The Gray Tomago

At Baltimore Animal Resource and Care Shelter (BARCS) I was getting one cat and wanted to make it two. I looked around at the other cats BARCS had. I saw a super cute one year old cat. This one year old cat has been at BARCS since the middle of January 2024, and I was there February 5th. I asked to see him and was surprised no one wanted this one year old cat. Kittens and young cats get adopted out first and he has now been in the shelter for a few weeks. As soon as this cat stood up, I saw why no one was adopting him. He was wearing a cast. He has a broken paw. When I asked more about this one year old cat, I learned he also has teeth missing and fractured teeth. BARCS said this cat was given to them with these injuries. BARCS said whoever adopts this cat will be spending a lot of money for teeth to be pulled because they are unable to treat his teeth and gave the warning of possible amputation depending on how his paw heals because the shelter is unable to care for him. As soon as I saw how dirty his cast was and hearing how BARCS is unable to care for him, I decided to adopt him because shelter life is not treating this one year old fairly. His shelter name was Tomago. I renamed him Gray after the character from Fairy Tail.

For the first week of February 5th, I was unable to find a veterinarian to do his weekly splint and bandage change. I asked BARCS if they could do it. They said for the first week they can. After the first week I should not rely on them to change his splint and bandage. If I had to I could only if for some reason a veterinarian office is filled for a week, however it was a vibe of don’t come back. Once his splint and bandage were changed, he was clean for the rest of the following week. Seeing how his cast was clean made me wonder if BARCS was even doing his weekly splint and bandage change because the one he had when I adopted him was dirty.

The following week (second week I had Gray) he went to a veterinarian office because it was a free first exam and I would only have to pay for his splint and bandage change. They looked at him and changed his splint and bandage. They didn’t charge me because they said for me being a new cat owner I can have a free splint and bandage change since this one cat is going to be expensive to me with weekly veterinarian visits. They told me his teeth cannot wait and they should be extracted as soon as possible. A dentist visit I thought could wait until April is happening now in February.

The third week I had Gray he got the teeth he needed pulled and his mouth is all healed. He went to an animal dentist specialist and they gave me a discount because they were surprised BARCS was unable to care for this animal. A few days later, he went to a different veterinarian office for his weekly splint and bandage change. This is the place I am keeping as his primary care veterinarian. They changed his bandage and splint, and said this cat has outer wounds. I told them I was unaware about this. No one in the shelter or even last week told me he had injuries on the outside. I was told injuries were on the inside only. This might have been caused by him wearing a splint and bandage that over time badly wore his skin away. The next day on February 23, Gray ended up in the ER. I was told by the shelter they are unable to do x-rays, however when he ended up in the ER, that veterinarian read his shelter file and noticed BARCS did in fact take x-rays. I am not sure if when BARCS said they are unable to do x-rays they meant for his teeth. The ER said shelters usually have a hard time getting an animal's dental work done and that is what they meant, however BARCS should not have adopted this cat out with his injured paw and leg in a splint. The ER said BARCS has a resource called the Franky Fund that when a cat or dog, like Gray, comes to the shelter they are able to care for them properly. I am unsure what the Franky Fund does, however it doesn’t actually help the animals. The ER, just like the animal dentist, gave me a discount because they said BARCS should have done more than what they did and were disappointed BARCS ignored this animal. The ER said BARCS shouldn’t have even allowed this cat to be adopted out with all his injuries because they have resources and funding to help while I as an individual person do not. At the ER, I learned that his injury to his paw is actually old based on the x-rays they did in the ER. His injury is not new and has been there before he was given to the shelter in the middle of January. This surprised me because I assumed his injuries were new. This makes his healing process harder because his injuries were old, not new. He was not healing properly like I hoped he would because he had old injuries. In the ER, they said his leg is going to have to be amputated since this is an old injury and not a new one.

The animal dentist and ER were very nice to me by giving me a discount, mainly because they are both disappointed in BARCS. I adopted Tomago, now named Gray, because he had some injuries. I did not realize his injuries were this severe. I did not realize BARCS has resources they were not using to help an animal. I do not think BARCS uses their Franky Fund or donations for anything useful like they claim on saving animal’s lives. BARCS is a kill shelter and it could be possible that they didn’t want to spend money on a one year old cat with injuries like they are supposed to. This past week of February 19th has been disappointing to learn from two different specialist veterinarians that BARCS have the ability to properly treat this animal and for some reason they decided to ignore him. The past week’s unexpected veterinarian visits have left me with no money left because I thought things could wait when in reality they can not and his injuries are more serious.

Donating to Gray your donations will actually be used to help an animal and not ignored like BARCS did.