|
Porch Kitty loves the scratches from the nails on his back - that's why I don't make it a priority to cut them 
|
#
?
Apr 20, 2017 13:20
|
|
|
|
| # ? May 25, 2024 04:16 |
|
|
Huntersoninski posted:Raw may not hurt your cats, but bacteria in raw meat can make a person very sick, and that bacteria can pass through a cat's digestive system and wind up on their paws and their tongues, and subsequently their whole bodies, making them potentially hazardous to handle. I feel like I've posted that a lot, but it does come to me from my friend who is an actual veterinarian and who won't handle any raw-fed animal without gloves. Back when I had to feed my kitty chicken liver to boost her vitamin D supply, I asked my vet about giving my cat raw meat. She told me certain types of meat, like beef and pork, where absolutely out of the question. (Where I live, there's a virus capable of killing cats in short order and both meat types can be vectors for the disease.) Chicken, turkey and similar stuff are OK, but only if I carefully wash the surface of the meat before cutting it. In other words, feeding my cat raw turned out to be complicated and dangerous, so I only did it for rare treats. And nowadays, I've stopped it completely, since she doesn't even like raw food that much, so it's an even bigger waste of time than I thought. Edit: Just in case, since this is SA: No, I did not feed my cat raw chicken liver. Like I was ordered to, I cut it into tiny parts and fried it on both sides, until it was well-done.
|
|
#
?
Apr 20, 2017 13:21
|
|
|
Deteriorata posted:Feel free to feed your pets whatever you want. Just be aware that you're not actually buying anything for the extra money you're spending. It's so you can feel good about yourself. You can spare the condescension and rudeness - it's inappropriate, unnecessary and makes you seem childish and ill-mannered. You might accept the fact that the world exists in grey areas, and you're not really entirely right and the point of view that I'm merely exploring (not an evangelist of, as you seem to view me) is not really entirely wrong, or whichever way you want to think about it. I'm sorry, man. I know most people are dualists and it's impossible to see the world in any other way, but I find that level of thinking deplorable, particularly when it's combined with condescension. For god's sake, I feed my cats fancy feast. I'm hardly in a position to cast stones. I just watched a documentary that freaked me out, did some research, and found that a lot of what they were saying was accurate. If it makes you feel better to additionally put me down personally (and incorrectly) after refuting one fact from a documentary I was discussing, then I honestly do not know what to say. kaworu fucked around with this message at 16:04 on Apr 20, 2017 |
|
#
?
Apr 20, 2017 15:56
|
|
|
kaworu posted:You can spare the condescension and rudeness - it's inappropriate, unnecessary and makes you seem childish and ill-mannered. You might accept the fact that the world exists in grey areas, and you're not really entirely right and I'm not really entirely wrong, or whichever way you want to think about it. I actually don't give a poo poo about cat food. What I care about is bullshit and misinformation. Buy whatever cat food you want to. Just don't make up a bunch of nonsense to justify it.
|
|
#
?
Apr 20, 2017 16:02
|
|
|
kaworu posted:You can spare the condescension and rudeness - it's inappropriate, unnecessary and makes you seem childish and ill-mannered. You might accept the fact that the world exists in grey areas, and you're not really entirely right and I'm not really entirely wrong, or whichever way you want to think about it. If you want your cat to have good and healthy food, just obey those two rules: 1. No sugar. Look at everything you want to buy, including cat milk. If they put sugar inside, don't buy it. Your poor cats can't even taste it, so they get their health destroyed for no reason. 2. Look up your local laws concerning cat food production, choose your cat food based on what turns up. Context for rule 2: In my case (German law), if cat food is labeled "with X", it only has to contain at least 3% of X. If it is labeled "with X taste", it doesn't have to contain anything of X, artificial taste is enough. In addition to this, the law counts every listed ingredient separately, so cat food with three different types of meat will generally contain at least 9% real meat when the labels starts "with X" and still zero if it starts "with X taste". All those shennanigans lead to me changing cat food when I found out the food I was using years ago had basically nothing even remotely meat-like in it. As a rule of thumb, as long as you get stuff where there is nothing harmful and at least some meat in it, your cats will be healthy.
|
|
#
?
Apr 20, 2017 16:08
|
|
|
Deteriorata posted:I actually don't give a poo poo about cat food. What I care about is bullshit and misinformation. My apologies. It was actually a mental blunder from the beginning, mixing up two departmental entities whose acronyms end in "DA". It was about the regulation of the meat itself, and the fact that the meat used in cat food is not inspected or regulated by the USDA, which is what I should have accurately said. Doesn't excuse you being a jerk, but whatever. Thank you for the substantive post. I know exactly what you mean about the percentages. There is actually no real law addressing that in the US, but a sort of... association of representatives from the pet food industry and so forth, basically all parties involved in making money off of this, called AAFCO. And they basically lobby for the desired policies on pet food and get what they want - they're the big juggernaut in the industry, really. They decide what percentage of crude protein is in a product that is called a "dinner" versus a product called a "formula" versus a product called "chow" versus a product called simply "cat food", and all these synonyms represent different formulations and percentages of meat. It's frankly pretty screwy, in my own opinion. kaworu fucked around with this message at 16:17 on Apr 20, 2017 |
|
#
?
Apr 20, 2017 16:08
|
|
|
Considering this isn't the first time someone has freaked out about cat food in this thread maybe cut them a break for being a little short with you? People don't like the implications that comes from a lot of raw food proponents and their propaganda that we're LITERALLY POISONING OUR CATS!!!1! It's not your fault you didn't know about the associated baggage, but let's all be chill in the cat thread, okay? It's a lot like parents getting advice about what they feed their kids. After the first twenty times someone mentions feeding their toddler only organic unprocessed food because they just care about what their kids eat, you start hearing the implied criticism of 'and you obviously don't care if your kid grows up to be a fat defective because I can see them eating Goldfish crackers out of the dirt from here'. So if someone later comes up and innocently mentions they read a study about how food coloring might give kids autism even the most patient person can snap unfairly at someone who really did just read a study and thought it might be interesting to discuss.
|
|
#
?
Apr 20, 2017 16:16
|
|
|
Tiny Deer posted:Considering this isn't the first time someone has freaked out about cat food in this thread maybe cut them a break for being a little short with you? People don't like the implications that comes from a lot of raw food proponents and their propaganda that we're LITERALLY POISONING OUR CATS!!!1! It's not your fault you didn't know about the associated baggage, but let's all be chill in the cat thread, okay? No, I totally hear what you're saying and get it, and understand the dynamic you mean. I've sincerely tried to keep anything personal out of it and would obviously *never* even... go there unless it was a situation of outright neglect/abuse. That's just how the social contract works regarding discussion between the caretakers of pets and children and so on, and I understand that. It's just difficult not to act a bit snippy in return. I feel a bit put-upon that I'm being treated like some sort of demagogue of the raw food movement simply for bringing up a topic that was mostly meant to be about the preparation of dry kibble by large pet food manufacturers, which I found troubling. And yeah, my vet (who is a real and legit vet) told me specifically to never feed my cat dry food 6 years ago, so it's not as if it's entirely out of left field for me to hear bad stuff about kibble, and I admit that I'm probably predisposed to be a bit suspicious of it as a result. I actually do give my cats a very small amount of dry food a few times a year for dental reasons.. it's a difficult thr haing, frankly, trying to discern what is and is not proper to feed your pets because there is SO much conflicting information from so many sources. I was legitimately was curious to what degree some of this was accepted as fact; but I had barely even heard of a 'raw diet' when I made that post and didn't realize it was a buzzword like "social justice warrior" that makes people act a little off-the-wall, or something. kaworu fucked around with this message at 16:42 on Apr 20, 2017 |
|
#
?
Apr 20, 2017 16:25
|
|
|
kaworu posted:No, I totally hear what you're saying and get it, and understand the dynamic you mean. I've sincerely tried to keep anything personal out of it and would obviously *never* even... go there unless it was a situation of outright neglect/abuse. That's just how the social contract works regarding discussion between the caretakers of pets and children and so on, and I understand that. It's just difficult not to act a bit snippy in return. I feel a bit put-upon that I'm being treated like some sort of demagogue of the raw food movement simply for bringing up a topic that was mostly meant to be about the preparation of dry kibble by large pet food manufacturers, which I found troubling. Yeah, it's just a term that comes with a lot of baggage that we can't really expect everyone to magically know about! There's a lot of conflicting information on what to feed humans, but we all eat food and sort of...muddle along. The cool thing about living creatures is how flexible they are and how as long as they eat within a certain range of nutrients it's just fine. I do wish there was a food that was just called This Is The Best Food For Cats, The Science Is In, Cats Love It Also Even Picky Bad Cats, This Food is The Good Food and Your Search Is Over. (Trademark Tiny Deer.)
|
|
#
?
Apr 20, 2017 17:03
|
|
|
 I interrupt this discussion to bring you a picture of my cat being cute. I've been trying to deal with constant wakeup meows in the morning (I'm talking 2:30-3:00 AM) for food in any possible way. The problem is that it's not just meows, she knows how to push my buttons enough to make me get up so she can get fed. This includes but is not limited to trampolining on my stomach/balls, laying with her face beside my face and purring loudly (which is cute but gets old at 2AM), and knocking all the poo poo off of my side table while staring me in the face. It's not that she doesn't have food, we keep dry food in her bowl all the time, but she rarely goes to munch on it when hungry and instead will just wait until we give her wet food to eat. I get that the best way to combat this behavior is to just ignore it - it'll get worse before it gets better, but it never got to that point and she just wakes me up earlier and earlier. Lately I've been getting up, letting her walk out of the bedroom, and closing the door to lock her out of the room. This seems to be a winning idea because she doesn't paw at the door or start meowing like crazy when she gets locked out, she usually just goes somewhere else and falls asleep. I understand that getting woken up by your cat for food is a relatively normal thing but is there any better way to deal with this other than just wait for her to stop? explosivo fucked around with this message at 19:39 on Apr 20, 2017 |
|
#
?
Apr 20, 2017 19:34
|
|
|
Hug her. Cats hate it but it doesn't hurt them, just makes them squirm away and flee. If you repeat hugging her every time she crawls on top of you she'll cut it out and then you can focus on ignoring the meowing. Basically you want to establish that when you're lying down in the dark no good comes of bothering you, only the awfulness of hugs or being totally ignored. It helps me a lot with my cat who also likes to physically demand food with his feet on my head.
|
|
#
?
Apr 20, 2017 19:39
|
|
|
Tiny Deer posted:Yeah, it's just a term that comes with a lot of baggage that we can't really expect everyone to magically know about! I would also like this food. My cat will only eat wet food that's shredded meat rather than processed chunks or pate, will only eat fish or fish adjacent flavours and any dry food other than Hills makes him get dandruffy and fart like crazy. He's also not a big eater and will stop eating dry food after a couple of days if that's all there is, so I have to keep him in expensive wet food or he gets skinny and/or smelly. It's pretty much Thrive Complete or he starves himself 
|
|
#
?
Apr 20, 2017 20:04
|
|
|
explosivo posted:(Cat wakes me up all the time) Am I mad or is the answer to just leave her out of the bedroom when you go to sleep in the first place?
|
|
#
?
Apr 20, 2017 21:21
|
|
|
Savings Clown posted:Am I mad or is the answer to just leave her out of the bedroom when you go to sleep in the first place? Nah this is definitely a potential solution, I was just trying to exhaust all my options before resorting to this because I like letting her sleep on the bed with us 
|
|
#
?
Apr 20, 2017 21:34
|
|
|
Having a cat on the bed purring as you go to sleep is the best thing really.
|
|
#
?
Apr 21, 2017 03:31
|
|
|
explosivo posted:(adorable cat wakes me up all the time) Well you might want to make it so she doesn't associate you waking up with being fed. Don't feed her first thing in the morning. Feed her when you get home from work instead and you will be greeted with love every time you walk in the door. It will still take some time for her to get over the programming of being fed in the morning though. Tiny Deer posted:I do wish there was a food that was just called This Is The Best Food For Cats, The Science Is In, Cats Love It Also Even Picky Bad Cats, This Food is The Good Food and Your Search Is Over.  Phobos and Deimos won't eat even a quarter of a can of wet food in a day but they go to town on dry food; however we have fed our cats wet food once a day for Time Immemorial (since I can remember having cats, and I'm 30 this year) and we want them to at least have the option so we are going to crazy lengths to stretch out all these cans we have. Every other cat we've had preferred wet food. The Lobster fucked around with this message at 04:20 on Apr 21, 2017 |
|
#
?
Apr 21, 2017 04:17
|
|
|
Savings Clown posted:Am I mad or is the answer to just leave her out of the bedroom when you go to sleep in the first place? Have you ever tried having a cat spend most of an hour jumping up and trying open the door handle? Our cats does that, one stops, and another starts. Only solution we found was, as somebody earlier mentioned, to force hug the cats.
|
|
#
?
Apr 21, 2017 08:41
|
|
|
The Lobster posted:Well you might want to make it so she doesn't associate you waking up with being fed. Don't feed her first thing in the morning. Feed her when you get home from work instead and you will be greeted with love every time you walk in the door. It will still take some time for her to get over the programming of being fed in the morning though. This is what my sister and her husband do. They have a code phrase that they say when they are going to feed the cats, and feed them at lunch, dinner, and right before bed. Their cats just don't expect any food until later in the day, and even then have at least some understanding that they only get fed when they hear the phrase. As a result their cats never expect any food in the morning, and don't try to wake them up. Being able to yell the magic "I'm going to feed you," words are also pretty handy for whenever one of the cats sneaks outside.
|
|
#
?
Apr 21, 2017 10:06
|
|
|
turn off the TV posted:This is what my sister and her husband do. They have a code phrase that they say when they are going to feed the cats, and feed them at lunch, dinner, and right before bed. Their cats just don't expect any food until later in the day, and even then have at least some understanding that they only get fed when they hear the phrase. As a result their cats never expect any food in the morning, and don't try to wake them up. I've found just shaking a bag of treats loudly before giving them a snack is enough to make them run back in should they escape into the garage. Synthbuttrange posted:Having a cat on the bed purring as you go to sleep is the best thing really. It's fun to fall asleep to, but one of my cats in particular tends to wake me up at 4 in the morning because he wants to burrow further into your belly. Also he tends to cockblock me and my girlfriend because when we're in bed he'll go to great efforts to wedge his fat cat body between us to keep me and my lady from cuddling.
|
|
#
?
Apr 21, 2017 21:49
|
|
|
Anyone know about feline diabetes home testing? My cat lives with my ex, long story but I need to get some home testing supplies for him. I think I just need the lancer and a meter with some test strips. I keep seeing old info on the meter, anyone know what the current conventional wisdom is on this? Bayer Elite?
|
|
#
?
Apr 22, 2017 00:39
|
|
|
Yeah cassie likes to accidentally wake me up by plopping herself on my chest and going to sleep. She's like 12 pounds.
|
|
#
?
Apr 22, 2017 09:26
|
|
|
Hey yall, my friend is moving across a couple states next month, and judging from the last time we moved only 30 minutes away, she HATES being in the car. Yowls the entire time in her crate. It was miserable for that short of a time, and now he's looking at 17-20 hours  . He's pretty much convinced his vet(an older type) won't prescribe her a small scrip because he "doesn't believe treating something that isn't a problem" (???) I told him he should still try the guy, and maybe try calling some other clinics in town. Besides that, what are his options? She's a grumpy Lil 11 year old lady but is healthy. I suggested trying citronella spray, but is there any other type of meds he could look into at his local pet shop? Any suggestions appreciated.
|
|
#
?
Apr 23, 2017 06:41
|
|
|
Yeah, usually for situations like that they'll prescribe a sedative. When my mom moved in with my dad before I was born she had to bring her cat onto an actual airplane (this was the 80s though so you could do that pretty easily back then) as she was moving from Texas to West Virginia. Her vet gave Maggie a sedative and she was out like a light, quiet the whole time. Though I guess she crapped in the crate anyway and my mom spent the flight wondering why the woman with the baby in the row in front of her wouldn't change her kid's diaper. I have no idea if people still go about things like this with that devil-may-care 80s approach but it would be my guess that for a 20 hour drive, you'd probably want to sedate the poor kitty. I don't see how that "isn't a problem" because it certainly causes distress to both your friend and their kitty. Knocking her out will make everyone happy. As for other options, perhaps spraying the carrier with Feliway would help a bit.
|
|
#
?
Apr 23, 2017 06:52
|
|
|
My vet gave me 2 doses of zoloft for my cats when I took them on a 5 hour drive to Houston and a 25 hour flight to Hong Kong. Worked like a dream to keep my cats, one of who hates drives longer than 30 min, calm for a least the drive. Not sure about the ride in cargo to HK but my wife said they looked fine when she picked them up.
|
|
#
?
Apr 23, 2017 10:05
|
|
|
Yeah I can't think of a vet who won't give you a light sedative for travel, just tell them she's stressed out by car rides and needs to sleep it off. They may want to see her ahead of time just to make sure she's in good shape, but that should be it.
|
|
#
?
Apr 23, 2017 14:59
|
|
|
Synthbuttrange posted:Having a cat on the bed purring as you go to sleep is the best thing really. You know, we have learned quite a bit about cats and purring. One of the most amazing things (which I had no clue about until very recently) is that a cat purring very close by has a number of theraputic effects, including bone regeneration. Seriously - apparently it has to do with the frequency at which most cats purr, (25-200 Hertz or so supposedly) covers the range that is actually quite therapeutic for bone health, density, bone regeneration/healing. The idea being that from an evolutionary standpoint cats have always spent like an hour or two a day hunting and the rest of the time sleeping and lolling about, or whatever. And in the case of of a fracture or from falling out of a tree, having such an internal vibration system as the purr would both promote faster healing, in addition to reducing swelling and even contributing to some pain relief as a result of it. And this makes *perfect* sense to me, given that whenever I encountered a cat who was injured or clearly hurt, they were always sort of purring manicly no matter what. You guys know the sort of purr I mean? Then there are the theories that cats can actually modulate their purrs, and they have a nice and soothing purr they use when going to sleep or cuddling, and then a much more insistent and rapid purr at a higher frequency (apparently the same frequency as a baby crying) when they want you to wake up and feed them or let them out or whatever, I know Jackie definitely has an "insistent" purr she uses when she wants me to get up and feed her - and it's usually accompanied by a wide-eyed stare while she stands on the pillow next to mine with her big kitty-face inches away. I'm sure she's not the only cat who does this. Oh and aside from all this crap things are going fantastically with my two kitties, It's so funny, I go back and read posts from last summer from when I first got Sardine, and I was trying to be optimistic here but I had at one point decided to take Sardine to a (no-kill) shelter after about 2 months since she could still barely leave the top of the fridge or her open cupboard just below the ceiling, but something in this thread ultimately convinced me, some post about how long it can really take cats to acclimate... Maybe it was somewhere else, who knows? But time is really what it takes, and I really can't imagine things without Sardine around. She is a *perfect* match for Jackie, too - they're both female, both tabbies, both the same approximate size (though Jackie's short and a bit fat and Sardine is tall and athletic), and they act like sisters now. But when I say Sardine is a perfect match, I mean that Jackie's a tough cat to get along with, and has never really gotten along with other cats before. Because Sardine is totally chill and never really goes after Jackie and is generally just affectionate and willing to play. Only when Jackie initiates it though, and if it were the other way around there'd be problems. But it isn't, so it works and Sardine defers to Jackie and everyone is happy  The greatest thing is that with Sardine around Jackie is eating less, exercising more, and always has someone to play with when I'm gone now, of course. I had always been *convinced* that Jackie needed to be an only cat, but I was so wrong. I think anyone who thinks their cat NEEDS to be an "only cat" is probably either very misguided or a bit crazy, with me falling into the latter camp obviously.
|
|
#
?
Apr 23, 2017 16:38
|
|
|
Left the cats alone for 24 hours and someone ate my Google home power cord. Since that isn't a murdering offense what's the best way to prevent that from happening again?
|
|
#
?
Apr 24, 2017 03:01
|
|
|
Len posted:Left the cats alone for 24 hours and someone ate my Google home power cord. Since that isn't a murdering offense what's the best way to prevent that from happening again? All the cables and cords in my place are lightly misted with lemon juice. Keeps Snowflake from electrocuting himself on a daily basis.
|
|
#
?
Apr 24, 2017 03:23
|
|
|
Pixelante posted:All the cables and cords in my place are lightly misted with lemon juice. Keeps Snowflake from electrocuting himself on a daily basis. How often do you respray them?
|
|
#
?
Apr 24, 2017 03:36
|
|
|
Harley likes the taste of lemon. I have lost many cords, but thankfully kitty is still breathing. We use burlap cord-covers where cords are exposed, but we have to just lock her our of the office while we're not in there or it's cordchew city
|
|
#
?
Apr 24, 2017 03:50
|
|
|
Len posted:Left the cats alone for 24 hours and someone ate my Google home power cord. Since that isn't a murdering offense what's the best way to prevent that from happening again? for the deterrent, i'd suggest those plastic coil cable wrap things, then spray with citrus or bitter apple spray keep in mind that you also want to provide a preferable alternative if possible, so have some toys nearby that they can bite the gently caress out of, maybe like a catnip pillow or sock or something
|
|
#
?
Apr 24, 2017 03:53
|
|
|
Any suggestions for durable toys that aren't just hard plastic?
|
|
#
?
Apr 24, 2017 05:53
|
|
|
Tuff Kitty sparkle balls are good. They have a sparkle ball on a string on a stick that holds up too. Yeeow catnip toys are good poo poo too. The sardines are small enough for them to bat around. I was leery of fabric toys for fangy animals, but so far only one has come apart, the pumpkin. Otherwise they're really well made.
|
|
#
?
Apr 24, 2017 06:52
|
|
|
I've gotten a few Kong toys that have held up really well to two crazy kittens.
|
|
#
?
Apr 24, 2017 07:41
|
|
|
I have a new problem with Deimos. She seems to be on a mission to look out every window in the entire house. This includes windows with things in them like plants that get knocked over. We have PLENTY of kitty-friendly windows all over the house; is there any way to steer her toward the ones that are already cat-proofed? We've never had this problem before because the windows we use for non-kitty things are actually really inconvenient for cats to get to (or so we thought).
|
|
#
?
Apr 24, 2017 20:35
|
|
|
The Lobster posted:I have a new problem with Deimos. She seems to be on a mission to look out every window in the entire house. This includes windows with things in them like plants that get knocked over. We have PLENTY of kitty-friendly windows all over the house; is there any way to steer her toward the ones that are already cat-proofed? We've never had this problem before because the windows we use for non-kitty things are actually really inconvenient for cats to get to (or so we thought). Is there a malevolent external kitty that has shown up in the last few days?
|
|
#
?
Apr 24, 2017 20:50
|
|
|
Seat Safety Switch posted:Is there a malevolent external kitty that has shown up in the last few days? That's a good question. I don't think so, though.
|
|
#
?
Apr 24, 2017 22:11
|
|
|
hi everyone in this thread. my girlfriend is moving in next month and bringing along her twelve pound ragdoll cat along. we were looking at some litter boxes and saw these modkat ones that looked pretty cool and promising in that they could cut down on kitty litter trails the cat would bring back on her paws. just wondering if anyone has any experience with either of these: https://smile.amazon.com/dp/B01JMDY0ZG/ref=twister_B00EOKFVGK?_encoding=UTF8&psc=1  https://smile.amazon.com/Flip-Litter-Scoop-Reusable-Liner/dp/B009UWMLC4/ref=sr_1_3?ie=UTF8&qid=1493080199&sr=8-3&keywords=modkat
|
|
#
?
Apr 25, 2017 01:33
|
|
|
Covered litter boxes are a very individual cat dependent thing. Some cats like em. Some hate em. If you intend to try one, make sure it's plenty roomy for the cat.
|
|
#
?
Apr 25, 2017 02:43
|
|
|
|
| # ? May 25, 2024 04:16 |
|
|
dorium posted:hi everyone in this thread. my girlfriend is moving in next month and bringing along her twelve pound ragdoll cat along. we were looking at some litter boxes and saw these modkat ones that looked pretty cool and promising in that they could cut down on kitty litter trails the cat would bring back on her paws. just wondering if anyone has any experience with either of these: the design on this one looks pretty good with the grating at the top that should hopefully let the litter fall back down into the box, but it seems a bit small for medium to large cats. honestly, if you really want to cut down on tracking, you need to use a litter with larger grains or go with fiber pellets
|
|
#
?
Apr 25, 2017 02:52
|
|