Cocoa and Lulu's Flight to Safety
Cocoa and Lulu safe at Purrhaven after we finally captured them in July after a long frustrating 2 months of tracking. They had fled the Hagerstown train museum at City Park area after a dog killed one of Cocoa's kittens. We found both Cocoa and Lulu 1/2 mile away behind the train museum near Burhans Boulevard in Hagerstown.
Cocoa had to help tiny LuLu flee the train museum area by crossing the rail road tracks where trains run fast and frequently and then traveled down a long lane. It was by sheer luck that we saw them crossing this lane one late June afternoon. We trapped Cocoa with a net when she wouldn't go into the trap. Cocoa had lost a tremendous amount of weight in a few short weeks since we had last seen her at the train museum. We took her to the vet right away and a stool sample revealed she had hook worms. Hook worms are life threatening and both she and LuLu were treated right away. 10 days later Cocoa surprised everyone by giving birth to 6 kittens. This story while having a good outcome overall, ended sadly for LuLu who passed after from FIP in her foster home. All in all we removed to safety: Mittens who had 6 kittens 2 days later, Inky, Magic, Twinkles and Tipsy who also passed from FIP 2 months later while in foster care. Mittens, like Lulu passed away from FIP several months later at her foster home. Mittens kittens appeared healthy lived happy lives for the first few months in a foster home but sadly most passed away from FIP.
 We noticed Tipsy had a slight head tilt when we saw him in City Park. This may have been the first sign of a neurological symptom of FIP.
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Cocoa, had been living in the neighborhood near City Park for 5 years and had never been spayed. She gave birth to many litters of kittens in the train museum yard. This is where she gave birth to Lulu and another black kitten. The black kitten was killed by a dog who lived nearby.
Pictured in the photo above is one of the 4 neighborhood cat's that was cruelly caught in a trap at Hagerstown City Park one cold March night. City Park officials had engaged a Boonsboro Maryland wildlife trapper to remove the cats being fed in the park near the Train Museum. After petitioning the City, they gave us permission to save the remaining cats by trapping and removing them. We worked with the person who had been feeding the cats against park rules and got her to understand that just providing food without doing TNR (Trap-Neuter-Return) was not the long term solution.
Here is Mittens, the night we trapped her 2 days away from giving birth. We are thankful that she was not caught by the wildlife trapper. The trapper who caught the 4 cats would not tell us nor the Humane Society of Washington County where the cats were taken. We spoke to the trapper on the phone where he said "these cats were wild and mean and had no collars" and "I gave them to a farmer". The person who had been feeding these cats said they were " friendly " and "came when called." After being able to handle Mittens, Cocoa and the rest of the cats we removed to safety, we think the cats that the wildlife trapper removed were just terrified of being caught in traps and were only exhibiting normal frightened behavior and were simply neighborhood cats that came into the park because food was being put out.
We counseled the person who had been feeding in the park for the last 5 years to stop and to start to do TNR with the other colonies that she does feed.
Our mission is to educate people that only providing food for stray cats is not the best solution for the health and welfare of these cats. Spaying and neutering is the best solution, as it will end the endless cycle of unwanted kittens and stop the spread of health issues.
We incur out-of-pocket medical costs when doing TNR. When cats and kittens like Sherbert, Bean, Sprout and Giant are ill we take them in and do our best to solve their issues. But we need your help to do this because of the expense. There are very few grants available to cover the cost of medical expenses and therefore we at Purrhaven bear the burden. So many kittens have stomatitis and need all their teeth pulled to eliminate the bacteria under their gums, get them healthy and adoptable. Full mouth dental surgeries are $1,000 by Helping Hands in Richmond VA (the best price around). If you would like to mail a donation to help cover dental costs please donate through our website or mail a check to: PurrHaven, Inc. P.O. Box 17 Rohrersville, Maryland 21779-1102. Sprout, Sherbert, Bean and Giant need to have their teeth removed before we can list them on Petfinder for adoption.
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ABOUT US
PurrHaven, Inc. is a stray and feral cat rescue and rehabilitation organization. Our purpose is to promote spaying and neutering and humane treatment of cats through funding of low cost spay/neuter and humane education. We are a 501(c)3 who started offering Trap-Neuter-Return(TNR) in Washington County Maryland in 2010.
Through donations and grants we sponsor TNR in circumstances where the caregivers are unable to get the situation under control due to lack of financial resources, humane traps or transport vehicles. We provide a the full cycle of services which includes trapping, transporting to clinic, returning ear tipped, sterilized and vaccinated cats back to the caregiver/property, vetting sick cats and kittens and re-homing adoptable kittens.
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