Oscar

Oscar was a stray cat in search of a warm home. A cat lover and IHP's pet heater came to his rescue. Here is his story told by his care provider. Here is a picture of Oscar sitting on his house. It was a made nearly 40 years ago and has been used for storing firewood in a corner of our garden, sitting beside a large hedge protected by a cluster of large trees. It is amazing that it has lasted. The cat it was made for eventually won our hearts and was allowed to live in the house, and many others have followed. We are keeping Oscar out of the house because in 2016 we took on a cat from the Blue Cross called Fifi, a difficult cat to re-home because she was 18 years old (now 19) blind in one eye and rapidly going blind in the other. We have experience of deaf and blind cats. The vets told us that it was due to a virus which would quickly affect her brain unless both eyes were removed. She is now like a new cat, but reacts to sudden close movement and touching without us talking to her first. She has had 3 friendly meetings with Oscar in the garden but in the latest one he took her by surprise and she spat at him. We hope that eventually they will accept each other and he will move from 8A to 8. Inside his kennel which is lined with cardboard, he has a 12 bottle wine case inside a 15 bottle case with bubble wrap insulation between. That sits inside a “garden waste” recycling bag which we assembled when he first decided he wanted to stay with us (we fed him food that Fifi left), but when it got cold we thought he needed more weather protection and some warmth, he is 10 years old. We put a cat bed warmer in, but that seemed insufficient. That stopped working and we got him a more suitable one just before we received your heater, hence the extra wires in the attached picture. We monitor the temperature with a spare weather station transmitter. He is now very cosy and not too hot. The heater panel is fitted to the lid of the kennel.