This trip had been planned as a follow up visit to our first clinic last September. We had a shorter time and it was just Elaine, her vet nurse friend Lisa and myself with Lukre our Dubrovnik vet who was with us for three and a half days. Between them they neutered and treated many more cats, a lot of them young, than any of us had anticipated.
It was a big help that quite a lot of people from our village, Luka brought in cats themselves, a few who I had never seen before. They seemed very pleased to have us back again and I felt the word had definitely started to spread. There was no actual opposition this time but I heard there are still a good number of people opposed to the neutering. I feel though this could start to change and hopefully they’ll see the difference we are making.
I was anxious when I arrived to find out how many of our patients from September were around and how they were doing. I had thought a lot about them over the winter. I was happy to see most of them were doing very well, with a few exceptions. Some of these we were able to catch and treat. Sadly a few favourites had disappeared.
Our clinic in Sipan is converted from a small bedroom with one window, kitchen facilities at the end and a shower room. There’s a confined terrace outside for a waiting area. The family who rent it to us are extremely kind and helpful (I pay a much reduced rate now from last September) and are big supporters of our welfare project. We stay in an apartment above the clinic to be close to the cats.
Elaine and I also spent time catching some strays or rather Elaine did the catching and I assisted. One little group, five small, young, very underweight, starving hungry with acute worms, four of them female, had been reported to us. One man had told me they were old and sick and needed to be put to sleep. These young cats were so happy to be in the clinic and to be given extra food and attention, but my concern was, what happens to them now? The last evening a man had appeared at the clinic saying we had taken one of his cats. It turned out he had been sort of feeding one of the strays. They were all then released back where we had found them. Elaine and I visited the man several times over the next few days, gave him dried milk, lots of food and a carrier for shelter. He seemed a nice person, had his own cats, luckily spoke some English and was our only hope.
One time consuming mission was to meet an older man, who had two cats he wanted neutering, from the other village, Sudurad. The plan was to go to his house with the carriers, Lukre had liaised for us. The school bus was late, it was wet and windy and we found the man waiting for us with two big old sacks tied up at the neck. I just hoped those cats hadn’t been in there too long. I knew it was going to be nearly impossible to get a terrified cat out of a sack and into a carrier in bad weather. As we were starting one sack ripped open at the bottom and the cat flew out. Elaine did a great job in transferring the other one. Finally the next day the escaped cat got put on the bus in a carrier with two fish heads and amazingly appeared at the clinic. Lukre had instructed, no food that morning!
We didn’t have a vehicle this time so were dependant on the infrequent bus and kind offers of lifts. Luckily one friend was on the island with his truck especially when we had an emergency situation. Lukre had arranged for some free roaming cats to come over from the neighbouring island of Lopud. Before the trip we didn’t know if we were needed to help catch them or how many there would be. Luckily we weren’t as we would not have had enough time. Lisa and I took the group back on the early boat on Sunday. We and the cats were the only passengers leaving Luka that morning and we were accused by a crew member of stealing cats from Sipan. At one point I didn’t think I was going to convince him and there was no time to run back and find our vet. He gave up in the end.
Lisa and I had to bring one cat back –she wasn’t well enough to be released and had started bleeding. I was so thankful to have Lisa with me as she knew exactly what to do and took charge. With all the waiting around for the next boat we were very anxious about getting her back to the clinic. Coming back to Sudurad Lisa had the cat wrapped up well, holding her in her arms in the cabin and to start with other passengers thought she was a baby. That made us smile. That little cat went through quite an ordeal over the next ten days. Having most likely never been in a building before she was cared for in our clinic and apartment, then the vet clinic in Dubrovnik and Lukre’s apartment. Elaine and Lisa did a great job looking after her before we transported her to Dubrovnik, the day they were leaving. Lukre had sent Elaine important fluids, anti-biotics and instructions over on the boat. Later after a blood transfusion I heard from Lukre that she had gone back to Lopud and was doing well with her friends in the wooded area where a devoted cat lady, Barbara was feeding them and had made an excellent shelter.
I had two more days on Sipan after the volunteers had left on March 6. I collected various medications from Lukre in Dubrovnik for the cats that needed more treatment and showed people back in Luka what to do. I also organised large bags of cat food to be sent over on the boat mainly through the summer months. Fishing restrictions are from May to October and some of the people who struggle to feed many cats really need help and then there are the strays who have to get by on their own.
Lukre and I spent time in Dubrovnik just before I left discussing future visits. There is a good chance we will be setting up a clinic on the island of Lopud later in the year as Barbara definitely needs help over there. Lopud is only a 20 minute boat ride from Sudurad, the other village on Sipan, so I aim to get some more Sipan cats over to their clinic, if it all goes to plan.
Many thanks again to WVS for all the generous supplies they donated (some are left over for Dubrovnik strays) the hard work and cheerfulness of Elaine and Lisa and the skilled work and time Lukre gave us. Thank you all so much for making this trip possible. April 25th, 2009
