Curiosity Killed the…

I remember being a little kid and reading the top of a box of Cheerios; it said to fold plastic lining to preserve freshness. So help me I took those words to heart.
My whole life I have annoyed my mother, boyfriends, roommates, and my husband with my insistence of preserving freshness. Baggie clips are on everything in the pantry and a good amount of food in the crisper.

When kittens became a part of my life I continued this preserving trend of mine. Back before I knew what I know now I used to give Annie and Oliver dry food.
At first I would push all the air from the bag and roll the top down as much as I could. But I figured that wasn’t good enough.
I then added a trusty baggie clip.

But I felt that wasn’t good enough either. So I invested in some Snapware. At first I was drawn to the adorable design. I do love paw prints.

With their dry food in an air tight canister I felt much better.
Even though my 4 kiddos do not eat dry food, my Snapware containers are still mighty handy. I keep one in the pantry filled with bonito flakes and another in the bedroom filled with treats for Oliver and Annie.

Dry food only maintains its freshness in a bag for 3 weeks so I truly encourage anyone who feeds dry food to their animals to not buy the 700 pound bag.
Or, if you must, pour the food into air tight jars. Nothing bugs me more than when I see on open bag of food. Besides being wholly unsanitary, it’s not very nice. Food goes stale. It’s that simple.

I have given away so many bag clips over the past couple of years that yesterday I bought 4 more for my own kitchen because I ran out.

With my own eyes I see food in pantries with rolled down plastic bags and boxes of crackers closed up to maintain freshness yet that same principle doesn’t travel down to the pets. Why?!
How hard it is to get clips or jars or lids for cans? It’s not that hard. I know because I do it all the time.

I am often sorely tempted to open bags and boxes in cupboard and pantries when I see open pet food. “There, now your food is stale too. Watch out for spiders!”

Be good to yourself, be good to the animals in your care. Simple.

I can’t wait for Christmas because I can’t wait to give my 4 cats their gifts. I scoured the internet and my local independent pet stores to find perfect presents for each of them.
Since I never taught them to read, it’s safe to show off their gifts here.

Penny, our 3 1/2 year old yellow tabby with an enlarged heart, crafty brain, and protective nature is getting the Tower Tunnel.

I found this gem at The Cat Connection, a wonderful online cat store.

Raccoons come up to our patio and even though Penny is intrigued by them, she also hates them. Tiny little Penny will pound her paws on the glass trying to get them to back off. But the raccoons are brave and have much faith in double paned glass, so they ignore the feisty cat.

The Tower Tunnel is going right up against the sliding glass door in our dining room so she can sit either in the hole or on top and scratch and be mad all she wants.

Penny gets what Penny wants is the house rule.

Finnegan is our problem solving, cerebellar hypoplasia, brown tabby kitten. He’s the youngest in the house at 14 months old. He is very smart, very loving, and very, very playful. For Christmas, his first Christmas as a Judge kitty, he’s getting the Fling-ama-String Motorized Cat Toy; another find from The Cat Connection.

I tend to think that motorized cat toys are lame but the video for the Fling-ama-String sold me.
It’ll be set up on the doorknob of the coat closet downstairs so Finnegan, Annie, and Penny can all enjoy it. I just hope they let each other have a go at it.

Annie is another tabby (gray) and also 3 (but a month older than Penny) and has been with us since we lived in California. She picked Mike and they’ve been inseparable ever since.

Annie likes to climb, scratch, show off, and have fun. For her I selected Bootsie’s Combination Scratcher made by SmartCat. I love SmartCat, they really do make both clever and sturdy products.

Even though The Cat Connection carries it, I bought it at Mud Bay, my favorite local, independent pet store. (Might as well save on shipping where I can.)

I’ve had my eye on this scratcher for a few years now and have always wanted to buy it. It can be mounted on a wall (which I what I will do with it) and I can really see Annie hanging off it as she gets Mike’s attention.

The final kitty on my Christmas List is Oliver. Oliver was our first kitten together. Oliver came to us when he was 18 days old and he and I have a very special bond. He’s a gray/brown tabby, very large, and another 3 year old: younger than both Annie and Penny.

He’s actually quite hard to buy for because I wanted to get him something he could enjoy without adult supervision. He has a tenancy to eat things he shouldn’t so anything with parts small enough to fit in his large mouth just wouldn’t do.

Oliver is getting the Turbo Scratcher made by Bergen.

We already have a blue one and now Oliver is getting the green one (he lives apart from the other cats). I really like this toy because it gives cats a lot of movement.
They can stand on the scratcher and push the ball around the track or they can stay close to the ground and play the part of the hunter. It’s a great design and always piques the interest of my cats.

The reason I’m making a special point to give each feline a gift is because last year I didn’t get them anything. Mike and I had just bought our townhouse and we were given a great 6′tall tree by a client of mine who was moving to Japan. I felt that the new tree and excitement of a new home was gift enough.

Also, last Christmas was Stella’s one and only Christmas with us and that’s the one year I didn’t buy presents for my kiddos.
I’ll never make that mistake again.

I know better than to wrap all of these presents: the cats will just play in the wrapping paper and ignore the fancy new toys.

Bamboo Pet Products, makers of barely-memorable items (I remember the red and white, little else) have just designed the stupidest thing out there: Feed and Toss Cat Bowls.

What’s even more surprising than this gratuitous invention is that it was the 2007 AMPPA Award Winner. I’ve never heard of the AMPPA but it stands for the American Pet Products Manufacturers Association.
I tend to frown upon such organizations. The AAFCO is on my List as well. The Association of American Feed Control Officials are the idiots who think by-products and mystery meats are acceptable forms of nutrition.

But back to Bamboo: how wasteful! Is this designed for really, really lazy people or people who would rather buy plastic dish after plastic dish than spend a few honest dollars on ceramic, stoneware, or stainless steel dishes?

Plastic ends up on landfills; plastic is one of the worst materials out there and Bamboo thought it would brilliant to add more of it to the world?
What the hell were they thinking?!

Stella’s last full day was Tuesday, September 11. About 45 minutes into September 12 she died in my arms while Mike and I were heading north on the 405 to get her to the emergency animal hospital.
We drove past some late night construction and the work lights lit up the car, that’s when I saw her.

It was horrible. It wasn’t a quiet or painless death, it was horrible. I have many regrets (which I think is to be expected) and one of them is that we didn’t get her to the hospital in time.

That’s why pets are euthanized right? So they don’t feel pain?

Her death floored me. I suppose I always knew the day would come but the pain of losing her still haunts me.

Stella had a heart murmur like our other kitty Penny. It was believed that Stella’s murmur was low grade but earlier this year she started having attacks. I don’t know how else to describe them except by saying they were like reverse seizures. She would lose control of her legs, her eyes would get glassy, and she became unresponsive. They were definitely scary.

I look at her picture all the time but I can’t really let myself think about her anymore. It’s like I’m standing at the edge of a very deep cliff. If I think about Stella I’ll fall in. I have no idea how long it will take me to pull myself out.

Thankfully I have 4 other kitty cats who need me and require my care and attention. If Stella was our only cat I don’t see how I could get out of bed every day.

There’s a good chance I’ll never recover from the loss of Stella; it was just so tragic. She was only a baby, a young and tiny 2 years old We had her for 16 months and she loved us unconditionally. Mike and I loved her right back.
Her favorite thing in the world was giving kitty kisses and being close to her people.
We were very lucky to have such an amazing little creature.

Pixel was the old gray cat Mike had when I met him. She was the first cat I ever lived with. What astounded me most of all about living with a cat was kitty litter. Those little pieces (which can be so sharp) were everywhere! All over the floors, even in the bed and her box was far from the bedroom. I forgot what litter-free carpet felt like after awhile.

And the dust! It was horrible. Every time I added new litter to her box I’d get hit with a mushroom cloud. Every time Pixel scratched, I’m sure she got a face full of it too.

Mike used Tidy Cats. I think it was the cheapest brand the grocery store carried. After Pixel passed away I vowed to never use Tidy Cats (or Jonny Cat again).

Oliver came into our lives when he was 18 days old, too young to use a litter box. But it was bound to happen and I needed an alternative.

I picked up a bag of Yesterday’s News (like Tidy Cats, it was made by God-awful Purina). I liked that it came from recycled paper and that the pieces were big.

It was perfect for kittens because it doesn’t clump and clumping litter is not safe for little baby kittens. (Everything a kitten is curious about goes in his mouth and clumping litter is not something a kitten should be digesting.)

Yesterday’s News was great litter, Oliver liked it and so did kitty number 2, Annie. I liked that the pellets were so big; it made it easy to clean up and they never traveled far from the box. My only concern was that it was from Purina, a company I did not want to support.

I tried Feline Pine for awhile but I just couldn’t get over the smell, a little too earthy for my taste. Though I did appreciate the large pellets.

To my delight I found Good Mews not long after. It was the same shape and texture as Yesterday’s News but it wasn’t put out by Purina. I was in Heaven. Until we adopted Penny. It was great for one, and even 2 cats, but not for three.

From Good Mews I switched to Healthy Pet’s Dust Free Fiber. I loved the way this litter smelled fresh from the bag. Like Good Mews it was non-clumping (which I didn’t mind) and the pieces were a good size so the kitties didn’t track it around the house.

But with the addition of Stella, our fourth cat, I knew it was time for a clumping litter.

I chose World’s Best Litter as a friend of mine raved about it years ago. It had an odd smell but it clumped very well. The tracking wasn’t too much of an issue and I loved that it was flushable and practically dust-free.

But then Oliver decided he liked it a little too much. When I would pour clean litter into the boxes, he would eat it. Since I couldn’t watch him all the time, I had to switch. Again.

Now I’m not a fan of adding deodorizers to my litter. If boxes are cleaned regularly (once or twice a day) they do not smell. I currently have 5 cats (Finnegan is the latest addition) and my 4 boxes don’t stink. That said, I bought the lavender scented litter from Vetbasis with the sole hope that Oliver wouldn’t eat it.

He didn’t, but I didn’t feel right about forcing strong scents upon the noses of my kitties. But like World’s Best, I did like the flushable and dust-free aspects.

The last litter I tried was made by Next Gen Pets, their Green Tea Leaves litter. I love this litter. I love it so much. When I open a new bag I love that it smells very faintly of Chinese restaurant green tea. It clumps softly, is flushable, and dust free.

Best of all, Oliver doesn’t eat it.

Completely delighted by the look of a nice looking litter box, I was sure I had found gold when I stumbled across Cats Rule. Great look, great name, I was sure the products would be great too.

How could they not? Look at them!

Simply gorgeous. I decided on a covered box for 3 reasons. (1) The box was going to go in our dining room (not formal, rarely sees food), (2) I really loved the cat face-shaped opening, and (3) I loved the color ’steel.’

As gung ho as I was, I was also hesitant. I read some horrible reviews on Target.com. Horrible! But, they were cute so I bought one anyway.

Since it was downstairs it was to be used by slinky Annie, short Penny, and giant Maine Coon-mix Oliver. The statement on Cats Rule read that the covered boxes easily support cats up to 26 pounds so I didn’t think Oliver would have any trouble at all.

This box was nothing but trouble. It came with a free filter disc to be placed in the disc holder at the back of the box plus a liner. I am not a fan of liners. Liners are plastic which is easily torn up by scratching kitties.

This liner had little adhesive strips so it wouldn’t move around in the box. Brilliant, I thought. In actuality since the liners didn’t wrap around the body of the box, litter kept getting kicked underneath it and un-sticking itself from the box. So little Penny, a ferocious digger, kept getting her sharp claws stuck on a bunched up liner.

But no big deal, liners can be removed. The trouble continues on though.

Oliver is a very large cat. He’s 12 pounds of muscle and fur. Not particularly gigantic, but he can hold his own. He didn’t fit in the box. His head and front legs would stick out when he went to the bathroom. He then had to walk all the way and back in, head first, to cover. That is too much work to do something simple like pee.

But that’s not the worst of it. The filter for the box is at the back, not the top like with traditional covered boxes. Oliver is a tall cat with long legs. He is also a boy. Sometimes he pees straight backwards. So not only would his pee hit the filter rendering the filter completely useless, but his pee would dribble out the back of the box onto the Cats Rule mat, which was porous. The mat, of course, was on carpet.

I was so very disappointed. And angry. But it was pricey and I didn’t want to just get rid it so I cleaned it out, added fresh litter, and put it in our walk-in closet for little Stella to use. Charlie’s Box works just fine for a small 6 pound cat.

I can’t possibly be the only person who’s suffered this aggravation. I should really do something about it.

Sadly, there’s a majority of cats with a drinking problem. The problem is, they simply don’t drink enough.

The weakest part of a cat is the kidneys. To help keep kidneys nice and healthy, a cat needs to keep hydrated.

Wet food really helps out in this area. Most wet foods are made up of over 70% water. A cat who switches from dry to wet will drink less because he’s getting more.

But wet food alone is not enough. It’s very important to keep fresh, clean water available at all times.

In my own home, we have 4 dishes and 4 fountains. Upstairs I keep a CatIt and a Drinkwell and downstairs is another Drinkwell and a Bubbler. The only fountains we don’t have is the Fresh Flow, Cat Fountain, and a Le Bistro (which is dumb).

To be fair, the PetMate Bubbler isn’t really used as a fountain. None of my 4 cats have ever taken a drink from it, but Oliver is fascinated by it. My husband and I call it Bubble TV because Oliver can watch it for a long time without looking away. Thankfully it was only $20 so I consider it a pricey toy.

I actually bought a Drinkwell back when we just had Annie and Oliver but I got rid of it when we moved from Los Angeles to Seattle because I thought it was a pain. Dust and hair was constantly dirtying it. I’ve learned this is just a part of fountain life.

Now I have one on both levels but have only ever seen Penny drink from the one downstairs. I like that it has a filter and is only sort of a pain to clean.

I used to have the FreshFlow as well but got rid of that one during an even earlier move. Pixel used it (may she rest in peace). This was years ago when I kept her food near her water. I know better now. I’ve actually thought of purchasing another one of these for the current kitties. I do like that it also has a filter.

The CatIt lives in the master bathroom for Stella to use as Stella lives in the master bedroom. (Her and Oliver are not compatible.) She really enjoys drinking from the dome and it’s adorable to watch. This one also has a filter plus an unusual design. It’s also quieter than the Bubbler and the Drinkwells.The mat it came with was useless though. I keep it outside Stella’s litter box. The little dish for food was lame too and I’ll get to why in a moment.

The one fountain I have never purchased (and never will) is the PetMate LeBistro. It’s just laziness. It doesn’t have a filter or even circulate water. It’s just stale water in a plastic tub. It encourages sloth, in my humble opinion. Boo and hiss to LeBistro and its dumb name.

My chief complaint with all of these designs is plastic. Plastic dishes can cause acne in cats. Cats should be eating and drinking from stainless steel, stoneware, or ceramic. Besides the health factor, non-plastic dishes look nicer.

The only waterer that isn’t entirely plastic is the Cat Fountain. I don’t have one because I don’t buy bottled water but I think it’s a clever idea.

Coming it at $7 it’s also the cheapest. Maybe I should order one. My suggestion here would be to place a new plastic bottle in it every other day. All plastic can harbor bacteria and no one wants to ingest bacteria.

Another way to encourage cats to drink their water is to keep it far from their food. Water absorbs smell and if a cat sniffs her water and it smells like food, she may just walk on.

The 4 water dishes around the house are far from the kitchen where the kitties eat. It can be annoying sometimes to gather all the dishes, rinse them with hot water, and refill them again with filtered water from a Brita pitcher we keep in the kitchen, but my cats (and all cats) deserve the best. And in this case the best means water that doesn’t have carpet fibers, fur, dust, and the occasional toy in it.

I’m a stickler for identification. I never knew I was until Oliver was big enough to wear a collar. In my quest to find a nice collar for him I was surprised by my choices: reflective, buckled, jeweled, bells, break away, etc. I had previously read that a break away collar is very important for cats. Should a cat get entangled in a tree, he can break away if his collar does.

I remember thinking reflective was crucial. The headlights of a car could pick up the reflective paw prints or even the lights of a flashlight. So I bought Oliver a reflective, break away collar. When Annie came into our lives, I got her one too. Then one for Penny and finally Stella.

All 4 of my cats are strictly indoor only, yet they wear collars. On these collars are 2 tags: their license with the county and another tag I had made which reads “PLEASE CALL” and my cell phone number.

I opted to for it to read “PLEASE CALL” instead of their names because I didn’t want to risk someone seeing how beautiful and friendly my cats are and decided to keep one for himself. It would be easier to bond with an animal by knowing his name. Paranoid? Maybe.

On top of wearing collars, my 4 are also microchipped. You can never be too careful. Should one of my cats get out (God forbid) and have their collar come off, I would hope that some caring stranger would take my dear lost cat to a shelter or vet where he or she would be scanned and I could be contacted.

The statistics are frightening. So few cats are returned to their owners. I think I know why.

Whenever I’m out driving or walking I always keep an eye out for cats. When I see one, I simply don’t know what to do. Questions keep swimming in my mind: Is this cat lost? Is that a stray? Does that cat have indoor and outdoor access? Was she dumped here when her family moved? Should I try to catch him? Should I borrow a humane trap from a shelter? What do I do?!

So many cats are allowed outside but so many cats are also lost. I’ve heard of cats escaping homes without meaning to, of cats falling from high rise apartment, of cats being allowed to explore outside without any identification.
What am I supposed to think when I see cats around the neighborhood?

I am in favor of indoor only cats. The only way I would ever allow mine outside is if I owned a house and installed the Purrfect Fence. And even then, they would only go outside if me or Mike was out there with them. But alas, we live in a townhouse and aren’t allowed such luxuries. Instead I keep the sliding glass door and windows open when the weather is nice, we have tall cat tress with good views, and a cat window seat in installed behind me in the office.

If there was a law to keep all cats indoors, I would be all for it. An outdoor cat’s life expectancy is less than 5 years while indoor cats can live up to twenty. Besides, it’s a scary world out there full of cruel people (including kids), mean dogs, territorial raccoons, antifreeze, poisonous flowers, and cars.

Cats are obligate carnivores. That simply means that they have to eat meat. Humans, on the other hand, are not. Neither are dogs.

I would never dream of subjecting my vegetarian feeding habits on my cats. Never. I’m horrified that companies with a vegan line of cat food even exist.

Dogs, though, are different. If I had a dog, he or she would eat this recipe I found in a 1976 cookbook called Laurel’s Kitchen.

The recipe for the Basic Doggie Dinner is:

* 2 tablespoons oil

* 1 cooked egg

* 2 cups cooked vegetables (blended unless very soft)

* 1 tablespoon nutritional yeast

* 1 cup milk

* bread ends and leftover cereal and beans

This will most likely be the only time I ever mention dogs.

Beth Adelman is a Certified Feline Behavior Consultant. She wrote these 10 tips (for pet sitters) and I really think they are worth passing on.

1. Talk to the Cat Face to Face

This may not seem like play, but one-on-one attention is very meaningful to the cat. This kind of nonphysical contact is especially important for cats who are reluctant to be touched, and is a way to reach out and build trust. It’s also a great way to start your visit with a cat who you are already friends with. Go to wherever the cat is and get down to her eye level, at a distance you would find comfortable for talking to a person. Look at her face and speak sweetly. It doesn’t matter what you say, as long as you speak softly and use the cat’s name often. Use your “cat voice” - cats prefer a soft, high-pitched voice. Your look should also be soft and not challenging - not a stare. Blink slowly, especially in response to the cat’s blinks. A blink is the cat’s way of saying, “I’m relaxed enough with you that I don’t have to keep constant watch.” When you blink back, you’re saying, ” Me too.” (If there’s more than one cat in the house, give each cat a few moments of this individual attention.)

2. Sing a Duet With the Cat

When she meows, do your best to respond with exactly the same sound. Keep echoing her as she moves from verse to verse. This is a great way to maintain contact with the cat as you go about other chores, such as scooping the litter box or preparing the meal.

3. Place a Small Treat in a Paper Cup and Put It On the Floor

Tossing a treat on the floor in front of the cat won’t do anything to stimulate her mind or her hunting instincts. Cats actually enjoy working for their food. The cat will have to either pull the treat out of the cup with her paw or knock over the cup. Either way, she’s thinking and working.

4. The Supper Olympics

Take the cat’s dry food, sit down on the floor, and toss a piece of kibble across the floor, one at a time, for the cat to chase and eat. It takes less time than you think to feed a cat a meal this way, and you have tapped into the cat’s hunting instincts and given her a good workout. If there are two cats, toss the food in opposite directions to avoid competition. You may also have to send the more dominant one farther down the hallway for each piece of food. (This is a tough game to play with just one person and more than two cats, and impossible to play with wet cat food.) Other events in the Supper Olympics include covering the food dish with a paper towel that the cat must drag off before eating (works with wet or dry), putting ping pong balls in the dish with dry food (different cats solve the problem in different ways), using a treat ball to feed dry food, sticking little bits of dry food between the coils of rope in a sisal scratching post, and feeding wet or dry food in several courses by placing it in a couple of small dishes that you set out in different rooms.

5. Put Something You Brought In From Outside On the Floor

Indoor cats crave novel experiences, and they read the outside world when they sniff something new. After sniffing may come some rubbing (scent marking), and the cat is also likely to sit on the object, if possible. These behaviors are part of the cat’s efforts to incorporate the novel object into her territory. If you crumple up a piece of junk mail, even better - you’re adding some auditory fun. Cats often locate their prey first by hearing it scurry through the grass, and the sound of crumpled paper on the floor is a good approximation that will stimulate the cat to chase and hunt. Often this can turn into a game of knock-hockey with the crumpled paper; you should definitely join in.

6. Open a Magazine or Newspaper On the Floor and Make a Cat Toy Dart Out From Under It, Then Back In

There is a temptation to move a toy towards a cat, but play should engage the cat’s prey drive and no prey animal in its right mind would approach a predator. Moving a toy under a sheet of paper is a lot like the way small prey animals dart in and out of grass, and the cat will definitely be intrigued, especially if the paper rustles a little. Don’t be discouraged if the cat doesn’t pounce; a big part of feline hunting play involves watching, waiting, and planning. As long as the cat is paying attention, she’s engaged. Make sure you let the cat catch the prey frequently.

7. Tie a Plastic Ring to a String and Pull It Under the Ottoman

The ring from the top of a milk or juice carton will do. As the prey moves and then disappears, the cat will try to stalk it and extract it from under the furniture. Keep the ring moving in and out of sight, because the constant challenge really stimulates prey drive. As with all simulated hunting games, make sure the cat has a lot of chances to catch the prey, and wind down the action rather than stopping abruptly. (Make sure you put this toy away in a secure place when you leave, because string and milk carton rings can both be dangerous if chewed or swallowed.)

8. Throw an Old Towel Over the Coffee Table

Watch how fast the cat gets under this “tent.” In fact, just being in the tent is exciting to a cat. But the game gets even better when you wiggle a cat toy under the edge of the towel (a feather works particularly well here) or ripple your fingers along it.

9. Hang Your Coat On the Back of a Chair

As with the towel over the coffee table, you’ve made the cat a tent. Cats like to hide behind something and then pop out at their prey. Hiding and waiting in a concealed position are hunting behaviors, comparable to crouching behind a rock or in a clump of tall grass and waiting to pounce.

10. Chase the Cat From Room to Room

Chasing is a form of kitten play that many cats continue to love as adults. Often they will solicit the game by standing at the end of a long hallway and looking back at you repeatedly as they take a few steps. Many cats also have specific rules about how the game of chase should be played and how far around the room or down the hall they should be chased. They will look back at you or verbally complain if you don’t follow the rules of the game. Two things to remember about chase: the cat’s tail should be up while she’s running as a sign that she’s enjoying the game (a lowered tail can mean she’s running because of fear). And while chase is great exercise (for both of you), the cat also needs a form of play that will engage her mind and her hunting instincts.