Kitty advice

[smilingcat]

Litter:

+1 with Eden. We use Wheat Scoop. Kittens may accidently injest the litter and with wheat scoop, it passes through their system. Clay litter does not. It can potentially become life threatening if they injest too much. For this reason alone, our rescue group recomment the Wheat scoop for kittens and wheatscoop or pine litter for adult cats.

Small amount of Wheat scoop does go down the drain when I wash and disinfect the litter box. The wheat litter decomposes and does not clog the pipe. Clay litter just turns into solid "brick" and clogs the pipe.

Also tried the pine litter but we prefer if the stuff would clump, not turn into dust.

We also do not like the smell of the clay litter with its perfume nor the clay dust it generates. And the clay dust is not good for the cat in the long run. Thinking of Silicosis (similar to black lung disease).

Water bottle:

my cats see that bottle coming out and they are gone under my bed in a nano-second. No need to squirt them anymore.

[Tuckervill]

I keep an old wooden stool around, unpainted, that sat around out on the porch for a long time and got weathered, just so the one cat can scratch it. He grew up scratching that stool and I don't want to take a chance on him scratching something else. I guess I could glue some sisal to the legs and he would love it that much more, but maybe not.

Karen

[badger]

spokewench: you have a 23 year old cat?!?! wow!! I thought I was doing pretty good with my 16 year old that still jumps around like a kitten.

The SPCA I volunteer at uses the pine pellets exclusively. For the price you really can't beat it.

Have any of you tried the Cat Dancer? It's just a stiff piece of wire with a couple of rolled up pieces of cardboard. My older one goes insane when I pull it out.

[Aggie_Ama]

We went to the shelter yesterday and home came a manx cat. She is a year old, vocal and sweet as pie! She is medium hair, white and brown tabby markings with a stumpy tail and seems like she will be huge. Oh and DH, she loves him and he spent all night petting "your cat". He likes her a lot, in spite of himself. The previous owner declawed her so I guess that settles the debate on indoor/outdoor and tearing up furniture. We are trying the pine all natural litter, hopefully with routine cleaning DH won't notice the box.

They called her "Telly" but she doesn't answer to it so we are letting her name herself. I had a manx growing up but was looking at kittens but this little girl said "look at me, I am your perfect friend". We tested her with some shelter dogs and she gets along. Heidi is smitten and kitty is tolerant of her new hyper friend. Pics to come.

[tulip]

Awesome! That sounds like the best solution to having an indoor cat-getting a cat that has already been declawed by someone else. Manx cats are neat.

[bmccasland]

Congratulations on the new addition to your family!

Just because she's declawed, it won't stop her from trying. I have a woven market bag that my one declawed kitty loves to try to "shred". I ought to try a sisal post for her.

Look forward to pictures of your new family member, with Heidi of course!

[BleeckerSt_Girl]

Amanda- sounds like you got really lucky!!! What a perfect cat for you guys!
She's one year old so some of the craziest kitten stage is over with but she's still very young and playful and adaptable....dog likes her, DH likes her...
...and best of all you can feel really good about adopting a shelter cat that needed a home. Now another homeless desperate kitty will get her spot at the shelter and a chance at finding a home.

[Andrea]

I'm glad I saw this post! We're thinking about adopting a cat soon. I've been looking on Petfinder and found these two at a local rescue group:

Parker
Tigger

Either of them sounds good since both ads mention that they get along with dogs & we've got two. The litter advice is interesting. I was wondering what would be best as far a cost/odor control/ease of use. Sounds like the natural stuff may be the way to go.

[Aggie_Ama]

I will have to try to snap pictures tonight, she is a cute little thing. We named her TORTILLA. Yes, it is weird. She looks like turtle ice cream (dark brown, light brown, mostly white) and I told my friend I might call her Tortuga. My friend said "you are naming her Tortilla?" I thought it was funny and so did DH so Tortilla is her name.

She is limping, they think it is from the injections they gave her at the shelter but just to be safe she is going to see our vet tomorrow. I hope it is nothing too bothersome for her.

She does have one really weird flaw I am hoping to break... When she is scared or nervous, she retreats to her litter box! We have one of those hooded ones and both nights she did it. Luckily it was post cleaning but I am going to look for a pet bed. I don't want her sleeping in her potty!

[Kathi]

She's not settled yet and still needs a secure place. When I got my cat I took cardboard boxes and made a cutout on one side for her to get into and turned them upside down. We have hardwood floors so I put lots of towels under them and some catnip. I put the boxes in every room she went into. Whenever she needed a secure place that's where she went. After a few months she abandoned the boxes.

I bought her a nice covered bed but no way would she use it. This winter I couldn't find her, typical kitty she was curled up in the bed. It only took 8 mos for her to discover it.