Full Hearts Cat Rescue

12/08/2024

The infamous one eyed Hunter, spunky little Blue, and indomitable 3 legged Tori are all now at the amongst many other cats from us and other rescue organizations. Topaz has also made his return after a bit of a stomach bug that gave us a scare, as he had just his finished his FIP treatment. His blood work is all good and he's broken another threshold in his max weight, clocking in at over 14 pounds these days.

We cannot even consider taking in any more cats until we recoup some funds via adoption donations. However we are still on track for our average of 50 street cats (again, street cats, not owner surrenders, as we only had 2 owner surrenders this year and we only do so as an exception) - rescued and rehomed in a calendar year at this rate, even without further intake. We have 14 kittens in the pipeline we are confident will find placement before the year is over, and we have also had great success with placing adults, it just tends to take longer.

11/08/2024

Help!

We have hit a snag in our cat juggling. We need a private foster for Buzz or Yoko. You may have met Buzz at the Pawsitive Cafe. Originally Buzz was placed there because he was very docile. Well, for better or worse, he has become a lot more confident. The issue with this confidence is his FIV+ status. We are big allies of FIV+ cats being equally deserving of loving homes, but we also are big fans of risk mitigation. We are a little worried he could get too worked up playing with a kitten and accidentally break skin, or get into a serious fight with other male cats, all who are starting to imagine themselves as top cat. So unfortunately we pulled him back to home base and he is isolated in the craft room.

Yoko swapped into the cafe to make room for Buzz to come back. She is being even more reactive to the other cats than we imagined. She was sharing a foster room before and largely left the other 3 cats alone, but, they also deferred to her. The cafe cats are gregarious and curious and Yoko is NOT having it. Unless she suddnely turns a new leaf, she can't stay for long.

If we can't find a space for one, or ideally both of these cats, we may have to put Falcor back into a kennel. He won't come out of his kennel if Yoko is in the room. Falcor is waiting for his oral biopsy at the end of the month for this oral lesions. We don't want him hiding in a kennel with the door open, or occasionally smooshed into a corner of the room when he does try to come out - for the next several weeks - these could be his last weeks if the biopsy results are really bad.

Fosters have to be in the Rochester area. We need reasonable access to the cats for vet appointments, meet ups with adopters, etc, so unfortunately we cannot accept fosters from far away. You must be willing to have your home inspected for hazards, house members interviewed as well to make sure everyone is on board and enthusiastic about the fostering opportunity. Renters can foster but there are usually a few more hoops we can discuss.

https://www.fullheartsroc.org/foster

07/08/2024

Latte went to the vet this morning before I had to go into work - they were unable to confirm ringworm but it's highly suspected. His bald spots did not fluoresce under a woods lamp but many types of ringworm don't. A culture grown from fur sample can take weeks. There are antifungal oral meds but they are tough on the liver, so we don't want to use those unless we have to. If Latte was still on the feral side that may have forced our hand a bit, but I was pretty confident I could manage baths and sulfur dips.

While we wait on the culture we are proceeding with antifungal shampoo and sulfur and lime dip and hope that does the trick and we can avoid the harsh medications regardless of the culture outcome. The vet had the shampoo in stock; I ordered the dip yesterday and it should arrive Thursday. I'm not looking forward to the sulfur and lime but it has to be done. Tonight he had a bath with the shampoo, and will have another tomorrow night. He was incredibly patient and well behaved for tonight's bath.

06/08/2024

If you ask for help from Caring Hearts for RIT Cats, I'm their advisor, so I'm in a consistent role year to year as students come and go and graduate. It's a student club trying to keep an eye out for ferals on campus and in the apartments, not a rescue organization to serve the greater Rochester area, despite that handy little infographic of local rescues that's been getting passed around for awhile now.

PSA:

Caring Hearts for RIT Cats is an RIT student club. As their RIT Staff advisor for the past few years, I want to clarify a few things. This may be a little long winded as it's a long time coming and there's been a lot of changes over the years.

The club is not a cat rescue. We do not have the proper environments for fostering in student housing, and the club does not have connections with a vet to support standard rescue functions such as cats experiencing illness. In my first year as advisor as I was learning the role on the fly, I had to personally pay for vet services for ill cats, and move cats out of housing when students were caught fostering without permission. We now practice TNR only, using the clinic at Lollypop Farm. And for the past few years, the TNR efforts have been focused on the apartments of Apex and Province.

Part of the reason for this focus, is that students in our club and online Discord community, have communicated increased sightings of unfixed cats at these locations. There are large dumpsters, and hunting grounds in the grasslands around the apartments. While we have tried to get a handle of some cats directly on campus, it is also known to us that there are other people, whether current employees, retired, or just somehow affiliated with RIT - that feed and provide shelter at undisclosed places on campus. Some of our previous E - Board members tried to establish connections with some of these people, and were rebuffed. We were told that the campus feeders did not want to tell students, even students on the E - board of a club dedicated to helping cats, the locations of feeding stations out of fear of sabotage. At the time, I had too much going on to try and force the issue. Our on campus trapping attempts were unsuccessful because trap savvy cats ignored our traps, as they had somewhere else to go eat. So we moved our attention to the underserved apartment areas.

As the club stands now, student engagement has greatly reduced as many of our go-getters have graduated. We have offered on campus events to try to drum up interest with little success. As for now, we only get the minimum number of students volunteering to be in E - Board to maintain our recognition from RIT so we can secure club funds, which we use for cat food, TNR spay/neuter/vaccinate, and the occasional in person club activity, like a craft night or a general meeting.

If you are already involved in the local Rochester rescue scene, you may recognize me as the president of Full Hearts Cat Rescue. I have taken in RIT cats who were friendly enough to rehome, but only when my own rescue has space or I have been able to plan ahead, like a group of older kittens I recently trapped at Apex over the summer.

Please do not refer people to Caring Hearts for RIT cats who are seeking to surrender or find foster or rescue placement for cats. My phone number was widely shared as the contact person, and I have transitioned that number to Google Voice and taken on a new personal number, as I was getting so inundated it was becoming disruptive. Calls are heavily screened as not only is the club not a rescue, but my own rescue is constantly full. I have had a script for the inbox prepared for awhile and just haven’t had a quiet moment to record it.

If you know current NTID/RIT students that would like to help with feeding feral cats, learning and practicing safe trapping protocols, reporting new cats, monitoring trail cameras, maintaining shelters, doing transportation for TNR days, please refer them to RIT Campus Groups to join our club. We need motivated, committed students to carry the club forward - especially students with a reliable form of transportation. As it stands now, the club will phase out or go inactive in a year. In that event, I will continue to feed and monitor the stations we have set up, but without the funds from RIT, increasing the strain Full Hearts Cat Rescue is already feeling.

-Jess Small (Goldman)
Club Advisor

Pictured here is Latte, a kitten recently caught at Apex (formerly Colony Manor area) who had an open wound upon capture, and also has now developed ringworm. He is being cared for under Full Hearts Cat Rescue.

02/08/2024

Falcor had a recheck today after being prescribed more antibiotics and prednisolone for the ulcers and swelling in his mouth and throat.

While some improvement has been seen, it's not enough to stop the medication and consider him better. We have scheduled a biopsy at the end of the month; he has to slowly wean back off the prednisolone first and have it fully out of his system for 10 days.

Hopefully this doesn't cause him too much discomfort while we try to learn more about what is wrong, and choose the appropriate treatment.

We still kinda wonder if someone dumped him at our house, as we had never seen him before and we keep a close watch on our feral colony. But wherever he came from, he's a sweet boy and we hope he can be helped.

02/08/2024

Hey everyone - an update/PSA. A picture of Latte, a kitten you don't even know about yet...

We are not just closed for intake temporarily, we are closed for the year or beyond.

We do not have the people power to interview fosters, recruit new volunteers, etc. Fosters and volunteers have come and gone. We have a few firm holdouts but I am talking count on one hand.

Rochester has dozens of other rescues our size or bigger. 

I do not regret the impact we have managed to have, but we can't sustain it.

The tabby kittens appear to have calicivirus (full disclosure I am guessing from descriptions of symptoms I read online) and I'm highly concerned it could be one of the more virulent strains. Now I have to watch them closely for signs of sudden decline. I think Toothless and her brood may have been carriers. Maybe it's why Toothless has no teeth. They've all had first shots but we know that doesn't provide full immunity. Look up any rescue resources on combing groups of kittens and it's always a pro - con situation. Many of the pros are social. The tabby kittens couldn't stay in their tiny playpen area alone, they needed more space to interact with us and the bonus of an adult mama cat. They were seperate for several weeks, we did combo testing, took as many precautions as we could.

In the meantime we had already dug ourselves into a deep financial hole with Edgar's tooth extractions, Hunter's eye enucleation, and Tori's leg amputation. The plan was to slow down on other things to work on grant applications and I haven't so much as opened a Google window to do so.

Ian and I both have full time jobs that go through periods of increased demand and stress and we are both under that right now. Since we do not have enough donations or grants to fully support the rescue, the rest has been falling on us. If either of us can't maintain our full time jobs properly, not only is the existence of the rescue at risk but our own personal finances will quickly crash and burn. Our personal savings frequently get tapped for cat rescue.

I'm not saying we are giving up yet but we are hyper focused on the living problems we already have.

21/07/2024

INTAKE IS CLOSED!!

I have set an auto reply on FB messenger but not IG yet as there are certain entities I connect with there and the auto message pop up would be too disruptive, but new inquiries are not being responded to, emails are also largely being ignored. Our contact form on our site, where most of these emails come from, says we are full/shutdown and it lists other resources at the top, and you have to scroll past several message that say please wait, consider these other places, etc, to get to the form. We have no more capacity, no more bandwidth to give, no time to answer questions. Every minute I spend on those is a minute I could be reviewing an application, or writing a bio on a cat, or editing videos for our reels. One of the big ways I was burning myself out was answering every email, call, messenger, carrier pigeon - I just can't anymore. At least not now. Truly urgent situations - like Tori who was in shock with a broken leg and bleeding on the pavement  - I still try to catch and if not help directly, acknowledge and re-direct. I know people get upset that "none of the rescues ever answer" so I'm at least trying to have the web resources, the auto response with links, and I wrote out a script for my voicemail ages ago and just haven't recorded it - I don't want to leave people in the dark but I absolutely cannot take on more than I've already committed to at this time. We need grants, we need fundraising, we need to pay down our debts. All of that is also rescue work and it keeps getting pushed aside. 

It's hard when I skim some of these messages - oh there's a cat that looks like she'll give birth anytime on my porch and I have cat aggressive dogs, oh I took in a stray but can't keep it anywhere I already have 2 cats (no bathrooms, bedrooms...? Where do you think other people put animals?) If I even start some of these conversations there's a chance I'm gonna try to find some way to take on "just one more" and I've been doing that for 4 years.

This has already led to an anonymous review on Google that someone asked for help and we didn't respond, which honestly at this point - good. Maybe other people will stop expecting miracles.

20/07/2024

I'm basically back at my 10 month contract full time job - summer "off" was completely consumed by rescue. Being forced back to my "real" job feels like a vacation. Kind of.

I didn't even get a tan (well a slight burn let's be honest, because I didn't really have a base tan to protect me) until my first day back at work when they had me outside for several hours for a summer camp session... My life is backwards.

I'm doing my best to complete the commitments I have, and taking on no more. The last two kittens I've been watching for at the apartment area are regularly coming to the drop trap feeding station now. I got Mom and one kitten taken care of earlier this week. They may be able to be socialized. Mom may need a dental. Can we afford it? Absolutely not. But what am I supposed to do?

Falcor, the white stray, went to the vet again, his oral lesions are bad and I had concerns he had inflammation further back into his mouth/throat and the vet agreed. He's continuing clindamyacin and added prednisolone. He gags and chokes when I give him meds and we are worried about his airway. There isn't much we can do right now other than keep trying medication, and he'll get rechecked in 2 weeks.

I have lots of video and pictures to edit and organize for use here in social media, and our website.

17/07/2024

Mixed bag past few days. Got one of the tabby kittens combo tested so they are now with Toothless and her kittens. Try keeping 10 freshly curious kittens contained in a foster room when you open the door. It's like juggling, grab one and toss, grab the next. 

The white male cat who I've finally named Falkor, is a mess. I'm gonna have to cancel his neuter appointment because I think they'd take one look at him and say "absolutely not." His mouth ulcers ebbed a bit with antibiotics but they're back in force and he's constantly dribbling pink drool, getting blood on himself wherever he tries to groom. Pretty sure he has stud tail, too. 

Topaz went to the cafe for a week and while socially he did great, health wise he took a downturn. But we don't know what's causing it. It doesn't seem to be an FIP relapse. He had reduced appetite and diarrhea and at one point dark stool and green vomit, indicating something going on lower in his GI tract, not just common food regurgitation. Also lost weight. So he came back to the house, seemed to bounce back quickly with some metronidazole. I made an appointment in case and by the time of the appointment he seemed pretty much himself, and had gained most of the weight back. However I did blood work anyways and his liver values are way out of bounds. So we will check again in a week, hoping he just had a bug or somehow ate something bad, but if his values are still off we will have to do an ultrasound and see a specialist. For now the cause is "nonspecific."

After getting her staples out, Tori the 3 legged cat has claimed the craftroom that the tabby kittens vacated. She's actually been quite affectionate, I have some video I need to edit and share.

I'm also watching a feeding station near RIT, part of my responsibility as an advisor for a club that gets TNR appointments for cats on and near campus. So those appointments at least are not from our funds, but in the summer there aren't many students around to participate so I'm working solo to trap older kittens and their mother who I've been watching for since May, when one young kitten was found on the ground and ultimately transferred to another rescue.

07/07/2024

Someone really doesn't like the cone...

Luckily we have backups. The good news is when Tori manages to get it off, she doesn't seem to be bothering her incision site. But the vet instructions are to keep it on. I give her breaks to eat. But she keeps taking unscheduled breaks...

She didn't even untie the gauze with the first one. I couldn't possibly tie it any tighter; I had it so I could barely get a finger under it. Same for the breakaway collar, whose clip really needs a good amount of force to open. At least she didn't maul this cone to death so I could put it right back on after breakfast.

06/07/2024

New skill unlocked. Re**al temperatures. Thanks, I hate it. I'd rather give subcutaneous injections any day. And the cats seem to agree. So much drama.

Blue's temperature after being home from the vet for several hours was perfectly normal. 101 compared to the 103.5 he managed to spike up at the vet - same as last time he was at a vet. So yeah. After all that, I'm calling white coat syndrome...

Topaz came back to us today after not doing well at the cafe health wise. Socially he was fine, loving the people and attention. But for whatever reason he's having GI issues and he lost about a pound in a week. The cafe sent a f***l into the lab, negative for anything on that. And he doesn't have a fever at least. We just checked. Hoping it's not an FIP relapse. But if it isn't that, I have no idea it could be and after playing mystery fever with Blue this morning...

Nobu's adoption applicant signed the contract so there's that, I've got to finalize how that will go, and we have some other applications to catch up on. I just have to decide if that's going to be before or after dinner and a shower, either of which runs me into medication and dinner time for several cats, and suddenly it will be 10 pm at night and I'll wonder where the day went.

06/07/2024

At the vet with Blue - he has been doing better but we still wanted a full vet to see him so we asked for any cancellations.

Everything seemed fine except he still (again?) had a fever. While it could be from stress, he doesn't like the carrier or the car or the vet, it seemed a little too high for that.

We did a FeLV/FIV retest and it was negative. Which, with all the communal living our fosters experience, thank God. But if you don't know how insidious FeLV can be - different stages it shows differently in different tests. It's part of why we are so paranoid. In a perfect world every cat that had been outdoors or of unknown origin would be isolated for 3 - 6 months and tested multiple times with different diagnostic tests. Instead we usually test once at intake with one kind of test. The ideal world method would cost not just time and space no rescue or shelter has, but hundreds of dollars in lab costs for each cat. The second method? Ten minutes and 25 - 80 dollars. So you see the problem.

Anyways, with that negative we are doing blood work. Checking A/G - to help rule out FIP, and checking for anemia. Paying more for in house instead of waiting for the labs on Monday, because I'll put up my own money for the sake of my blood pressure the rest of the weekend.

I've never taken temperatures but I asked the vet how far do you put in the thermometer which was basically my only question, and we'll stop at a drug store for a thermometer and some lubricant. If it is a stress fever he shouldn't have it at home. But I have felt like he was warm laying on me. 

05/07/2024

Met up at the cafe with an adoption applicant for Nobu, seen here in a cone. He's been having hot spots. His adopter is prepared to take over his medical care which we are immensely grateful for - it could be environmental or food allergies and that will be much easier to work out in a home. So fingers crossed that all works out!

We have so many adoptable cats at the currently - here is just a sampling. For example, remember Mitzi, the tortie with the white undercoat? She's still looking for a home - she is so friendly with people that visit. Just don't expect her to be best friends with your other cats; she definitely prefers her feline space, especially from other females.

04/07/2024

I feel like I wrestled a bear.

After bringing Tori home last night and getting her settled, cleaning the tabby kittens space, spending time with Toothless' kids so they don't end up antisocial little weirdos - I noticed Blue had changed where he was laying in the bedroom. He had chosen a more hidden away spot. I scooped him up and tried to settle for the night.

Tuesday after his booster shot, he slept most of the day. Then that continued into Wednesday. His appetite had lessened. Not disappeared but he had been demanding fresh canned food every few hours. By last night it was 36 hours since his shot and he was still so lethargic. Also since his food binging he's had a very big belly - the vet techs checked it when he got his booster, and when palpating him it made him p*e and he emptied a full bladder on the exam table. They didn't have any notes after that.

I tried to relax and play a game with Blue sleeping on my chest (while some jackwagons blew up fireworks right in our street). Instead my mind went over data and tried to connect dots. Blue's stomach was still very bloated even though his consumption had seemed to slow.

What if lightning had struck twice and we had another FIP case? This time in a tiny kitten, effusive, with a big swollen belly?

I filled out the urgent care triage form since it's a holiday.

I woke up at 2 am after nightmares about kittens, checked on Tori and she had managed to dunk part of herself in her water bowl. Not the surgical site, thankfully, though I don't think a little water would do much to surgical staples. I patted her fur to help dry and she had some Churu mostly willingly, so seems her appetite is coming back. I'll have to teach her how to eat with the cone on. 

Woke again around 5 am, and Blue used the litter box, proving he isn't constipated, at the very least. His belly was smaller. Then his screaming for food resumed. So he's more like himself again, which is still quite reserved for a kitten his age. They can be tired after vaccines for 48 hours and I guess he was gonna use all of them.

No call from urgent care. Guess we didn't make the cut. I'll schedule him for a regular checkup.

Happy 4th...

02/07/2024

I keep a pretty close eye on my colony and I'd never seen this guy until we scooped him up Friday from our own driveway. 

A few days in the kennel while I tried to figure out what to do with him, and I noticed excessive drooling and failure to groom.

I got an email one of our vet partners had openings today so I jumped on that.

He's really looking rough now, he's getting examined, tested, vaccinated - it's all more expensive doing it at a vet office instead of Lollypop's clinic but it is what it is.

I have a bad feeling...

02/07/2024

Baby Blue is doing much better after B12 and antibiotics last week, and his booster shot is rescheduled for tomorrow. Then he can soon join the where his brother and friends are waiting! He's been a great snuggle bug - you always get a little more attached to the ones that need a little more care and attention, but I'm so glad to already have one less thing to worry about. Now, if we can just wean him off the habit of getting fed fresh canned food every few hours... 🤔 But how to say "no" to that face??

30/06/2024

More updates today, Sunday: the injured cat had a chip, the owners wanted the best treatment possible and so surrended her to us. She has a broken leg (the through the skin kind) and trauma to her chest. The former owners are doing transport to Buffalo as the vet in Rochester was running out of oxygen. Then we will see about transferring her to another vet to set the legs with pins if she does well today and tonight.

We hurried home after squaring up with the emergency vet (over 400 so far to get her stabilized before they realized their oxygen shortage), fed some cats and kittens a late lunch, er fed ourselves something, and are packing up several cats to go to the . Topaz completed his 84 days of FIP treatment and had great bloodwork results so he will be among the cats going to the cafe. He's great with kittens and several kittens are going as well.

26/06/2024

Giant tabby bottle kittens are finally weaning. I'm still getting up once or twice a night to check on their food and kennel but not offering milk all the time anymore.

Blue, the fluffy grey-blue kitten, skipped his booster shot today for antibiotics and B12, he had a fever. Still being offered wet food nearly constantly. He's gained about .2 lbs and we have fought for every ounce.

His brother Sesame the white and black is doing fine and roughhousing with older kitten Joseph who has finally been stable as well with his appetite and weight gain.

Mama Toothless got combo tested, negative. (Also Hunter the one eyed cat got retested after her escape outdoors 2 months ago, also negative.)

Christopher the light orange cat is a new intake from the streets, newly vetted, and is kenneled while the other fosters get to know him. Yoko hopefully doesn't bully him. Tommy, the grey tabby pictured, will go to the Pawsitive Cafe soon - he is great with other cats, he came right up to say hello.

Still desperately need to update our database and website, there's piles of vet records and digital files staring at me - but there's been so much else to keep up with.

23/06/2024

Edit: Tim from West Wildlife eventually intervened, final outcome unclear. Thanks for all the contact info I'll file it away for the next time someone asks for something well outside my wheelhouse.

Who is a good contact for racoon rehab? A contact told me there's been a baby raccoon on their porch since late last night.

23/06/2024

They say you have to "make the time" which I guess explains demolding some dice I made at 4 am while a kitten gets his extra food in private in the bathroom.

Blue was caught during TNR, I didn't realize how small he and Sesame were until they were secured but they were just big enough to fix. During the extra holding period for cats under 4 lbs, they warmed up to us. But after a few weeks I've realized he isn't gaining weight. He's having digestive issues and seems constantly hungry but only eats a little at a time. I'm going through the usual medications. So he's been getting fed extra when I feed the bottle babies, hence my 4 am situation. I had resin castings ready to demold and it's easier to cut off the burrs when it's still a little soft, and since Blue needs company to keep eating I figured sure let's have some arts and crafts time...

17/06/2024

Kittens Sesame (black and white) and Blue, seen here cuddling with FIP Warrior Topaz, still have a sibling outside. They disappeared a few days before my last trapping attempt but have reappeared. Trail cameras are such a valuable tool. Hoping to get them early tomorrow morning before the heat sets in. There are other cats around I can trap for TNR as well, though they don't come around everyday.

Topaz has bloodwork and a checkup scheduled this week. He is nearing completion of 84 days of injections to treat FIP. If everything looks good at the appointment, he'll enter the observation period. Some cats relapse. Relapse can happen anytime but is most likely shortly after stopping treatment.

12/06/2024

Ian scheduled the day off for our 2nd wedding anniversary and so far he's cleaned Toothless' and kittens' kennel while I did morning rounds (here's the runt getting first dibs at fresh food) - and we've stacked ferals in the backseat of his car to go release them back to their home territory, and we'll hit some feeding stations, then it will be time to bottle feed kittens again and maybe we can get lunch/brunch somewhere. I've also scheduled Toothless for an appointment late afternoon to get looked at and tested, because when I called last week all I heard was Wednesday and not the actual date. Bad wife o'clock over here.

I am hoping we can play some co-op video games or do some gardening together or something. That's about the extent of "celebration" plans.