Eye injury?

i found my cat outside this afternoon with green goo oozing out of one eye and the third eyelid(?) covering 1/4 of the eye ball. i have absolutely no money to bring him to a vet. any recommendations?

Yes. You need some boric acid ophthalmic solution, which is very inexpensive; is an antiseptic for the eye. You will also need some visine or isotonic saline (which people who wear contacts have) and some cotton balls.

If this is just happening in one eye, then it is possible your cat got something in the eye, or else that something abraded the eye surface. You need to be very tender with your kitty, so he will let you manipulate his eye. If he won't let you near it, wrap him in a towel with only his head sticking out, and let someone else hold him while you work with his eye. The important thing, no matter how much he may not like what you are doing, is to be calm and soothing. If you freak out, he will totally freak out, so be professional with your cat.

Dip a cotton ball in the boric acid solution until it is wet, but not sopping wet. And gently stroke the eye with the cotton ball, moving from the inside corner out, repeating and repeating until all the gunk is off the eye, and the area around the eye is clean. If you need to change the cotton ball, do. If it gets icky, get a new one.

CLEAN YOUR HANDS WITH SOME ALCOHOL GEL HAND SANITIZER and check the other eye. Just see if it looks inflamed. If your cat has an eye infection, it can easily spread to his second eye. If your cat has an abrasion or piece of something in the one eye, the second eye is in less danger of infection. But if the exudate is greenish, an infection may well have set in. You do not want to spread infection from the partially closed eye to the "good" eye. But if the "good" eye looks a little inflamed, clean it as well, using a fresh cotton ball.

After you have given the "bad" eye a moment to recover from the cleaning, see if the third eyelid has retreated a little. If so, that is a good sign. If not, just keep going.

Using the Visine, or artificial tears or isotonic saline, you need to irrigate the eye, to wash out bunched up gunk that is a breeding place for bacteria and to clean out any scratch that may exist. So, very gently, pull the lower eyelid on the "bad" eye down with your thumb until it pulls away from the eyeball a little and makes a little pouch. Drizzle some of the tears or saline onto the eye. If the solution is at room temperature, this should not bother the cat at all, should actually feel kind of good. Then release the lower eyelid.

Lift the upper eyelid, just pull it back by placing your index fingertip on the upper orbital ridge -- the rim of the bone at the top of the eye that the eyeball fits into -- and pulling up toward the top of the head, until the upper eyelid is pulled back. I am not good at manipulating that third eyelid, but I think this will release that at least somewhat, too. Once you see a portion of the upper eyeball exposed, irrigate the hell out of that with your saline solution. I suspect that the third eyelid is covering the particle or the scratch, and you need to clean it out, because that is where the green stuff is coming from.

Release the eye again, and let it rest for a moment. Wipe any solution off your cat's face. Clean your hands with the alcohol gel, and give the "good" eye an irrigation. If the tip of the Visine or whatever touched the "bad" eye, clean it first. Don't spread that infection!

Take a good look at the bad eye and see if it looks a little better, if the third eyelid hasn't retreated a bit.

Now you have a choice. You can lift the upper eyelid on the bad eye and put a couple of drops of boric acid solution in it, as an antiseptic, just to clean it out some more. Or you can have handy a tube of yellow oxide of mercury ophthalmic ointment. This is an old timey medication, and it works, but it may not be easy to find. Ask your pharmacist if he has a tube, or ask him where you can get some. Before antibiotics, this is what physicians used for eye infections in humans and livestock.

If you can lay hands on that yellow oxide of mercury, pull down the lower eyelid until it pooches out a little, and put a nice stripe of this right over the opening, then let the eye go shut, and lightly massage the eyelids, using them to distribute the medicine over the eyeball. Repeat in the good eye, just for safety's sake.

If your cat has been in the towel for this procedure, release one front paw, and wash the hell out of it with soap and water, and dry it. He has undoubtedly been cleaning that eye with his paws, and he almost certainly has infected matter on them. You need to get rid of that. Then wash his other paw, well, with soap and water, and dry it.

Keep him in a clean place until the eye really begins to clear. Don't let him go outside. Keep him in.

If he is a healthy animal, and you have cleaned and disinfected the troublespot, he should be able to throw off any infection.

Good luck. I hope this works.

You may have no money but that's serious you need to take your cat to the vet. ASAP
If it was clear fluid I would just say it is some sort of eye infection, and to wipe it and keep it clean. But if it is green, it is more serious. If you cannot take him to the vet, call the office and ask for advice. Explain that you do not have the money for it to be seen, and maybe they will let you pick up antibiotics. Do everything you can to get it to the vets!
it could have an eye cold. just use warm water and a rag to clean it. check its nose to see if its wet (good if wet), watch its water intake if its abnormal then your cat may have the cold. if the eye is red and you live around a lot of fox tails, one could have gotten stuck in its eye. you just have to pull the eye lid back pretty far and use tweezers to remove it.