Cat thread

[LK]

Mesa has developed this habit of using my computer chair as a climbing post. So one brave leap up to the top while I'm sitting low causes the cat to dig a claw straight into my forehead in its search for a grip.

Ow.

[Sjofn]

Gilly the Sick Cat has gained SO much weight I actually have to put her on a slight diet so she doesn't get any fatter, because one of her drugs + being a fatty = diabetes. The vet seemed pretty happy it was something to even worry about though. 

[tgr]

I've never actually had to put cats on a diet, either to fatten them up or slim them down. The only thing I've had to do is have one of my cats' teeth cleaned, and 4 teeth pulled due to some disease which apparently afflicts 60% of all cats which are older than 5-7 years old. Thankfully she's taken that in her stride, and are still eating dry food without any issues at all.

[Sky]

Bart is probably Bombay, prone to overeating. I let him eat his fill as a kitten so he'd get big but now we have to monitor his intake because he'll continue eating his fill as an adult and get fat. He's settled in around 15 lbs, just slightly overweight. He's obnoxious when he doesn't have food in his dish - while he's really good at staying away from the things he's not supposed to be into, he heads for those exact things to get my attention and then runs to his food dish and looks at me like I'm an idiot.

[rattran]

My big cat has problematic teeth, he'll likely have to have them all pulled soon. It's thankfully not Feline Infectious Peritonitis, just part of his weird genetic mix. His fangs are so big he can't close his mouth all the way, and toothbrushing and dental treats can only go so far.
Not too bad though, Oscar is somewhere near 11 now, the first vet I had him to thought he'd start breaking/losing teeth around 5.

Though Bart at 15# being overweight seems odd, is he really small framed, or just not getting enough exercise?

[Sky]

He's not fat, the vet just likes to bitch if they're not some lean ideal cat shape. He's got that big skin flap belly that some breeds get. The doc should know better, imo. It's hard to say, though, since he's looooong cat and solidly muscled. He likes to sit on his back (I call it the Bundy position) and looks fat, but then he stretches out and he's long cat.

At first (when the vet first bitched about it) he was heavier, peaked at 17lbs. I think he's cool where he is now, just doing some final tweaks to the portions. He eats EVO which doesn't have grains and is 80% meat.

[tgr]

I've literally never done anything to limit what my cats can eat, they eat what they want, when they want, I just make sure they have excess food/water. vOv

Perl is short and long-haired, but I don't think she has much fat on her. HUGE paws though. She's a sucker for sleeping on my stomach while I try to play Eve, so that can be a bit awkward at times. Nova Luna is bigger, but she has tiny paws, and that flop-belly. Neither of them are fat, but they have a layer you can definitely feel is present, which I tend to think of as just normal. I just don't worry about it, and it all just seems to work out dandy.

Well, until Perl decides I've played too much eve or watched too much tv series, and sits at the desk right infront of whatever it is I'm doing. No matter what it is, or which monitor it's on, she covers it.

[Demetra]

Gilly the Sick Cat has gained SO much weight I actually have to put her on a slight diet so she doesn't get any fatter, because one of her drugs + being a fatty = diabetes. The vet seemed pretty happy it was something to even worry about though. 

Very glad to hear this.  We've had cats that are always so lean that if they get sick and stop eating they have no cushion to fall back on. 

The "kittens" (5 years old now) are lean and mean, the two geriatrics are prone to getting fat so we have to pay more attention to who eats what to just let everyone free-feed.

[Sjofn]

Yeah, I'm glad Gilly still has her appetite, even if she is a little monster.

I can't freefeed Gilly even if I wanted to, because she does not stop eating. It's sort of amazing. I have very rarely seen her actually decide she's full and stop, usually she finishes her food down to the very last crumb, then stares at Lizzie's dish longingly until Lizzie decides she's finished, then licks every last molecule from LIZZIE'S dish too. This means, of course, I cannot free feed Lizzie either, which is just as well, since she's an idiot who doesn't drink water and thus is on a wet-food-only diet, and I don't think you're supposed to leave that shit out.

[Fordel]

I seriously love that Lizzie is too stupid to drink.

[Signe]

Lister drinks much more than Magenta which worried me in the beginning when I was cat clueless.  Dogs just don't have these issues for the most part.  I've always given them very wet, gently cooked food and she laps up the juice like crazy.  Another thing that seemed to encourage her to drink was putting an ice cube in the water bowl.  She sits and watches it, now and then tries to fish it out, and ends up drinking some water while she's there.  Lister is afraid of the ice cube because sometimes it pops.  Anyway, I've heard those water fountains sometimes encourage cats to drink, too.  I've always wanted to try one but haven't yet.

[Arrrgh]

We switched our cat to bottled water and he drinks much more now.  He likes Dasani.

[Trippy]

We switched our cat to bottled water and he drinks much more now.  He likes Dasani.

Ha! That would be a great commercial.

[Signe]

Our cats drink filtered water just like us, too.  I rarely buy bottled water anymore because of all the plastic bottles.  I think most of those water fountains for pets also have a filter.  I do remember Dasani as being about the nastiest of the bottled waters I've tried in the past.  That's the Coke one, right?  I think they're also the ones that were recalled ages ago in Britain for having unsafe levels of Bromate, too.  I'm sure it's fine now, though.  Just sayin'.   

[Sjofn]

I do have a water filter fountain thingy, but it didn't really help. Basically it was an awesome toy for the first few days (which was fine, Lizzie would bat at the water, then lick it off her paw), but now she ignores it completely. Gilly likes it, though, so it was not a complete waste.

Gilly's latest thing is to carry the cat grass (it's in a light plastic pot) into the computer room as a subtle hint that it is time for her to be fed.

[Sky]

The only thing my cat carries is one of his stuffed animals so he can fuck it in front of company.

[tgr]

One of my cats is absolutely terrible at picking up stuff like my SOCKS and dragging them all over the place. I've come home to seeing 20+ pairs of socks lying about everywhere in the living room.

And of course, one of the cats had vomited in the interim, and pulled 5-6 of them into a giant lump to cover the vomit.

Owning cats still own though.

[Bunk]

I was a little disturbed when I realized my cat felt it was neccessary to hide vomit. It's pretty rare when she does throw up, but she'll use anything handy to hide it.

I also have to be wary of things like dryer sheets being on the floor, as she's been known to use those to "bury" suprises.

[Sjofn]

My cats puke proud, man, they've never hidden theirs.

OR HAVE THEY 

[Signe]

Magenta just threw up.  Geez.  She always throws up almost at my feet and only when she eats really fast.  I guess I'm lucky or something.

[Engels]

ya, Binkie is bulimia kitty too. Binges on 2/3 lbs of catfood, then yerks it all up a moment later. I don't think we'll ever see a red cent of that safety deposit.

[Rasix]

My cats puke proud, man, they've never hidden theirs.

OR HAVE THEY 

It's always fun when you find a hidden cache. 

[Reg]

The worst is when you hear it happening during the night and then can't find it anywhere the next morning. My cat doesn't seem to mind eating the same meal twice.

[tgr]

It's arguably just as bad or even worse when you hear what SOUNDS like the hac-hac-hac sound of a cat in the throes of throwing up ... and it turns out to be the neighbour in the floor above that's walking around in high heels or whatever.

False alarms are 

[Engels]

My cat doesn't seem to mind eating the same meal twice.

Oh, my two cats are siblings. The sister yukes it up, and the faithful brother chows down like its just been served up warm and gooshy for him.

[tgr]

and the faithful brother chows down like its just been served up warm and gooshy for him.

[MisterNoisy]

My cat doesn't seem to mind eating the same meal twice.

Heh.  Mine does the same thing.  Conveniently, she always warns me that she's going to hurl with a peculiar yowl, so I can scoop her up and deposit her in the bathtub to take care of business.

[Sjofn]

Lizzie's pukes are stealthy sound-wise. I have never heard her throw up, but she always barfs in obvious spots (OR DOES SHE  ) so I can find it. Gilly will do the vluk-vluk-vluk sound. Neither really puke a LOT, especially since Gilly went on medication for her various woes.

Now I will wake up tomorrow to find a bunch of puke all over the place.

[Goreschach]

This thread sucks now.

[LK]

Is a cat consuming toliet paper bad? Petra seems to like to eat and play with toliet paper, which gets all over the place...

[Cyrrex]

If it's consuming it right off the roll, I'd say yes.  If it's been swirling around at the bottom of the bowl for a few hours, I'd say yes.

[Mrbloodworth]

Is a cat consuming toliet paper bad? Petra seems to like to eat and play with toliet paper, which gets all over the place...

One of my cats eats paper, the other, eats plastic. Vet said the paper, is OK, and won't really hurt him if its infrequent, plastic is a different issue and we have to be very careful.

[Signe]

My vet told me that she's had to attend to some nasty infections in cats due to dried pine needles puncturing their stomach lining during Xmas holidays.  I'm assuming that some plastic thingies would be dangerous like that.  She sprays her tree with a bitter apple solution so they don't go near it.  Lister used to do this thing: 



but he grew out of it.  Well, for the moment.  Sometimes he revisits old habits.

[sickrubik]

TIME TO SHARE.

Meet Chi-Sai.

Meet Bella. Bella's sleeping in her favorite spot.

What happens when the spot is taken? She sleeps there anyway.

Meet Miss Cheiva

Miss Cheiva is a Big Kitty. A Big Kitty needs her room when sleeping.

[LK]

Neat thing about failing to properly secure the plastic top on a tub of cat food is that you know the mess that erupts from the lid breaking off as you pour will clean itself up.