On one of my surgery days at HSSV, a feral cat was trapped for TNR (Trap-Neuter-Return) and brought to me for surgery. Immediately upon looking at him, it was clear that he wasn’t doing well. While I neglected to take a photograph of his condition at the time, I can assure you that the skin on his face and neck was akin to the photograph at the right – cracked, hairless and oozing.

We saved him for last as we were worried about him having an illness that would be transmittable to the other animals in our care (or even to us as humans).

He was sedated and taken out of the trap to be examined. I urged all staff to only touch the cat if they were wearing gloves, and to otherwise keep clear of him. What I was worried about was Sarcoptes scabiei or the “cat version” Notoedres cati,  both of which cause intense itching and a horrific skin condition if they are not treated. What’s worse is that both are transmissible to other animals and to humans, so we had to be very careful handling him.

We performed a skin scraping to look for these microscopic mites that I had a feeling were going to be present. Sure enough, they were. Plenty of them!

We did consider euthanizing this cat for multiple reasons related to his condition as well as the overall health of the colony that he came from. However, upon speaking to the person who trapped him about whether it would be possible for him to be trapped again in the future (which was deemed possible), we decided to treat him and see how he responded.

We neutered him and treated him for the mites and sent him on his way. When he showed up 2 weeks later for a follow-up treatment, we were happy to see that he was already looking remarkably better!

And he didn’t come to us in a trap, but rather a cat carrier. It turned out the trapper never released him but was keeping him in a crate at home so he was getting some socialization.

Fast forward another 2 weeks to his 3rd treatment and he’s a giant love bug, with a huge purr box, looking a million times better, skin healed and hair growing back! I am so incredibly happy that things worked out so well for him.

Check out a few videos of him now!

Given how far he’s come and the fact that he’s now such a loving cat, the decision was made to not release him back into his feral colony. Instead we’re working on finding him a home!

UPDATE: This beautiful boy found his forever home not long after this post was published!