This Norwegian Forest cat’s (?) not-so-brief story so far:

Found this injured feral cat in my garage in late January. Something completely tore off his left jowl fluff plus a chunk of skin, as seen in the last pic. Probably a bobcat or coyote did it, maybe a fox. I started bringing food and water out to him and brought him a little cat house so he could have a warm place to sleep and recover. I worried about his injury and a possible infection and his weakened state, so just before temps were supposed to drop well below zero I tricked him into a cage and brought him into the house. I set him up in an upstairs bathroom where he was safe and warm 24/7 but sequestered for rabies watch. I had no idea of his regular health status and didn’t want to risk my kitties downstairs, so I exercised a great deal of caution, washing hands after being in contact with his space and litter box. He has let it be well known all along that he does not want to be touched or too close to humans, but seemed to become comfortable otherwise. He has kibble available all the time, a sunny windowsill, his padded little nap house and I visit with him two to four times everyday, bringing gifts of many flavors of Fancy Feast Pate’ and several other good quality food. He went from devouring everything he saw to becoming a terribly picky eater in the 3 months he’s been with me! His urine is pretty stinky and he poops the size of a medium dog. I have to clean his litter box morning and night or the air quality suffers terribly.

He and I were both traumatized when I had to put him back in the cage to bring him to the vet for his first checkup. As expected, he was unfixed, unvaccinated and not chipped. Doc says he was likely born in the wild and is probably around 5 y.o. After neutering, deworming, flea and tick meds, feline leukemia testing (negative) and everything else the doctor recommended, including scheduling a booster shot for the middle of May, the out of pocket cost at the vet was roughly $500. What little trust I painstakingly earned from him was ruined the moment I grabbed him to put him into the cage. I’m dreading having to do that all over again in a few weeks. I don’t think he’s a very good candidate to be a house cat and I have zero hope he would integrate into the downstairs crew. If I can’t come up with a permanent home for him, I may have to open the door and give him the choice of staying or going. I would provide him with food and heated housing in the garage if he chose to stick around. I think bringing him to a shelter would be too traumatic and finding him a home where someone doesn’t care about not having a friendly, loving kitty isn’t very realistic.

Ideas welcome. What else can I do?