When I started my shift last Friday at the SPCA, I noticed there were over 25 kittens there. That was the most that I have seen at one time. I took several photos but the kittens were very busy so it was hard to get a good shot. Fortunatly, these two were resting at the right time.
Everybody loves kittens so I am sure they have been adopted by now. It is the older cats that I worry about. Some have been there for too long and need a home.
Chris and Frankie want everyone to know that today is Ginger Cat Appreciation Day.
But who doesn’t appreciate ginger cats?
Chris’s addiction to kibble has always been a real problem. I have not eliminated kibble because he eats very little wet food, even when faced with starvation. Instead, I buy the highest quality kibble that I know of, a brand called Rawz, and try to keep it to a minimum. I have also been giving them homemade raw cat food twice a day that I make using chicken and a premix from a company called TC Feline.
The problem has always been getting Chris to eat the homemade food, or any wet food. I usually give him about half of what I give Frankie and Flokie, who both love the homemade food, but typically he only eats about half of what I give him before one of the other cats come and take it away from him. Sometimes he leaves his food before anyone shows up and I have to follow him around with his plate. I might also put some on my finger and feed it to him like a baby. That usually works once or twice before he turns his head and refuses to look at my finger.
Not long after I feed them, Chris is hungry and wants dry food but the bowls are empty, so he lies down next to the bowls and talks to anyone that will listen.
My wife and I joke that he is “holding vigil at the food bowl.” When this doesn’t work he comes and annoys me in hopes that I will give up and put food in his bowl. Sometimes it works.
Lately he has been eating even less of the homemade food. Sometimes he wouldn’t take even one bite. I did not want to stop giving them the homemade food because it is the healthiest option and Frankie and Floki love it, but I did want Chris to eat something besides kibble, so I decided to split the difference. I decided to give them a can of food in the morning and the homemade food in the afternoon.
Since Chris is also picky about canned food I decided to go back to a food I found after much experimentation years ago that seems to satisfy everyone. It is a food from Earthborn Holistic called Chicken Catcciatori. This is the most universally accepted canned food I have found that is also somewhat healthy. While it is not as healthy as homemade, it is better than kibble.
Please note that the above link and that of the Rawz food are Amazon affiliate links. I included them because there is a lot of information about the products on Amazon but I would recommend that if you are interested, check your local pet supply store first because both products are overly pricey on Amazon.
It has been over a week and I can report that Chris is eating a fair amount of the canned food. Not as much as I would like but much more than he was eating before. He is even eating slightly more of the homemade food. Perhaps he just needed the variety.
Here is a photo of Alex, his sister Abbey, and Tigger. It was taken eleven years ago tomorrow and was almost three months before Chris came and spoiled their peace.
There is a similar photo taken after Chris joined the crew. You can see it on my other blog here.
It’s usuall for Chris to be snuggled up with Frankie or Floki but to have all three together and touching each other is somewhat rare. It is also a surprise that Chris is not the one in the middle.
I found this rather cute photo of Chris, Tigger and Abbey napping together eight years ago today in 2012.
Of course, it didn’t start out like that.
Chris gradually worked his way into a comfortable third wheel.
Regular readers may recall the trouble Chris was having with his ears. His regular vet said the ear polyps in his ears were too extensive and refereed me to another vet. In a nutshell, they charged me almost $1000 and did nothing for him except give him a medication that helped somewhat. I will post a link to those posts below.
Since then I was able to get my regular vet to order that same medication compounded for a much cheaper price. It seemed to help for a while but I know an antibiotic won’t work forever and his ear polyps won’t just go away so the problem will just keep coming back.
I put the medication in his ears for a few weeks and then took a break for a little while and then continued with the medication. I needed to order more medication but since Chris is still shaking his head from time to time I decided it would be wise to have the vet check his ears again.
He had a 2:00 appointment today but I was not allowed to bring him inside. When I got there I had to call and someone would come out to get him. I arrived a little before 2:00 but nobody answered the phone. I assumed they were at lunch and sure enough someone pulled into the parking lot a few minutes later and went inside. A few minutes after that she came out, asked me a few questions, and then brought Chris inside while I waited in the car.
Some time passed and I got a call from the vet who said that his right ear was okay but his left ear had problems. She asked for permission to take a sample to determine what pathogen was invading his ear.
Of course I gave her permission and she called later to say that in addition to the bacterial infection that was already determined from the last vet, he picked up a fungus as well. She said that sometimes happens when an antibiotic is used. I learned years ago that the same thing happens when a woman gets a bladder infection.
While Chris was there I asked her to microchip him. None of our cats have been micro-chipped and I have felt uneasy about it for a long time but every time one of the cats is at the vet I either forget to mention it or I don’t want to add to their trauma.
When we got home I let Chris out of his carrier outside as a reward for handling himself well. In other words, he was good for me but perhaps not so good for the vet.
When I brought Chris inside Rose suggested I bring Floki to get his nails clipped and get him micro-chipped as well. I called the vet and asked if I could bring him with little notice because he is nearly impossible to catch so making an appointment would be hard to keep. She said that should be okay and they could just slip him in between appointments.
It was a long shot but I brought his carrier inside and set it on the kitchen chair. Floki did not see me bring in the carrier but his psychic abilities alerted him to danger and under the bed he went.
Frankie, on the other hand, was not alerted to danger and climbed inside the carrier.
Rose then suggested that I bring Frankie to be micro chipped because he needs it the most. I agreed and zipped the top shut. I then brought him to the car and called the vet. I told her I couldn’t get Flokie but I had Frankie. She put me on hold for a long time. I decided to start driving and was half way to the vet when she said that I would have to leave him there because it might take an hour or more before they could get to him. I said I didn’t want to leave him in that little carrier for that long and turned the car around and brought him home. Perhaps I will just make an appointment for Frankie since I know I can catch him.
If you want to read about Chris’s ear problems, check out the posts below.
Ear Polyps, Arthritis and 19 pounds
I hope all of our American friends had a great Fourth of July. I know it can be a difficult day for people with pets, but our pets are not normal.
I vacuumed the house in the morning while Chris and Frankie were napping in the Florida room. They weren’t bothered by the noise in the slightest.
Later that evening is when the fireworks started. Judging by the sound, a very close neighbor spent a fortune on fireworks. I think it peaked around 9:30 when there was a continuous stream of loud bangs over our house but all of our cats were napping on our bed like nothing was going on.
How did your pets handle the Fourth of July?
The SPCA announced recently that they were allowing the volunteers to come back. I took that opportunity to trade my 4-7 shift on Thursdays for a 1-4 shift on Fridays. This means that I will be volunteering at the same time I am on call at the Red Cross but I have gone on two calls in six months so I thoght it would be no problem.
When I walked into the cat room I noticed that all of the pods were empty, at least all that I could see.
I thought maybe they moved the cats and didn’t tell me but as I continued I saw a pod with four cats in it. I was pleasantly surprised to find seven of the eight cat pods empty. The next room has the smaller cages where cats are kept in isolation, either because they are recovering from surgery, they have a special diet, or the don’t play well with others.
There were four cats in that room, including a very friendly black cat named Sassy who had a skin condition from a flea allergy. I took her photo but it is too blurry to post.
There were also six kittens in the room in three separate cages, probably separated by litter. There were two black kittens that I failed to get pictures of. There was also a single gold and white kitten who was curious but shy.
Then there was three kittens together in one cage, a ginger boy and two females including one tabby and one tortie.
The ginger kitten was the most outgoing of the three and would come down from the shelf for attention.
The four cats inside the pod were pretty shy except for a white and gold cat named Max.
When Max wasn’t busy catching some rays he was busy looking for attention
While I was there, a man and his two boys came in shortly before a woman. All of them decided they wanted to adopt the ginger kitten but the woman recognized that the man was first and let him take the kitten. Perhaps if he didn’t have two young boys who wanted the kitten, he might have let her have him. Unfortunately, the woman left without a cat.
Another woman, who had been in earlier, decided to adopt an eight year old male Siamese cat named Sage. He was hiding under their homemade cat tree so I had to pull him out and put him in a carrier. I’m sure he wasn’t happy about it then but today he is living the good life.
While I was there I spoke with someone about doing animal transports. It is an on call position that I know almost nothing about yet but she did ask if I would be comfortable handling wildlife and mentioned birds of prey and a few others that I don’t remember. My guess is these are animals that are injured and need medical attention but I don’t know. I have an appointment to meet with her at 7:00 am this morning where I will learn more about the job. I think it will be interesting.
Here is a photo from ten years ago of Chris and Tigger. It was taken when we lived in Myrtle Beach on June 28, 2010. It shows Chris was as touchy-feely back then as he is today.
Bad Cat Chris 