Cats Of Sanbernardino

We are back at the vet. This is the 7th time to the vet or specialist this week with our tunnel kitties.

Today, Hana Highway, our Mama cat, is in for surgery. She is being spayed to make sure their isn't an infection in her uterus, and her facial mass is getting reavulated. We did x-rays on Tuesday, and she didn't have any babies stuck inside. We are hopeful the mass is an abscess that can be drained. With that being said, it feels very hard to the touch, which is worrisome.

We did send out a cytology on the mass Tuesday and are waiting on those results.

The Tunnel kitties are in terrible shape.

Santa Anita Update!

We have been working on gaining Santa Anita's trust and showing her lots of love. We can honestly say she loves it 😍

We are going to get her back into the hospital tomorrow. Even with all her medications and food, she isn't keeping on any of her weight gain. She goes up to 4.7-4.8 and then has a bowel movement and goes right back down to 4.2-4.3. We have been keeping a really close eye on her weight in the hopes that she can get stronger

During her time with us, I've come to think she might be a lot more like Santana than we initially thought. The jaw area that we thought could be broken, I'm beginning to think, is cancer 💔

We will have an update tomorrow after her vet visit.

Axl Rose Update!

Our gorgeous boy has almost made a full recovery!

He's happy, he's healthy, and he's looking for his forever family.

New Rescue Alert!

We were in Brooklyn, New York, a couple of weeks ago and went out to visit colony cats with our friends @pawsofhopenyc

We wanted to educate ourselves on the lives of feral cats in the city.

While we were out, they got a call about a cat who had been abandoned in her carrier 3 days previously. We went out with them to see if we could find her. Little Mama was still waiting patiently in her carrier for someone to help.

The ladies were talking about her placement as they were at capacity, and we asked if we could take her home with us ❤️

Brooklyn got in to see their vet and got checked for a microchip, vaccinated, SNAP tested, and ready for travel.

Brooklyn did amazing. My first time carrying her in my arms was through TSA, and she trusted me immediately. She even came out to sit on my lap during the flight.

New Rescue Alert!

We were contacted about a cat with a severely broken leg who was getting bullied in his neighborhood. We found out about him right after rescuing Rain and went out to try and find him yesterday.

We poked around the neighborhood before finding him sleeping in a flower bed. We lured him out with some food and ended up trapping him with 2 of his friends using our drop trap.

We rushed Big Man to the vet @arrowviewanimalhospital_ where he was hospitalized for the night. He is still at the vet, getting treatment and a full assessment. We do believe he will most likely need an amputation... we have never seen a break that goes out to the side like his.

Lumen Update!

Our sweet girl is now weighing 7.3 pounds, can you believe it?! She even has a little belly now, which makes us smile every time we see her. When we first rescued Lumen, she was so frail and underweight that every ounce she gained felt like a huge victory. Seeing her now, healthy and happy, is such a reminder of how far love, care, and patience can go.

She’ll be able to have her much-needed dental surgery soon, and once she recovers, she’ll officially be ready to find her forever family. Lumen is one of those cats that just radiates kindness, she’s so gentle, affectionate, and grateful for every bit of love she receives.

Bobbie Update

Our sweet girl is doing pretty good. The mucus in her nose is getting thinner and she is breathing a bit easier. She is still in oxygen and receiving nebulization treatments to help keep her airways clear.

Because her sense of smell is starting to come back, she is eating a little more on her own which makes us so happy. We are still supplementing with syringe feedings and giving sub q fluids to keep her hydrated and supported.

She is still struggling at times, but overall she seems more alert, more comfortable, and more content. That alone feels like such a huge win.

We will have more updates on Bobbie soon.

You may not know this because we don’t talk about it enough, but our work goes far beyond rescuing cats and finding them forever homes. We also care for 14 managed colonies totaling over 150 cats every single day.

Welcome to a typical day in the life of Cats of San Bernardino.

Our day started by releasing Wall-E back to his colony. Wall-E is the kitty who was recently trapped between two walls. Before releasing him, we verified that the repairs to the homeowner’s wall were completed and that the gap he became stuck in was fully secured to protect other cats. We also made sure his colony caretaker was stocked with food.

From there, we loaded up the car with supplies and delivered food to several colony caretakers whose colonies we have supported and TNR’d over the years.

Next, we headed out to release another TNR kitty at a new colony we’ve recently begun helping.

In between all of this, we had to stop back home to care for our bottle babies. These tiny kittens are only a few weeks old and require feedings every four hours, no matter what else the day brings.

We rescued Belly with a ruptured eye after she was found underneath a stairway at a busy apartment complex.

She spent 15 weeks with us and our incredible foster Alivia, healing, growing, and learning what love feels like before heading to her forever home.

Her extraordinary mom made the trip all the way from Toronto, Canada to adopt her ❤️

We’ll have another update once he gets those sutures out and begins the next chapter of his journey.

Valkyrie has good news. He is finally getting his entropian surgery!!

This beautiful boy has been with us for a long time. He was really sick with mange, an Upper Respiratory Infection, and terribly inflamed eyes. We had to work on getting his eye swelling down so that Doctor could figure what was going on. We discovered that his lower eyes lids are turned inwards and are constantly scratching and irritating his eyes. Now that the inflammation has subsided with medication he can have his long awaited surgery!!

He is going to feel so much better! We are so excited for him.

We were contacted about a cat who was missing the entire side of her head.

She was close by, so we rushed out immediately.

We tried setting a drop trap, but she wasn’t food motivated enough to go under it. We tried to gently lure her head out so we could scruff her, but she was smart. Too smart.

At one point she got spooked and ran out from underneath a car, then darted right back under. That was our moment. We positioned the net and were able to safely secure her.

Once we netted her, we noticed maggots all over the net and on the cement. The poor girl. We can only imagine the pain she has been living in.

We rushed her straight to the emergency vet.

Thankfully the doctor does not believe she has cancer, but we are still waiting for a full update.

This is going to be a long and costly recovery, and she is going to need all of us.

The hardest part of rescue is almost always the people.

We received an email about a cat who had been hit by a car, and we immediately went out to help. When we arrived, the kitty ran from the street and crawled up into the engine of a car parked at a local business. The building housed multiple businesses, so we started asking around.

One employee was kind enough to help us contact the owner of the car. We spoke to him on the phone, and he said he would be there shortly so we could open the hood and safely remove the cat.

While we waited, another man approached and became very aggressive. He took control of the situation, told us to leave, and was extremely suspicious of our presence. At that point, we contacted animal control for assistance so we could legally and safely access the area.

Lady Di was found alone in an apartment complex, crying for her mom and missing half of one of her rear legs. She was only a few weeks old when she came into our care. Despite everything she had been through, she healed beautifully and never needed surgery.

Today, she gets around great and doesn’t let her partial leg slow her down one bit.

Lady Di is sweet, loving, playful, and full of energy. She’s confident, affectionate, and has the biggest personality packed into a tiny body. She’s grown into such a happy, resilient little girl.

We released the four cats we trapped for TNR. These beauties are now spayed, neutered, vaccinated, and microchipped. Both we and the clinic staff assessed their demeanor to determine whether they were social prior to release.

We’ll be back next week for their mom and the remaining cats. Stay tuned for more updates.

We got 4 kitties for TNR today from a colony we had previously done a lot of work on... but work never ends. This is an area with a notorious amount of dumping so we always find new friends that need to be TNR'd. We only had 4 transfer crates with us today so additional 5 kitties will be caught next week 🤞

For anyone new here, a little info about TNR and these cats:

• Every cat we TNR is spayed or neutered, vaccinated, and microchipped

• They are returned to the exact location where they were trapped

• Each colony has designated caretakers who provide food and water daily

• Caretakers notify us immediately if a cat ever needs medical attention

We microchip community cats so we are alerted if one is ever injured or brought into a shelter. That would indicate the area is unsafe for return. This has never happened.