Friday, January 23, 2009

Samantha's surgey




I did get a picture of Samantha the rat's incision area after her tumor was removed. The pictures are bit blurry and Samantha still had staining on her fur from what they use to wash her up before performing the surgery. Pardon the messy cage too.
She is diong excellent. She is active and climbs all over. Healing up very well. She is still a sweet and friendly girl.

Caught in the act




You cannot tell me that husband, Ray, doesn't love the cats. These pictures prove he does. Randy, Motorman and Riley are laying on him.

Hamsters love tofu!
















Last week I fed the dwarf hamsters tofu and took pictures of them eating it. Some of the pictures are of them enjoying their wheel and little houses. Enjoy the pictures! :)

New Kitten! :):)






















I am not sure if I posted about our new kitten yet. We were fostering a 4 to 5 month old kitten for a week. He quickly captured our love and hearts. He made friends with Randy the cat right away and soon , Marty. Well, when a week was up , we wound up adopting him instead. Seems like we are unable to foster cats, and we won't be doing that again. His name was Simba, but we changed it to Riley. The name Simba didn't seem to suit him. He is now friends with all our cats. Here are cute pictures of our newest kitty addition.

Saturday, January 17, 2009

Good News and Bad News




Last Friday I took Samantha the female rat and Fluffy the hamster to the vet because they both had lumps on their bodies. Samantha's was by her armpit and Fluffy's was also by his armpit but it grew very large very quickly. After talking to Dr.Fijas we decided to go through with tumor removal surgery for both of them. If we didn't go ahead with this procedure, both tumors would have kept growing until neither Fluffy or Samantha would have had a good quality of life anymore. If we have the tumors removed and the tumor doesn't come back or no new ones pop up, they could have many good times ahead of them, a good future. Yesterday they both went to the vet for the operations, I dropped them off early in the morning. Both Samatha and Fluffy made it through sugery. Fluffies operation wasn't quite so smooth.. the large tumor has blood vessels attached to it so the little guy did loose a lot of blood during the surgery. Dr.Fijas had to remove a lot of skin in order to make sure that all cells and "tumor stuff" was taken out so a new tumor didn't regrow later on. It was then difficult for Dr.Fijas to close him back up, but he did. And Fluffy did come out of it, he woke up. Dr.Fijas checked on his little patient every hour on the hour and Fluffy looked good. But then, by the next hour he checked on Fluffy to find he had passed... We did what we could for him and I know Dr.Fijas performed the best surgical procedure he could on such a little patient. The tumor was so large and he bled too much :( Even though Fluffy was never a very friendly hamster, he would nip me when he had the chance. I loved him no matter what, I love all these little ones no matter what their attitude is or personality. They all deserve the very best, and vet care when they need it. That is what this rescue is all about. Samantha is doing great , she is going to heal well and no one will even know she ever had a tumor there once her fur grows back. Her cagemate , Molly was happy to have Samantha back. Once Samantha is healed and we know she is in good health , she will be adoptable with Molly . Anyone who would like to adopt two sweet female rats these are great girls. Samantha is a grey colored Dumbo rex and Molly is kind of cream colored, regular ears and flat short coat. They are both approximately a year old. I am estimating that Samantha will need about 3 weeks to 4 weeks to heal.
Here is a picture of Fluffy. I am going to try and capture a good picture of Samantha and Dr.Fijas's fantastic work on her.

Tuesday, January 13, 2009

Critter Nation

Ray (husband) surprised me this Christmas with a card saying we are going to order and buy the Critter Nation for the rescues! I was shocked because I didn't know he ever read this Blog. I only wrote about it here and never mentioned anything to him, so I knew this was the only place he could have found out about the cage and that I wanted it. We haven't ordered it yet, but will be soon. I can't wait! It will be so great for the rats, sugar gliders, degus, etc! I can hang lots of hammocks and pouches in there! Lots of Toys! A lot of room for them :) I love how the doors in front are large and swing wide open for easy cleaning and access to the little ones. Once we get it and have it assembled I am moving Samantha and Molly the female rats into it, they will LOVE IT! I'll take pictures of it too and post it here .. coming soon.

Many guinea pigs have found homes :)











I cannot believe it is already this far into January. Where has time gone?, and I haven't posted..





Over the past week many guinea pigs were adopted. All of them are adults that were abandoned behind a business building back in June. First, Monty was adopted. Monty is a very special guy , his back legs do not bend at all because his knees are fused together. Our vet said there wasn't any surgical procedure to fix his legs and he may have even been born with the disability. But Monty never acted disabled, he can move and run, FAST! To him, he is no different than any other guinea pig. We are thrilled he also has found a very loving home. This past Saturday, 6 guinea pigs went home. Mooey and Chester was being fostered by Andrea, I didn't get their pictures or place them on Petfinder, but they did get adopted anyway. They are two brothers with wild hair. Then Travis was adopted. Travis has such a wonderful personality, he is a cuddler and loves attention. He may have a new friend guinea pig by the name of Leto. Next to be adopted was Wild Thing and Mr.Big, two very amazing boys. I personally loved Mr.Big, but Wild Thing is a charmer too. Then last, but not at all least, Paris the girl guinea pig found a great home. She has a wonderful new Mom a seems to have already a liking to her girlfriend guinea pig, Woobie.





All these adoptions make me very happy! :):)