A middle-aged woman with an orange tabby cat rests on a gray cushioned chair in a living room, surrounded by neutral tones and soft natural light.

3:56

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Five good months for a 17-year-old shelter cat

Name: Five good months for a 17-year-old shelter cat
Uploaded: 2023-07-24T17:53:19Z
Duration: 3 min 56 s
Description: Mr. Whiskers was 17, sick and stuck in a packed shelter when Jessica found him. She's a seasoned rescuer who knows her way around shelters, and he was the one she picked.

Mr. Whiskers was 17, sick and stuck in a packed shelter when Jessica found him. She's a seasoned rescuer who knows her way around shelters, and he was the one she picked. more

Senior cats tend to get passed over while the younger ones go home. This one was an orange tabby with a solemn look in his eyes, and Jessica read a lot in it. At his age, in a place that full, he seemed to know how things usually go.

Mr. Whiskers, an orange cat, looks out through the metal bars of a cage. A headline runs in white letters across the lower third. — Mr. Whiskers at the crowded shelter where Jessica found him.

Her best guess at his story was a common one. His health had gone downhill, his owner couldn't keep up with what he needed, and he was surrendered. Jessica did not have to think it over. She adopted him and named him Mr. Whiskers, which, given the whiskers, was the obvious choice.

At home he crept around at first, the way an old cat in a strange house does. Then a vet got to work on him, and so did Jessica, and some of the old spring came back. He began following her around like a second shadow, and he got on well with her dogs.

A middle-aged woman with an orange tabby cat rests on a gray cushioned chair in a living room, surrounded by neutral tones and soft natural light. The headline runs in white letters across the lower third. — Mr.

There was a catch. Mr. Whiskers had FeLV, a virus that cats can pass to each other, so he had to be kept apart from other cats and spent a lot of time alone. Jessica saw that he was lonely and handled it like the rescuer she is. She adopted FeLV-positive cats to keep him company, and before long he had a girlfriend.

He found his voice, too. He called out eagerly at mealtimes and asked for affection when he wanted it. Mr. Whiskers had about five months with Jessica, and he spent them in a house instead of a cage, with a girlfriend of his own and a person who had picked him on purpose.

#cats #adoption #animalrescue