When 11-week-old Dandelion, an orange tabby cat, was found near-death in the streets of Bradford, a city in the United Kingdom, his outlook wasn’t promising.
He was urgently taken to a vet, which did not treat the kitten.
“Dandelion had been in the vets for two and a half weeks, and unfortunately, because there was no one able to pay the bill, the vets felt they weren’t able to offer the care, and his condition deteriorated rapidly,” Bradford Cat Watch Rescue and Sanctuary volunteer Katie Lloyd told the BBC.
“His red blood cell levels decreased so much that he went from having anemia — I mean severe life-threatening anaemia — and, when I picked him up, he was pretty much collapsed,” Lloyd explained.
In dire straits, volunteers took Dandelion to a trusted practice, Northcote Veterinary Surgery. That’s when another rescue cat stepped in.
Carrots, a blind cat, also in the care of the cat sanctuary, was a match for a blood transfusion.
Carrots is a therapy cat, well loved by volunteers, known for “seeing with his heart,” as Lloyd puts it.
“It was a bit of a stab in the dark — ‘Which cat shall we use?’ — and I was just like, ‘Oh it’s got to be Carrots. It’ll be Carrots,’ and by chance it was,” she told the BBC.
While the blood transfusion will not cure Dandelion’s anemia, the rescue reported that it bought them some time to “seek specialist advice.”
In other words, Carrots saved Dandelion’s life.
“It could have gone very wrong, but it didn’t,” Lloyd told the BBC. “So we’ve just got to be grateful for that. We had a kitten that was dying in front of us, so we really had nothing to lose.”
About 48 hours after the transfusion, Dandelion gained over 20% of his body weight back and was responding well. A more recent update from the rescue said he had a “turbulent” few days and suddenly stopped eating.
Fortunately, he is now in the care of a trusted veterinarian. His blood gets tested every two days and his medications are tweaked as needed.
Lloyd told the BBC that Dandelion will need to be monitored closely for the next few months as he recovers, living alongside the other 65 cats cared for by the rescue.
That, of course, includes Carrots, which the sanctuary calls “the bright orange light in Dandelion’s darkest hour.”
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Featured Image: @bcwrkittens/Instagram
