Farewell Dennis

We found Dennis in November 2024. A lucky kitten, or so we thought. Late kittens can die from lack of food and the cold, their mother’s exhausted, as it is their third litter of the year, and often die too. But Dennis was at the right place, close to a feeding station in our village Kini, but with seemingly no road sense and being pushed around by the other older, larger members of the colony. Luckily for our volunteers, he proved remarkably easy to catch. A trail of biscuits was all it took to entice Dennis out from under the car (no road sense again…) and provide enough clearance to drop the cage on him and take him to safety and our quarantine. After one escape attempt, Dennis realised that resistance was futile and that actually it wasn’t that bad living at Syros Cats!

What a joy he was! An absolute beauty with big cartoon eyes. He was an adorable, friendly and playful little guy from the start, loved human company and would just melt in your arms, soaking up the attention. And he was an expert biscuit maker! He had the regular health checks and vaccines and seemed like a normal kitty. Until he got sick and his eyes looked funny. We were shocked when the vet told us he had gone blind. He got urgent care while we waited for blood results. (The FIP sample needed to be sent to the mainland for analysis.) FIV/FeLV tests were both negative, toxoplasmosis (a possible cause of blindness) also negative, but we waited anxiously for the FIP test. He was sick and deteriorating very quickly. The positive result arrived and we had no choice but to let him go.

Three months at Syros Cats was too short, he brought joy to us all and we know he was happy with us.

RIP little one, so sorry we couldn’t save you.

Sincere thanks to those of you who donated to his vet bill and to his two sponsors who have kindly passed their sponsorship on to Bella and Rodi.