been bathing his sores with a warm, clean, fresh facecloth twice a day. His dew claw looks swollen and he has licked most of the fur off of it; like his face, it is scabby. We think he's fur mowing because it itches or hurts, yet he isn't limping. He's acting like his perfectly happy self, appetite unaffected. We haven't taken him to a vet yet because we can usually handle simple cuts and abrasions just fine and we have dealt with some pretty gnarly injuries to our cats (including missing claws and even an abdominal puncture wound which was super nasty and still makes me shudder while my mom who grew up on a farm and didn't even flinch) but his injuries are starting to seriously look like they need a professional opinion. I've thought that they might be mange, but that doesn't make sense because he doesn't go outside. (Though I am not discounting it completely!) I've also heard suggestions of 'fungal infection' and 'ringworm.' I'm trying to do research but I'm finding it difficult to find a starting point. Has anyone here ever had a cat with weird scabby injuries like Copernicus'?

Without further ado, a current photo of his poor sweet face (unfortunately I don't have one of his leg):


Ouch.

So has anyone ever encountered anything like this before? That thing on his nose bridge is a big horrible scab. We're hoping it will come off soon. (I'm hoping he will heal in general soon!) He's licking himself in the photo.

Oh poor baby !

I think he really needs to see a vet. I'm no expert but it does look like something along the lines of a fungal infection or mange - that sort of thing.

Mange can be carried on our clothes and shoes, so your cat doesn't need to go outside himself to catch it. Luckily mange is easily treatable with the right stuff from the vets if caught early enough. Not that I'm saying this is mange, this is something only a vet can diagnose.

Good luck with your kitty and welcome to the site

I can't get book an appointment until tomorrow (darn Sundays!) but I'll be trying to get him in with my vet this week. I really hope it's something easily treatable that some medicine combined with the face washing we've been doing with him will clear it up. 

And thank you! I'm glad I found a new place to express my cat love haha.

Keep us updated. I agree though a vet should look at it..looks painfull and needs a antibiotic?

I will. I just sent a query to a local holistic vet to see if we can get an appointment this week.

I would stop the face washing. Wounds should be kept dry in order for them to heal. When it's moist bacteria likes it much better and it won't heal as well or could get worse.

I don't think it looks like ringworm but maybe he's been irritating it and it looks worse. A trip to the vet is probably a good idea. Until then I would leave the scab alone.

I appreciate your suggestion but washing actually seems to be helping, at least with his face. As of tonight while his skin remains red from being new and raw, the only scab left is the really huge ugly one on his nose bridge and he's worrying it much less than he was before we started washing his face for him. We can't do anything about the dewclaw though and there's a possibility that whatever it is that is messing with him has afflicted his other dewclaw too because I think I've found a red, rough patch there but he doesn't want me to look at it. I'm keeping a close eye on all of his parts as best I can. I don't believe us washing his face is any worse than the kind of damage he does to himself while grooming, slobbering all over himself. Before we started washing his face he was literally trying to scratch it by rubbing his muzzle on things like corners and chairs - now he isn't doing that anymore. It was so itchy once before we started washing his face that I saw him literally turn his head and kick it with his back claws, reopening the wounds. His face being a face, it is very much exposed to air and dries off quickly after being washed. The fact that we use warm water helps it dry off even faster.

I am taking him to the vet to find out exactly what is wrong but I do have to wait until I can get an appointment. As far as I can see this isn't a life threatening emergency so it'll probably be a day or two. 

Copernicus' vet appointment today went fantastic! The vet thinks that he just got a bacterial infection from being scratched and gave us some antibiotics to try on him for a week to see if it clears up his skin. I'm so relieved that it most likely is not mange or a fungal infection as we were fearing. Apparently cats have weird bacteria on their claws and it only takes one tiny puncture for things to get gnarly like with Copernicus sometimes. It likely started on his face and infected his dewclaw when he was washing himself with his paw, thus smearing the nasty bacteria from his face all over his thumb which made it infected too. The vet also said that everything we were doing with him, soaking his leg in epsom salts and washing his face, was really good and she applauded the measures that we had taken to care for him! I am so happy! 

That's great! I hope he feels better soon. It looks quite uncomfortable to have a wound like that.