Spotted Cat Designs

Cat Found Treading Water In Rocky Bayou Rescued By Fisherman

News for cats and dogs – Police Investigate “Cat” Burglars At Bank

Today Steven went outside to get the mail. On the way, he saw one of Darkly’s kittens (who are still quite small and fluffy). He put some food in his hand and the kitten came over and ate out of his hand! He carefully reached over and pet him/her on the head and s/he finished eating and cutely ran away.

But wait, there’s more!

After getting the mail, he noticed Darkly sitting on one of our cars watching a bird on the ground. The bird, meanwhile, was watching another one of the kittens. Darkly stalked, the bird got nervous and took off, but Darkly landed on it in midair!

She walked off very proudly with her catch.

Last night I was just dropping off to sleep when I heard a terrible yelp. You know the sound a little dog makes when someone steps on his tail? Like that…except we don’t have any dogs.

Susan had stepped on Yang by accident (after clearing the path, too, but he ran back in front of her in the dark). It sounded so hurt and forlorn! But he was okay.

Tonight I heard a similar sound, though not so plaintive. It was Yin and Jennifur getting in one of their dustups again. Nobody seemed hurt either, but it’s a bit scary when you know they’re not just playing around.

The web site of the American Association of Feline Practitioners is primarily for veterinarians. If you use their “find a practitioner” it will only show you member veterinarians, not all veterinarians that care for cats.

If you go to their Practice Guidelines page, you will find a few really large .pdf files detailing their suggestions to all veterinarians on many subjects including feline pain management, zoonoses and assisting aging cats. This group and the European Society of Feline Medicine which is linked with the Feline Advisory Bureau(UK), publish the bimonthly Journal of Feline Medicine and Surgery. While a large part of the site focuses on technical matters, the Feline Advisory Bureau web site also has practical information about catteries, boarding facilities, and useful information for those who are owned by their cats.

Two nicely written articles.

News for cats and dogs – Rochester on Aging: Confessions of a Senior Cat

Senior Cats and Hearing Loss

We have seen the commercials and ads for years…but did you know Del Monte 9Lives company was helping abandoned cats, too?

From their Business Wire Press Release:

Celebrate the 500,000 Adoptions Milestone for Morris’ Million Cat Rescue campaign

A shocking 3 out of every 4 cats that enter shelters do not leave alive. The reality is that 5.5 million cats are euthanized each year, representing 71% of all cats that enter animal shelters. Many don’t know that there are tremendous advantages for the entire family in owning a pet — for adults, pet ownership can decrease the risk of having a heart attack by up to 6%. Pet ownership can teach children about responsibility, compassion and loyalty — in addition, positive self-esteem is enhanced in children with pets. And pet ownership has been shown anecdotally to help children diagnosed with Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD) to focus and concentrate.

About Morris the Cat

In 1968, a street-wise orange tabby from a Hinsdale, Illinois shelter was languishing for a loving home after being abandoned by his owner when the shelter staff noticed something special about the cat – a certain star quality. They quickly contacted Bob Martwick, a professional animal handler who quickly adopted him on the spot, and — 20 minutes from death — Morris the Cat got a second chance. Recognizing his charisma, 9Lives cat food quickly signed him up, and the entire nation took notice of this new star of their television commercials.“

“Morris’ Million Cat Rescue mobile adoption bus will visit Santa Monica’s Third Street Promenade between Santa Monica Boulevard and Arizona Street from 12:00 p.m. – 5 p.m. PDT to mark the momentous occasion and to promote pet adoption. The 500,000^th cat will be officially adopted by Audrina Patridge of MTV’s “The Hills,” who will also participate in an exclusive check-donation ceremony. A grand total of $10,000 will be donated in her name to a local area shelter, Feline and Friends, to help them continue in their mission of finding loving homes for homeless cats.

According to Thomas, the Morris’ Million Cat Rescue tour will be making additional stops this year in San Francisco (9/27), Sacramento (10/03), Portland (10/11), Seattle (10/18), and Denver (10/27) before going on winter hiatus. For more information about Morris’ Million Cat Rescue Campaign, bus or van stops, visit www.9Lives.com.”

Lisa Wade McCormick of ConsumerAffairs.com wrote an article about Walmart’s public rebuttal to the ExperTox Analytical Laboratory analysis of toxins they found in certain cat and dog toys carried by Walmart. In the article she writes:

“ConsumerAffairs.com hired ExperTox to test four Chinese-made pet toys — two for dogs and two for cats — for heavy metals and other toxins. Two of those toys — a latex one for dogs that looks like a green monster and a cloth catnip one — revealed what the lab’s toxicologist called high levels of the toxic metals lead, chromium, and cadmium.”

This lengthy article has detailed information from both ExperTox and Walmart, as well as other independent sources. Definitely worth reading — then you decide which path to follow.

I can cruise the net with the best of them Anecdotal stories are often interesting. However, when it comes to caring for our precious family members — that includes my sons as well as our cats I prefer to get my medical advice and information from those whose jobs involve staying at the forefront of medical knowledge.

Cornell University Veterinary School’s Feline Health Center has quite a few free online brochures related to various health and behavioral concerns. You can read them as an article or download as a .pdf file. Where appropriate they cross reference their own videos. From the link above, you can also access a glossary of feline medical terms, articles from their newsletter CatWatch.

At this writing there are 8 articles about general health issues ranging from what to do if your cat is “going outside the box” to dealing with aggression. There are four brochures about feline infectious diseases including zoonotic (transferable to humans) disease. And there are six about specific feline health diseases.

The American Veterinary Medical Association has lots of feline health brochures in English and Spanish; printable .pdf files and online readable files. Veterinary clinics can order mix and match packages of 50 brochures to give to clients. They also have a huge number of .pdf files concerned with disaster preparedness, mostly for veterinary practices and state organizations, however there are a few that are of use to pet owners such as Saving the Family (including pets!).

Go and see for yourself!

I had previously written about some videos that showed cats having asthma attacks. I have found some more useful videos that I thought important to share with you.

These How To Health Videos are from the Cornell University College of Veterinary Medicine Feline Health Center web site. These videos are:

• Caring for your Diabetic Cat
• Giving Your Cat a Pill or Capsule
• Giving Your Cat Liquid Medication
• Trimming Your Cat’s Claws
• Taking Your Cat’s Temperature
• Brushing Your Cat’s Teeth

Free Stuff Channel’s Pet Page

Cool Freebie Links Pet Page

There is a lot of information overlap between each of these sites, so I try to keep a record of the offers I have already taken advantage of.

Cool Savings requires you to “become a member”. Personally, I don’t often do this as it has led to spam in the past. If you try them out, let me know.