Meet Smoke, My Feral

tarusway

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This is when I first starting feeding her.


This Summer


Couple of weeks ago- She doesn't even look like the same cat... the vet said she was middle aged, in the first picture... I am... not so sure of this look how big and how much she's changed in just 18 months!

This is going to be a bit long so I apologize up front.

About eighteen months ago (maybe a bit longer) we started feeding a feral female cat we named Smoke.  It's been.. an interesting experience.  I've been bitten more than a few times by her.  Some my fault, others it was just out of no where.  This summer about a million male cats showed up at our house, it was like some catnip party had been arranged.  I immediately said "Oh crap, she's in heat."  She was REALLY small when we first started feeding her, and we both said "yeah she's an 'older' kitten,  Probably like 9 months or something.  So I start trying to figure out how I'm going to get her fixed. After some research online I found out there is a place about thirty minutes from me that will fix feral cats really cheap, but I had to have her in a live trap.  So I went and bought one of those.  I could NOT get her to go in it.  "Well crap."  Finally I bring the trap in the house and have her come in, while male cats keep getting in fights around the house.  She wasn't letting any of them mount her though.

I cover the trap with a blanket and stuff some chicken in the far back of it.  She stayed at the front and just stretched, so finally I just grabbed a blanket and shoved her inside that way.  I drop her off at the place and when I go to pick her up the attendant tells me the vet wants to talk to me before I take Smoke home.  So I, of course, fear the worse.

Vet comes in and tells me that Smoke has a massive​ infection in her uterus.  She had to have more stitches and a wider incision because of it.  She said the uterus was literally falling apart every time she touched it.  She told me that she was not sure Smoke would recover from it, she gave her some massive antibiotics and pain meds before we left and gave me her personal number and told me to call her if anything went wrong.

I mentioned to her about the male cats around the house and she told me she had absolutely no indication that Smoke was in heat when she did the surgery at all, but said she may calm down with the biting given how sick she had been before we took her in.

So for the next week Smoke lived in the garage while she recuperated.  A few of the male cats still hung around yowling for her.  I kept in pretty close touch with the place that fixed her, their biggest concern was that she needed to both pee and poop and she didn't for I think it was 48 hours, but she did and everyone rejoiced!

So for the last couple of months I've been trying to introduce her to our house cat, Bobbi.  Smoke is CRAZY affectionate to her.  Every time she sees Bobbi she's rubbing up against her and purring, which annoys the hell out of Bobbi.  Bobbi will his and smack her.  Smoke will go away for a bit and then come back and do it all over again.  I am amazed they haven't gotten in a fight.  Since the weather dropped below freezing I've brought her back in the garage, she wasn't happy about it and kept meowing at me a good thirty minutes.  I told her "Yes I know I'm horrible! You have three warm beds in here, a personal litterbox and food and water.  I'm sorry."  While my twins are at preschool I let her in to the major part of the house to wander around and get use to things/sights/smells etc...

The biggest problem I'm having with her is her biting.

The first time she bit me, I'm pretty sure was my fault.  It was last winter and we had brought her in the house because it had snowed.  She hid under the couch during the day to avoid all the noise and commotion so we weren't concerned about our twins getting hurt.  I was laying in bed reading and she hopped up on the bed and wanted me to pet her, so I did, but I was also reading so I didn't really think about it and started petting her like Bobbi likes, which is a bit more of an aggressive pet at times.  Smoke suddenly clamped down on my hand and started shaking her head back and forth like I was a mouse or something!  Then she hisses at me and hops down on the floor, and is back laying next to me a few minutes later.  I opted not to pet her again that night. 

An online friend of mine takes care of ferals quite a bit and after I told her about my bite she told me I needed to go have it looked at as cat bites are notorious for infection.  So off I go to urgent care in the snow the next morning to get a tetnus shot and huge horse pill antibiotics.

About two months later, she was in the house and I was petting her, and by then I had learned that if you pet her too much she tends to bite.  So I stopped, but she kept bumping against me, so I said "fine, pet yourself then I'm not getting bit."  And just put my hand down for her to rub on if she so wanted.  10 seconds later she clamped on me and shook again, and it was worse than the first one.  "Well crap."  My girlfriend kept telling me "You need to go to the ER."  "No it's late and cold and I don't feel like it, but after what was skin or muscle kept bubbling out of the wound and my mom freaked out after I sent her a picture asking what the hell it was, I go off to the ER.  This time I get an xray to make sure nothing foreign is stuck in my hand, then another round of antibiotics, and they had to report the bite.  So I go home freaking out animal control is going to come and take her after I've done all this work to domesticate her.  Lucky for me our city sucks and they so much as didn't even call!

Fast forward to now, after a few more bites I think I have figured out WHY she bites.  I'm pretty sure she gets overstimulated, as I'm told that's fairly common in cats.  (I honestly don't know much about them, I'm more a dog person)  Two weeks ago I went outside to de-stress.  She runs up to me and purrs and starts rubbing against me as is what she does.  I ignore her and keep reading something on my phone as she keeps rubbing against my legs.  Then she chomps in to my calf!  I yell out "SON OF A B**&"  She jumps back, looks up at me, purrs, and starts rubbing against me again! 

I have NO idea how to keep this from happening, and she can't be a full inside cat until she lessens that with the twins around.  She does tend to run away from them, but she may not always. I bought her a few toys, a catnip mouse that I'll toss for her.  She just looks at me.  I got one of those feather wand thingies today and tried playing with her with it.  All she wanted to do is rub against me.  I realized THAT IS ALL SHE DOES when she's around any of us (except the twins).  When she comes in the house she's rubbing against everything.  When she's near us, she's purring and rubbing against us, which makes us dance around her as we don't want to get bit, today she was even rubbing up against my 100lbs Labrador.

So any thoughts, advise, etc.. would be GREAT.
 

ondine

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Bless you for your patience and for all you've done for Smoke.

We have a cat, Schofield, who is like her - he gets over stimulated very easily and will bit and swipe.  We've learned to pay close attention to his tail and eyes; they give us pretty good clues about his feelings.  If he tries to get more petting, we have to ignore him.  There have been many times when I have had to isolate him because he just doesn't have appropriate coping strategies.

There is a very famous woman, named Dr. Temple Grandin, who is autistic.  It is  her belief that all animals are autistic, meaning they lack the ability to communicate some of their feelings to others.  I remember how much sense that made to me when I read it.  I realized Schofield was just like an autistic child, unable to communicate when he was feeling overwhelmed, so he has a meltdown instead.

You are wise to keep her away from the twins until you know for sure how she'll react.  She may never be able to be around them without adult supervision.
 
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