Help Support Colony Cat Imposter Ted’s Medical Recovery

TL;DR - Lauren here; I’m raising money for an AMAZING colony caretaker named Samantha who has gone ABOVE AND BEYOND to provide care for one of her colony cats (named Imposter Ted) who was badly injured back in February and has needed quite a bit of medical care for a gruesome neck wound and several broken teeth. Trigger warning - some pictures are pretty graphic - but they show the AMAZING progress he has made, all thanks to Samantha stepping out of her comfort zone in SO many ways to ensure he received ALL the care he needed. Please help us make a dent in her vet bills!!

Backstory:

- This cat was dubbed “Imposter Ted” because he’s an orange male cat that looks just like both Samantha and my orange boy resident cats who are both named Ted…. And somehow who has also won our hearts… Thus… he is an imposter!

- Imposter Ted has been a fairly elusive colony cat who we tried to catch last year when I TNRed the rest of Samantha’s colony. We wanted to get him because he had a leg injury at that time, but his unsteadiness caused him to set off the trap prematurely and after that he wouldn’t go near a regular trap ever again and became quite inconsistent with stopping by. Thankfully his leg healed on its own.

- We always thought Imposter Ted was a grandpa because he looked so rough, didn’t look like he had any teeth, and because he was kinda so passive and sweet whenever it came to food — he always backed off and let little black kitty (one of their other colony cats) eat whenever she was hungry - such a gentleman! Turns out, he’s only like 6-7 years old!!

- Prior to taking him in for this injury, when Imposter Ted was living outdoors, he was taking churus out of Samantha’s hand and allowing brief pets here and there. Imposter Ted is a sucker for churus.

Injury:

- One day, Samantha saw a small wound on Imposter Ted’s neck, but didn’t think much of it because Ted seemed to get banged around a lot out there in the wild. But then one day she witnessed Imposter Ted get into a big brawl that was instigated by this big bully cat in the colony, and the wound became huge — so that fight (probably among others) is what really lead to the gravity of his neck wound and his several broken teeth.

- Imposter Ted was NOT yet neutered (like I said, he was very evasive in our previous trapping events), and hopefully now that he is neutered, if he is released, there will less hormones and hopefully less brawls.

- Samantha was INVESTED in getting her boy some help — she learned how to use a drop trap, and successfully got him on her own! She transferred him into a regular trap and everything - I was so proud!

Care Received:

- Imposter Ted was first assessed during his TNR appointment with the wonderful Dr. Wilson at SPCA. He got his neuter, ear tip, vaccines, long acting antibiotic injection, and first sedated wound debridement. It was there that they also discovered the several broken teeth.

- I was frank with Samantha about Imposter Ted’s condition, about how most people would usually euthanize an outdoor cat in his condition, and that he will likely need to be kept indoors, in a large dog crate, where he will need to be cared for to keep him out of the cold, wet elements for his wound to heal for a few weeks to months, and that he will likely require frequent trips to the vet. Samantha didn’t hesitate one bit. This was her colony cat and she was going to make sure he received the care he needed!

- So, I packed up a carload of supplies and we set up a large dog crate for Imposter Ted’s to have a safe, clean, controlled healing environment in Samantha’s spare bathroom in her basement. I taught her how to use a transfer carrier with a guillotine door to transfer Imposter Ted in and out of the crate to get him safely to and from vet appointments - which he did well with, at first… until he started catching on to us!!

- Imposter Ted received another 3-4 sedated debridements - I’ve lost track. He received multiple long-acting antibiotic injections as well as regular daily doses of gabapentin throughout the past two months to take the edge off with the pain and healing process.

- Imposter Ted also had actually FOUR broken teeth, which were removed during one of the sedated visits, which, again, were likely broken from fights with other cats.

- He is almost fully HEALED!!!!!

Healing Journey:

- At first, we gave Imposter Ted a box for a little hidey space which he LOVED. We wanted to give him his space to decompress and retreat when we were changing out his food and litter, especially when he had just come back from the vet.

- Imposter Ted is a goofball, and has some very funny sleeping positions with legs completely straightened out in the air.

- Imposter Ted is a night owl! Samantha placed a camera on his kennel and he plays like a crazy man to the point where his kennel items are completely rearranged every single morning.

- Imposter Ted gets lonely - when Samantha was out of town for a few days and I was cat-sitting, he basically went on a bit of a hunger strike. He definitely missed his momma and hearing the other kitties around the house!!!

- Imposter Ted has a favorite blue feather jellyfish toy. The other day, we caught him bathing it. He also allowed the jellyfish toy to have the bed and he preferred to lay on his scratcher - it’s like it’s his baby!!

- Since his last vet visit, we his box out of his kennel to encourage some more interaction with Samantha and to try assess his comfortability with Samantha, now that he should be fairly pain free. He is also starting to really enjoy feather wand toys and head scratchies with the handle of the wand from time to time. He is also back to eating churus out of her hand!

Future Outlook:

- Living in a kennel is not what we have in store for Imposter Ted. We would like to make sure Imposter Ted is fully well-healed and healthy before we make any major moves in any direction going forward.

- Imposter Ted is certainly litter box trained from this recovery period and has some small level of comfort with humans. There is the possibility Samantha may test out his comfort level of living indoors a little further in her home in one of her spare bedrooms to see if he could potentially be domesticated. But that is certainly multi-faceted — depends on how Imposter Ted feels about it, depends on how he feels about her, and it depends how he feels about her other resident cats (and how they feel about him)! But truly, at the end of the day, it’s up to Imposter Ted and his well-being. If he is not thriving, we will not force it.

- If Imposter Ted decides outside is the place for him, and he is released, I am going to help Samantha with finding a suitable shelter for Imposter Ted where he can retreat if that big cat is still acting like a bully. She has a huge covered porch, and the cats haven’t really needed shelters in the past (they’ve gone under decks and such), but this may be what’s best for him, something close by where she can keep an eye on him.