Shake a tailfeather

Jack?

Momma, are you here to open the treat cabinet?

No Jack, sorry, I just wanted to ask you a question. 

Can I ask you to open the treat cupboard? 

You can ask, but you'd be distracting me from what I want to ask you. 

I like it when you open the treat cabinet

I know you do buddy, maybe after this conversation, okay?

You haz my full attention, what do you want to know?

Are you going to be shaking that tailfeather anytime soon?

my what?

Your tailfeather... 

*looks at tail*

So...??

You are making me wait for treats for that lame joke? 

Not to mention blogging about it??

Um.. kay... point taken. 

Do you want chicken or salmon treats?

Yes Please!! You are so awesome and clever 

and beautiful when you have treats in your hands

Rupert vs his new adventure

I had a few cans of the Tiki Cat variety pack left at the house so I brought them up to the shelter to give to the foster coordinator, who is caring for Rupert. I hadn't heard from her but I was hoping for the best. I brought my camera so I could photograph the cats at the shelter so I would have something interesting to post this week.

When I stopped in the woman behind the front desk phoned the foster coordinator and she said she wanted to talk to me. I will admit I had a few moments where I was afraid he hadn't made it through the weekend, but she came out smiling and told me what a little spitfire he his. He thunders down the stairs and pushes the other cats out of their plate to have a bite.... but never more than a bite or two. She said even her grumpy cat that usually doesn't allow that puts up with him.

Rupert is always asking for food. There was a workman that came into the house and he was all up in the workman's face and getting all in his stuff. She said the workman was quite taken with him.

She mentioned that he does smell again, which I don't doubt. He doesn't spread his legs when he pees.. he sits more than squats, but he's young and small and I'm sure once he starts to grow he'll grow out of it.

She mentioned the vet put him on metro, but she wasn't sure why.. His gut was always pretty strong and his poop was always well formed when he was here so I don't know why either, but he's active and eating, so there is that.

Unfortunately, he is still not gaining weight, but... if he is eating better then that is only a good thing and hopefully.. *fingers crossed*

She said she would send me photos.. if she does I'll post them.

Rupert vs his body

I received an email yesterday asking me to call in about Rupert. I knew that there must be news and it was not good. I called in and was told that Rupert had seen the vet and they were able to get enough blood to do some bloodwork. How much I do not know, I was told that the report said that his organs were shutting down. I'm left to wonder if they are shutting down or if they ever worked properly.

They are going to try another medication with him, so he is currently staying with the foster coordinator. The outlook does not look good and barring a miracle he will remain in hospice care until such time as his quality of life is an issue.

I am heartbroken by the news. I knew that the chances of him becoming a big strong healthy mancat dimmed with each day I had him and his weight did not increase, but I had hope. I always have hope. So much so I bought him a food dish..

I mean how could I not.. I miss him like crazy. I love how much he wanted attention. He was the only kitten that would run out of the kitten room to greet me and then run back in when I stepped in the room.

I do not know how much time he has.. but I know that his remaining days will be filled with love, not only in person by the woman caring for him, but from me from afar, and I'm guessing from all of you.

Weruva Paw Lickin' Chicken from Chewy #chewyinfluencer

This month Chewy.com also sent me some Weruva treats as part of their influencer program. They come in Chicken and Fish and since they are single ingredient freeze-dried treats they are good for both cats and dogs.

These are relevant to my interests

Momma! Open it, now!!  um.. please.

Thank you.

Um, could you take them out for me?

The treats are just the right size for cats or small dogs. I know that people who are training dogs also like to use smaller treats as well, but considering the size of the container, 1.91 oz or 54g for the chicken, you might be going through these kinda quickly with a larger dog.  The tube is an interesting choice for storing chicken treats. Getting the top off wasn't easy - nor did Fleurp help with her singing her song "Give Me Treats NOW, um, please" the entire time.

nom nom nom

I think I need to take that quarter away before she eats it

Fleurp really loved them. She would thank Chewy if her mouth wasn't full. I will say it was nice to have these on hand to bribe Eli into forgiving me. It took a few hours, but I think he's over it. So that is twice this month that Chewy has come to the rescue.  I still haven't heard anything on Rupert. I'll try calling later today if I don't hear anything.

What do you do with a high strung cat who may or may not be ill?

Eli started his life as a foster with us back in 2002 when I had *no* idea what I was doing. I was told to feed them, cuddle them, play with them, and when they got sick I medicated them.

Unfortunately, Eli was very sick with calci - blisters and everything - and once again we did everything wrong in relation to medicating and socializing and as a result by the time he was healthy he was scared to death of us assuming we were going to medicate him every time we touched him because that was what he was used to. And once again I did everything wrong by assuming that leaving him alone was the best option. He spent the next 10 years running from us.

Halfway through those ten years, I learned. I attempted to help him but he resisted. I learned of Rescue Remedy and I gave it to him whenever I could and slowly he started to not run at the sight of me, which allowed him to see that I wasn't always coming at him, which slowly let him realize that my walking in his general direction wasn't my coming to get him, which slowly let him realize that I wasn't evil.

The major problem is that while he has long ago forgotten why he was running from me, he has it ingrained in his psyche that if I want him that it has to be bad. So now when I suspect that something might be amiss with him and I want to look him over he freaks right out and gets all tense and curls himself up into a ball and tries to make himself small and protect himself.

The past few days things seem to have been off with him. Both Twee and Skippy have been chasing him around the house. They will sometimes play chase, so this isn't completely unusual, but it has been happening a little more frequently. Then I found pee in the spot that Eli tends to urinate when he's uncomfortable. I immediately called the vet to schedule the dental he needs. I was hoping to do it next week when Jack's medication is over (he is on antibiotics for a runny eye) so I could report what is happening with him. But if he is uncomfortable it might be his teeth and I wasn't going to wait anymore. He is scheduled on Friday.  Then he vomited.

So, really, I'm panicking over a little urine, but since he has a history of crystals which tends to be a problem for him when he is stressed, it could be that is causing him a problem.

So I picked him up to see if he was tender in his belly and remembered this is Eli not Jack, so I did the only thing I could..

I put Eli in the guest room with a litter box and some water and a can of food, which means Muffin REALLY wants to get in that room. She and Fleurp have made a real nuisance of themselves which I'm sure is stressing Eli out even more. Muffin was even driving me nuts so I locked her up for a while too

After eight hours he has eaten but still hasn't gone pee, but that is not unusual at all. When I locked them all to collect stool samples for the KittyBiome project it took quite a while before he relaxed enough to go. If he hasn't gone by the morning I will take him directly to the vet. He'll be fine, of that I have no doubt, but I know that things like this are made worse simply because of his nature.

4am update: still no pee. Signs that he investigated the box once but not that he got in it. I had fresh litter in there and a weird box so to attempt to make him more comfortable I switched out the litter to clean but previously used litter. I opened up a third can of food which he not only ate, but willingly came out to see me to do. Encouraging signs that he will pee before sunrise... Fingers crossed

7 AM update: we have urine. He is so upset with me, so I'll be doing my best to keep an eye on him without upsetting him any further. He is seeing the vet on Friday, and I'll probably have them do a urinalysis while he is there just to be safe.

Rupert vs the women who want him

Rupert spent yesterday at the shelter. I didn't get an update until well past their closing so I can only assume they had a busy day. Rupert is on clavamox and he is being a 'rascal'. The foster coordinator was happy to report that he likes to take a few small bites out of multiple bowls.

She wants him to see an additional vet on Thursday so she is going to keep him for now. I will admit to thinking some not so helpful thoughts when I read that text, but it is in his best interest to be closer than the 30 minutes away he would be at my house and since I work out of the house during the week he would be unattended. (but that does not help me in that she has a kitten and I do not)

So I will probably learn more on Thursday unless something very unexpected (either good or bad) happens between now and then. I am sure your good thoughts are helpful and I fully expect to see him again Thursday evening.

Rupert vs the vet - and a big thank you to @chewy

Unfortunately, Rupert is not gaining weight. All of the weight I have been able to get on him he would lose within a short amount of time. Every time I found a food he would like and eat, he would stop eating it after that initial meal. He seemed to have a preference for beef and the mixed grill type of foods and was refusing to eat poultry (including duck which I tried assuming it was novel). As I mentioned on Friday, he really liked the can of Tiki Cat that Chewy had sent me through the Influencer program. Interestingly he also ate the second can. He liked the reddish "consomme" of the product.

I stopped by the shelter and picked up a wide variety of foods made plans to coerce him to eat every couple of hours this weekend hoping that the uptake in calories would make a difference. Sadly, it did not. Each time I was in there I got about an ounce in him and it raised his weight but a few hours later when I would go back in his weight had dropped again.

I was getting concerned so I texted the woman who was going to come down and see him on Sunday that things were not getting better.  She was still interested in meeting him so we confirmed plans and I gave Rupert another bath and cleaned up the room and left him with food and hoped that the last feeding of the day would bring hope.

When I went down for the last feeding on Saturday night I saw that he had peed four times since his late afternoon feeding. That is a lot. I knew he was drinking a lot of water and was peeing frequently but it had never been so blatantly obvious. I texted the shelter coordinator and asked if they wanted me to bring him in and they did, so I texted his wannabe mom to tell her that he was going to the shelter and we will reschedule when he comes back.

I got him into the shelter and they wanted to keep him for the day and have him see the vet on Monday I intended to run out and get him some Tiki Cat food but once I walked out of the shelter I realized I didn't have my wallet with me. I ended up running home to get my wallet and I hit every pet food store between my house and the shelter (30 minutes away) with no luck. (I did get to scritch the neck of a kitty up for adoption at one store. I nearly laughed when they let me know it was up for adoption and tried to 'sell' her to me)

Finally, I went to their website and tried to find a store in the area that carries the food and found two. One down the street by the shelter and the other by my house - the one store I didn't go to - I called the one and they didn't have the flavor he liked and the other was closed. I was glad I had the foresight to take the three cans in the collection that had consomme.  I brought those in for him and learned that while I was out they were able to get a urine sample from him and tested it and found that it was very dilute and had "quite a bit" of blood in it. I was afraid I had missed something until she mentioned that it wasn't visible until they ran the test. So they were starting him on antibiotics. He was slow to take the food but eventually started eating on his own.

It was mentioned that they would really like to do a full blood work up on him, but they need 3cc's of blood to do that and considering doing that would remove over three ounces of his 1 lb 4oz body, no one really thinks that is wise.

So I will be praying that they find something and it is treatable and I get him back quickly. Paws crossed and purrs and prayers are all welcome.

A day for kitties

Rupert is doing okay, he eats, he poops, he sleeps.. he is still avoiding the 'putting on weight' of his todo list.. maybe I should write the list out for him so he sees it whenever he is awake so maybe he'll remember.

This boy is pretty clever. He seems to have a pretty good grasp of the English language because when I tell him to eat a little more he will quite often walk back to the food bowl even if he just walked away. Last night I brought down a can of the Tiki collection I got from Chewy. I really wasn't paying attention to which one I grabbed and when I opened it up I saw that it was mostly large chunks of fish. The chunks were bigger than Rupert's mouth so I put the plate down outside of the kitten room for my cats to eat. I hung around Rupert for a while and opened up another can but he didn't want that one, he apparently wanted the first can. When I opened the door up a few minutes later to go up and get something I forgot to bring down, Rupert ran right out of the door and straight to the food... he did not care one bit that Jack was investigating it. I'm sure Jack was quite surprised to find fish in the middle of the basement and was trying to figure out why it was there when this little whipper snapper showed up and started eating his prize. He hissed at Rupert and Rupert didn't care. He hissed again and when Rupert didn't respond he snapped at Rupert's ear - Jack's favorite trick when Skippy is in his space. Rupert still didn't care. Jack hissed again, a longer more menacing hiss and he was none too happy when I told him to stop and I took Rupert and the food back into the kitten room. Rupert went back to the food more than a dozen times - far more than any other food I've offered him. He only ate about a third of it, but it was something.

Because I think today needs more kitties, I think I'll share some random cat photos for you to enjoy.