ANIMALS. That's what I spend all my KWS profits on. Once the cost of supplies and etsy billing is taken out of the sales, I spend all the rest on animals, in some way or another.
First off, I donate monthly to a few different animal rescues. $55/month goes to Animal Alliance of Canada (formerly known as Project Jessie), an amazing organization I've been supporting since my early 20s. They do a lot of animal rescue, saving dogs in shelters from pound seizure to be used in animal testing, but they also work on larger issues, and even lobby for political change. They are based in Toronto and at the time I started supporting them, they were 100% volunteer run. As they grew over the years, they've now added staff members. They are great and I love all the work they are doing.
I also donate $25/month to World Animal Protection (formerly World Society for the Protection of Animals, or WSPA). When I decided to start giving monthly in my early 20s, I wanted to focus on one rescue working in my home town, and one working on the international front. This rescue focuses on international rescue initiatives, and I think they do some really important work.
Lastly, I donate $10/month to the Wilderness Committee, who works on environmental initiatives in Canada.
$80 a month isn't a huge deal I suppose, but as I said, I don't make a ton of money, so it feels like a lot to me each month. Especially because I sort of run a haphazard animal rescue out of my house.
What does that mean exactly? It means that injured or homeless animals wander up to my door, I take them in, nurse them back to health, then try to find them homes. Sometime the animals I take in require a lot of medical attention, and I pay for it all myself. Other times the animals are so badly damaged, either physically or emotionally, that I can't rehome them. That of course means the house has essentially become an "island for misfit toys". After a recent failed adoption, I'm back up to seven cats and one dog. UGH. Last month I tracked my pet related spending, just to see how much it costs for basic necessities for the animals I care for, and was horrified to learn I'm spending about $700 CAD per month on just food, poop bags, litter, and the regular medication that the dog needs. This doesn't include flea/tick/worm meds (three of the cats are on this monthly, and the dog is on it monthly in the summer - each single dose is $18), or any other vet related issues that come up. If KWS can cover even half of my pet costs each month, it will really help me fund more vet bills for the animals I continue to pick up off the street.
Over the next few weeks, I'm going to do bios of all the animals that live with me and their origin stories. I'll probably even do some for a few of the animals I've placed in other homes too.
So, lets start with the most recent additions - Karamel, Butterscotch, & Ripple!
Karamel showed up my doorstep last March. We have a lot of cats in the area that are owned who wander around all day and night. They do go home I assume, and are fed, but it makes it hard to tell a homeless cat from one that roams around but has a bed waiting for it at the end of the day. Generally I start by assessing how skinny the pet is. Karamel looked reasonably plump, so I thought she probably had a home. I gave her some kibble and petting, but left her outside to see if she would leave or not.
Over the next couple days, Karamel hung around, appearing from under the bushes or even our neighbour's car anytime I came out the front door. I left more and more kibble for her, and she ate ravenously. I still wasn't sure if she had a home or not.
A week and a half later, I was sure. She had gotten dirtier and dirtier over the past week, and she had gained a large amount of weight. I realized she was both homeless AND pregnant. I wanted to bring her in right away, but I still live with my parents (more on that later), so it wasn't entirely my decision. My mother is a total softie, and I get my sense of responsibility from her, but she's also already not impressed by how many animals we have in the house. The idea of bringing in a pregnant cat didn't thrill her. She resisted, and so I left Karamel outside.
One day the next week, we were talking to our neighbours about Karamel, and they mentioned that during a very strong thunderstorm, the poor cat had huddled up against their back door, trying to get shelter from the rain that the two inch door frame provided. It didn't work and she got soaked, but she still refused to leave the area. I gave my mom a pointed look, and she sighed. I knew the battle was half won. Later that night I made my case - mom and I both knew that if Karamel had the kittens outside, I'd be compelled to do something about it. That would end up with me tromping through bushes, following Karamel through the nearby ravine, trying to get her to lead me to her kittens. It was going to be harder and more expensive to treat them once they had been born who knows where, and we'd STILL end up doing something about it. Mom knew I was right, and grudgingly gave me the go ahead to bring Karamel inside. I set up the basement, got her easily into a carrier, and brought her inside that evening.
For four days, Karamel enjoyed indoor living. She was nervous without me, unsure of what would happen to her, but when I was around, she was a happy, loving little kitty.
I spent a lot of time with her, reassuring her that she'd be okay. When the kittens fussed inside her womb at night, I'd massage them gently and sing The Rainbow Connection. Everything seemed like it was fine.
Four days after coming inside, Karamel gave birth to two kittens while I was at work. When I went to see her at night, I found her nursing a pair of brothers that I named Butterscotch and Ripple.
At first it seemed like she was a great mom - whenever I went into the room with her, she was an extremely attentive mother. I went to bed the night she gave birth confident I'd wake up to a happy, healthy little family.
That isn't what happened. When I opened the door the next morning, I found Karamel huddled next to the door, peeling chunks off the bottom, desperately looking for me. Ripple, who had gotten hungry overnight, had left the safety and comfort of their large bedded area in search of his mother, and had stalled on the cold linoluem atop concrete floor a few feet away from the bedding. Who knows how long he had been there, but when I found him at 9 am, he was freezing and motionless. I was sure he was almost dead.
Thankfully, I've been volunteering in the Toronto Humane Society's kitten nursery for 11 years now, so I knew exactly what to do. I warmed him up with a hot water bottle, and rushed to the pet store to buy kitten formula. I have a lot of extra syringes lying around from volunteering, so I got to work bottle feeding the kittens every two hours. Thankfully it was the weekend, so I had the time to commit to the job without having to take vacation time. I did a lot of research on ways to calm new mothers, and finally decided to give Feliway a shot. In the past this has not worked with any cat I've tried it on, but with Monday looming and the kittens mewling desperately, I was willing to try anything. I plugged it in and checked on Karamel three hours later. She was like a different animal! She was cool and calm, happy and purring, cleaning the kittens and nursing them whenever they wanted. Finally, the little family was happy and healthy, and I could breathe again.
Does the story end there? Of course not! Come back tomorrow for the finale in their life and death story. :)
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