About Patches:

This is a chronicle of the rescue of an injured cat and how he became a part of our family.

While the Patches story will have a happy ending, it nearly didn't, considering how hurt he was and that the county would have put him down due to stray cat over-population if we had left him with them.

We took a risk bringing a hurt cat into our home, which is not something that I recommend that everyone do. A stray can be a health risk to your own animals and bringing home too many, animal hoarding, means that you can't properly care for any of them. However, I do hope that everyone does what they can -- even if you can't take in an animal yourself, you can volunteer at a rescue organization, donate to shelters, and make sure that your own pets aren't out adding to the injury and over-population problem.

Thanks for visiting the Patches Blog!

Thursday, July 8, 2010

4 July 2010

     I was not looking for another cat. Christopher and I have our hands full with Jack, our 1.5 year old black cat that we got from a rescue organization, and Jack is as rambunctious, playful, and troublesome as a toddler with a four foot vertical leap. We love Jack to bits and, living in an apartment, we didn't feel like we had room and time for another cat.

     No, I was out looking to get some photos of fireworks on the 4th of July (Independence Day here in the USA).  My friend Rachel was playing hostess to a few friends who were content to watch the TV broadcast the celebration down town, but she and I decided to briefly walk around the neighborhood and see if we could see the live fireworks going off at a local University.

     We found that we had a decent view from the parking lot of a junk yard adjacent to the park that borders her neighborhood. While we were there, a teeny cat came up and started rubbing against her. Also a cat lover, Rachel reached down to pet the friendly cat -- and didn't feel fur.

     By the light of our cell phones, we could see that the friendly little cat had serious injuries to her (we presumed the cat a young female based on how small it was) neck and shoulders. I held the cat while Rachel called her sister-in-law to look up phone numbers for the humane society when a pair of gentlemen that worked at the junk yard came out to see what we doing there.

     "Is this your cat?" she asked them.
     "Yes, " replied one of them.
     "She's really hurt; she needs medical attention."
     "It's not ours; we just feed it.  We don't take it inside or anything."
     "Well we need to call someone to help her."
     "We didn't know who to call."

     Rachel proceeded to give them the phone numbers she had just obtained. We decided that we couldn't expect someone to come out on a holiday or a Sunday, let alone a day that was both, so we got the men to agree to call the next day.  I took a reference photo of the injuries, in case this turned out to be a case of abuse and not an animal attack or accident. Still, the cat was so good with people, that we didn't think that was the case.

     "She just needs a little TLC," Rachel said, repeatedly.
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