URGENT, URGENT: Please give Ari a home!

Claudia Vecchio, 19/05/2012
Founder of ORA

ARI was rescued in 2005 thanks to the Neighbourhood Cat Watch Program. This program provides logistic support to people who have stray and feral cats in their neighbourhood and are willing to cooperate with ORA to help them. The cats are sterilized and vaccinated and if tamable are placed in foster homes, otherwise they are returned to where they were originally picked up and the neighbours take care of feeding and looking after the released cats.

TNR (Trap Neuter and Return) is a practice universally used to provide a better life to the strays, ensuring regular checks and feeding - and no procreating. Feral cats are happier living outdoors rather than being taken indoors and having to live in strict contact with the humans whom they fear and mistrust.

Obviously released cats are still exposed to the risk of being killed in traffic or by dogs and wildlife and sometimes they may suffer abuse from people intolerant of animals.

Ari was part of a group of stray cats TNRed in Toronto's West end in a cat-unfriendly area. A neighbourhood leader with rescue experience took charge of deciding which cat, deemed tamable, should be housed in a foster home or await adoption, and which cat, being untamable, should be released back.

Ari, an older, large black cat, was going to be released. He was vaccinated and neutered; a tip of his left ear was cut off to indicate that he had been sterilized prior to release.

But he was not in the best of shape. He had spent many years already on the streets in an hostile neighbourhood. I had never seen him, but as I became acquainted with his story, I intuitively felt that Ari should not be released back to the streets, that he deserved a quiet, protected place to live out the last part of his life.

With all the ORA’s foster homes being full as always, and having to find a place for Ari on a minute's notice, I e-mailed and called anybody I could think of and finally found a place with a rescuer in Bayfield on Lake Huron. Ari spent one full year there, but he was not happy and over time he developed acute kidney issues.

We needed to take Ari back to Toronto right away to get him proper diagnostics and treatment. Again we did not have a single space in any of our foster homes, but we had Bev Smith, one of our best foster moms ever, who was always prepared to find a way to house a cat in need. When Ari arrived at Bev's home, his prognosis was not good, and it took quite a few months for Ari to reacquire his health under Bev’s vigilant eye.

This period gave Bev and Ari a chance to bond and Bev eventually decided to adopt Ari. Although she had quite a few cats in her lifetime and she had quite a few already at home when Ari came into the picture, she considered Ari her best cat - “My Big Boy,” as she used to call him. Ari spent plenty of time in Bev‘s lap and at nights, he would follow her upstairs and lie in bed close to her. Ari finally found happiness.

Unfortunately, Bev passed away, on June 23, 2011, and for Ari, there has been no peace since. We at ORA have taken in all of Bev’s cats, but due, as always, to lack of space, Ari has ended up at a foster home in Stratford. The new fostering woman is trying to do her best, but she has large dogs and Ari is afraid of dogs (probably due to some bad encounters during his previous life on the streets). To avoid the dogs, Ari spends all of his time in an unfinished and unhealthy basement sitting at the windowsill, looking outside, probably wondering what happened to his loving mom.

Ari is an old cat, probably 13 or older. It breaks our hearts that he is spending the last part of his life in such an unhappy situation and we are also upset that we cannot provide a proper home to Bev’s favourite cat. “Ari is very undemanding," his new foster home says, but we know he just wants a quiet home with someone to love him. If you do not have large dogs, please consider fostering or adopting Ari. He has had such a tumultuous life, please help him; Bev will smile to you from heaven.

ORA's Cats in Need Series: Tilley

"Please sponsor me and my buddy, Mungo!"

Claudia Vecchio, 5/11/12
Founder of ORA

Taking care of many special needs animals is not an easy task for a small organization like ORA. In strict compliance with the No-Kill principle, we provide all of the animals in our care with any needed medical treatment. Even though we have over 130 animals under ORA at any given time, each of them is treated like he or she was just an only pet, as every life is unique and each of them deserves to live life to the fullest. Obviously this implies high vet bills and as ORA does not receive any public funding we need the financial support of animal caring people who share our vision and our beliefs.

In the last few weeks we have been burdened by several medical emergencies and in just one week, after Mungo's sickness and long hospitalization, we have also had to deal with the inexplicable sickness of our darling Tilley. Mungo is recovering quite well, while Tilley is still struggling too, although he has considerably improved during the week-end.

Financial toll: last week, we paid over $1,500 to the vet and now we have been told that both Mungo and Tilley will again need urgent dentistry to be done within the next two to three weeks. This means another huge vet bill for both of them. Please consider donating to ORA and sponsoring Mungo or Tilley or any of the special needs cats and dogs in our care with a monthly donation. For more information, please email us or contact us at 416-726-5762 or 416-726-8895.

Let me introduce you to Tilley: 
Tillley is a little more than 8 years old. He was abandoned at just a few days old in a box with Mom and two siblings in front of a vet clinic in Mississauga. ORA was called and one of our volunteers promptly left work to pick up the abandoned family and house them. Tilley and siblings grew up into beautiful, healthy kittens. Tilley's young Mom and siblings were adopted out, but Tilley stayed behind, nobody ever applied to adopt him. All the same, Tilley has had, up to now, a great life under our care. He has bonded with some of the other cats his age, he is easy going and he pretty well loves everybody: cats, dogs and people. Tilley has never had any health issues until last week, when he suddenly stopped eating, became lethargic and developed a high fever. Tilley's temperature is now back to normal and he has started eating on his own. 

Tilley, the kitten nobody wanted to adopt, would be very proud to know that someone out there is sponsoring him.

Donate online with PayPal, or call 416-726-5762 or 416-726-8895 to find out how you can help special needs cats like Tilley. 

ORA will be running our Cats in Need series all month long this May! Although the objective of ORA is to work for the benefit of all animals, given the compelling need, ORA is heavily involved in the rescue of companion animals. The animals who, throughout the years, have not been adopted out (for reasons of age, health or behavioural issues), live in ORA's foster homes or in ORA's residential sanctuary until the ends of their natural lives. If you would like to help ORA's Cats in Need with a donation, please click here to give. If you would like to volunteer your time and talents to help ORA, please click here to learn more and to apply.

ORA's Cats in Need Series: Mungo

I've had a rough week!

orarescue.org | Mungo and Gizmo were given up just before the holidays in 2008 by their owner, a lawyer who had them since kittenhood. He was planning a move to his mother's home with his wife and their newborn child, he said, and they could no longer keep the cats. He signed a contract with ORA to pay a boarding fee of $3.00 a day for each cat until we could have them adopted out. The lawyer delivered the cats to us in cardboard boxes loosely tied up with rope. In the 8 years he has had the cats, he could not even buy a proper carrier for them! We managed to take them to our car somehow without them escaping.

Their health was not good. We noticed right away that Mungo had crusts all over his skin. At first we thought that this was possibly due to an allergic reaction to fleas. "No," said his owner, "just dermatitis." But in fact, the two cats were fed the cheapest of dry foods, which caused and continually exacerbated Mungo's severe skin allergies. He has greatly improved on a healthier and cleaner diet since then.

Soon after his arrival, Gizmo experienced severe diarrhea and had to be put on an IV in the hospital for several days. He made it through, but he still suffers from mild bouts of it every now and then.

Mungo and Gizmo have been with ORA now for almost three and a half years. They are not adoption material. They are older, in precarious health and do not have consistently proper toilet habits (to this day, Gizmo occasionally likes to defecate in front of the litterbox).

The lawyer stopped paying their meager boarding fees after only four months.

Last Tuesday, we noticed that Mungo was unusually quiet in a basket and that he was not going to his food. We took his temperature: 40.4, and nursed him with loving care overnight. The following morning, however, Mungo's temperature went up to 41.2, so we immediately arranged for his hospitalization. Mungo was put on an IV and a series of antibiotics until last Sunday when he was released. Total tab on Sunday: $1,500.

Can you help my big bro, Mungo?

Today, he finally began eating on his own. He moves around actively again and constantly asks for attention - sure signs of a healthier cat! We hope that everything will continue well for Mungo.

At ORA, we spend an average of $2,000 to $2,500 a month in vet bills, but lately we have had several surplus vet emergencies on top of the usual - and this latest one with Mungo has proved too much for us to handle.

Gizmo, in particular, has been very worried about his big brother Mungo, and would be very appreciative of any contribution you would like to give towards Mungo's vet bill, if you can help.

Donate online with PayPal (works best for Internet Explorer users), or call 416-726-5762 or 416-726-8895 to find out how you can help cats like Mungo and Gizmo.

ORA will be running our Cats in Need series all month long this May! Although the objective of ORA is to work for the benefit of all animals, given the compelling need, ORA is heavily involved in the rescue of companion animals. The animals who, throughout the years, have not been adopted out (for reasons of age, health or behavioural issues), live in ORA's foster homes or in ORA's residential sanctuary until the ends of their natural lives. If you would like to help ORA's Cats in Need with a donation, please click here to give. If you would like to volunteer your time and talents to help ORA, please click here to learn more and to apply.