How I did it: This rather affectionate big gray cat, whom I dubbed "Gray the Stray" was hanging around my porch and wanting to be petted and loved to be fed. One day he showed up with a neck wound and some face scratches and it was freezing outside anyway so I took him in, gave food & water and cleaned up his head as best I could and put some salve on him that I had from a similar neck abscess on other cats. He seemed alright and I let him back out after he warmed up. But the next day he was lying on my porch and limping - it turned out his rear paw was also hurt and so I decided to take him to a vet just to get him cleaned up. Turns out it's not that simple, the abscesses had to be drained, to do that (and bathe him) they had to sedate him, and since that's the biggest expense, why not give him some shots against Leukemia and Rabies?  And they had a special on neutering too, so the whole package was a great deal on a new cat. They even threw in a free microchipping! So my investment was protected, the neighborhood cats would not get knocked up (as much) and the diseases would not spread to him. I also threw in a treatment of Advantage for fleas, that was something I should have thought of at the start. 

Lessons & tips: Strays are living a much more miserable existence than they let on. They're covered in dirt, parasites, cuts, and are out there freezing and hungry, not trusting water sources, getting attacked... 

Resources: Talk EVERYTHING over with your local vet, even wishes and stuff you're just considering. I had about 7 different end scenarios I had to work with. Putting them down is not one of the top ones.

Jan 28, 2010, 06:34PM PST | 1 comment | 13 cheers