06/19/2026
We need help.
It has been an incredibly expensive month, and Tuesday night our beautiful Sadie suffered a devastating leg injury. We don't know what happened, she was fine Tuesday evening, and Wednesday morning she had a severe injury to her leg and ran away when we tried to catch her. Despite searching for her, it took us more than 24 hours to find and secure her.
Huge kudos to my husband and son, who managed to sneak up on her when she showed up for dinner Wednesday night. My husband reached right into the middle of a feral feeding frenzy and grabbed her with his bare hands. Sadie is a true feral. She bit him. She scratched him. Badly. But he held on for dear life.
We have to admit...she's one of our favorites, despites being non-receptive to our attempts to tame her.
Sadie has been with us since April 2024. She survived the horrible panleuk outbreak that year, and while she's never allowed us to get close, she's always nearby. She's been part of the Chaos Crew for over two years…an OG!
We got her to Dr. Wes Thursday morning. When we spoke with the clinic around 5:00 yesterday afternoon, he had just started surgery and had already removed her leg. The injury was simply too severe to save it.
Needless to say, Sadie's outdoor days are over. She'll be joining Sundae and Picante in what is becoming our feral medical room while they wait for the day they can have their own amputations. We're pretty sure Sadie is going to have some very strong opinions about becoming an indoor cat.
Financially...this month has been brutal.
Our veterinary bills have already reached nearly $2,000 between Ozark Veterinary Clinic and New Brockton Veterinary Service. We also spent another $1,900 spaying and neutering 49 cats over the past two weeks. Forty-nine! 🤯
And I don't even want to talk about what we're spending on wet kitten food, even with Kita and Becca's incredibly generous wishlist donations at the beginning of the month.
Lynne's generous grant last month allowed us to restock desperately needed medical and preventative supplies and to run the advanced PCR testing on Nemo to try to figure out what's causing his stomatitis. Unfortunately, molnupiravir doesn't seem to be helping, so we're now facing the decision of trying another treatment protocol or removing all of his teeth. (Although, considering how much Nemo hates taking medicine every day...I think all of us probably vote for the extractions. 🤣 He's definitely an orange cat…we’re getting the scars to prove it!)
We've also put almost 7,000 rescue miles on our main vehicle in the last 50 days. Between transports, emergency calls, shelter pulls, vet appointments, and everything else, we've been everywhere. Fuel alone has been brutal, although thankfully it's finally starting to come back down a little.
We've received $235 in donations this month (plus the generous wishlist purchases the ladies made), and $100 of that is designated for Tanner, a feral from Colony who desperately needs dental surgery. He was neutered and vaccinated this week, and the clinic found multiple rotten teeth while he was under anesthesia. They gave him a long-acting antibiotic, and he'll be heading to Ozark in early July for his dental.
We hate asking for help. We know times are tough for everyone right now. But the reality is that our expenses have nearly tripled with kitten season, and we simply cannot continue at this pace without help.
If you're able to donate, we would be incredibly grateful. If you can't donate, there are several free ways you can help us:
🐾 Donate directly to Ozark Veterinary Clinic: (334) 774-5940 (Option 5).
🐾 PayPal: https://www.paypal.com/donate/?hosted_button_id=BLA2XSVYK3TFN
🐾 Shop our Chewy affiliate link: https://chewpanions.chewy.com/wildlyferal
🐾 Invite your friends to follow our page. We need just over 100 more followers to qualify for Facebook monetization, and every single penny that brings in will go right back to the cats.
🐾 Share our posts, leave a comment (even just an emoji helps) or a like.
🐾 Bookmark and share our Chewy affiliate link. It doesn't cost you anything extra to shop through our link, but the kitties earn a small commission every time someone does.
Sadie is at Ozark Veterinary Clinic, and we're hoping to bring her home today. It was obvious from the start that amputation was necessary, so there likely won't be X-ray charges, but there will certainly be additional costs, including pain medication and follow-up care. The balance may not show until we've picked Sadie up, as we generally pay at time of service. This time, we simply cannot.
Thank you. Whether you've donated, shared our posts, followed our journey, or simply cheered us on, we appreciate every single one of you more than you'll ever know.
