One early fall evening, not that long ago, Don and I were standing on his mother’s porch after taking out the garbage, and I heard a small meow. After pressing my ear to the floorboards, Don crawled under the neighbor’s porch and found a very tiny kitten caught between some crates. He was weak and soiled, and about half the size of his two nearby littermates. We put him in a box and left him near the porch in the hopes that the mother would come and take care of him. Unfortunately, a short time later, he was still in the box and his littermates were gone. We took him to an emergency vet, did a lot of research, tried to keep him comfortable, and stayed up watching over him. Yet after a few days, he was gone. It was an exhausting and heartbreaking experience, which woke a passion in Don, and put us on a path neither of us had ever imagined. Since that day our life has filled with furry ones. We started working with Itty Bitty Kitty and Sean Casey Animal Rescue. Our main cat Moochie, reluctantly, gained two brothers, Apple Pie and Bliss. Plus, we are often fostering any number of kittens. Now that we are in Buffalo, Don and I mainly work with Ten Lives Club taking on neonatal kittens. Sadly young kittens are often found without a mother for any number of reasons. Kittens only days old have very little chance of survival even with their mother, and these risks increase dramatically if they are being hand-raised. That is where Don and I come in. Small newborn kittens are incapable of maintaining body temperature. Keeping them stable is key: too cold and their bodies will be unable to digest formula or could even go into hypothermia; too hot and their little organs and brains cook! They also need to be kept hydrated so it’s also important to keep the air with a certain level of humidity. Gratefully, Ten Lives Club has an incubator we can use!! But we are always looking for donations!! The next big item on our list now that we have the incubator is an oxygenator which we can use with the incubator when we have kittens in distress. Please donate! and help us get an incubator! Of course, there are bottles, formula, medicines, bedding, toys, and lots of things little guys need. The work is still exhausting and heartbreaking, but so joyous once we are able to send the little guys back to Ten Lives Club and to their forever homes. Please like and share our posts and delight in the nuggets just as we do.
