My nose is running and I am sneezing - is it a summer cold?

Dear George,
Can cats catch colds in the summertime? For the last two years I have developed some kind of strange "cold" symptoms in July. My Mom takes me to the vet and each time he gives my antibiotics. I hate going to the vet and I hate taking antibiotics.
Last year I had fever for about two days and my nose was running and I was sneezing a lot. This year it was just a runny nose. And in about a week or so everything was back to normal.
The only good thing about being sick is that I get pampered even more than usual (as you can see form my photo). But, if it was a cold, wouldn'tmy brother get sick too? Could it be allergies instead of a cold?
I usually go hunting in a ravine behind our house where my brother doesn't go. What do you think?
Love Minnie.

Dear Minnie,
I am not a feline veterinary expert but I have done some research for you on your symptoms. Without looking at your veterinary notes, I can only guess that your vet is treating you for an outbreak of cat flu, by giving you antibiotics to ward off secondary bacterial infections. These can be serious for cats who get cat flu. Take a look at www.fabcats.org for full details. This is generally labelled upper respiratory disease.
Regular vaccinations, which I assume you have had, should protect against the two kinds of 'flu, feline herpesvirus and feline parvovirus, but (like human flu vaccinations) cats can still get a milder form of the disease. Symptoms include sneezing and runny nose. Sometimes, cats have had 'flu in the past. Breeders may not reveal the fact they have had this disease and shelters may take in diseased kittens who then recover. The cats have apparently recovered. However, they are symptomless carriers but the symptoms may recurr if they are under stress. Tests for this are available.
However, cats can suffer allergies and the most common ones are flea allergies and food intolerance, which show themselves in an itchy skin. There is also something called feline allergic airway disease - these symptoms are coughing, wheezing and breathing difficulties. The only way this can be diagnosed is by eliminating the possibility of other disease, including cat 'flu. More tests, I am afraid. This is often labelled lower respiratory disease.
As well as the www.fabcats.org details, there is even more on this written by an expert on this, a vet called Danielle Gunn-Moore. You can find three long articles by her on a feline asthma website - www.felineasthma.org They need careful reading. The fact that your brother doesn't catch the symptoms from you suggests an allergy is at least a possibility. Maybe you are coming across something in the ravine which gives you an allergic reaction - but you can't assume this safely without the tests. This website will take you through the process.
All this is a rather bad news for you, Minnie. It all seems to involve much more contact with the vet and we cats hate all vets, even those like Danielle who love us. I always bite the vet, when I can get in a quick nip - just to make the point that what is going on is an assault on my personal freedom! Incidentally, there's a lot of controversy on how often we should be vaccinated - the UK and USA differ on this. What is important is that if your owner opts for less frequent vaccinations she should make sure she gets the right brand of vaccination - I am not sure if the three-year type is available in the UK.
Yours gloomily when I think of vets,
George.
PS. Do I detect a certain embonpoint around the tummy? Next week I will be discussing STS, or Saggy Tummy Syndrome in both humans and cats.

Rabbit and cat - is the rabbit safe?

Dear George,
My name is Tutu and I am a lop-eared human - no, sorry, a lop-eared house bunny! My stable mate is Frederico the Cat. You may have met him already. I am 10 years old and he is a young whipper-snapper.
My humans seem to be very fond of him but he is a little b.....! I wish I could train him but he won't listen to me or obey anybody. Look at him in the photo. He thinks he's some great movie director!
What can I do? Can I trade him in? What do you think?
Hugs
Tutu


Dear Tutu
You have a bit of a problem.... Or you might have. Kittens brought up with house rabbits probably think of them as family and are probably going to be safe with them. Probably. That's the rub.
My attitude to rabbits, the natural cattitude, is to stalk, pounce, grab and eat them. In that order. It is literally hard wired into my brain. There's a neuroscientist, Jaak Panksepp, who has revealed that when you stimulate the seek-and-reward area of the brain, rats sniff and forage around, cats stalk and pounce. It's just the most enjoyable thing in life for felines. It is what a cat does.
So, your human shouldn't leave you alone with Frederico - just in case. (Any more than a large dog should be left alone with a baby or a toddler). Yes, it is probably safe almost all the time. But again it's that probably and almost. If you suddenly scuttled away extra fast, seeing you running might set off Frederico's chase instinct.
I don't think you should trade him in. As long as your human is sensible and doesn't let you play unsupervised, you will be safe. She should make sure that you are always in your crate or den when she is out of the house. Of course, if you were a giant rabbit, you could probaby chase and harass Frederico. But a French lop, which I think you are, just isn't big enough to turn the tables.
Cats and house rabbits can live together but only if the humans never forget that the cat is the predator and the rabbit is its prey.
Love (and I would love you in a gastronomic kind of way)
George

The latest New York hairstyle - should cats shave?

Dear George,
Your blog is getting better that any fashion magazine. Better then "In Style" or "Vogue"! I like to think of myself as a fashionista ....always interested in the last fashion trend!
Blue hues, hats, nail covers, etc. Really impressive! How about hairstyle?
But..let me introduce myself! My name is Bondocella and I live in New York! And ...look at my picture....THAT'S hot & trendy in NY!
What do you think? I personally would love to be a little more of a "shaggy cat" but my human thinks that this is cool (or hot...whatever). What do you think? What is trendy in UK?
Bondocella

Dear Bondocella,
Your photograph without the fur took me by surprise. You look pretty good to me, Bondocella. I like the way that the beautiful fur round your face emerges from the shaved body - very very hot. Or rather, as we used to say, cool. Your human has been really thoughtful in making sure you don't suffer from heat stroke.
In the UK, where it is cold and wet most of the time, the only cats that need shaving are those who have neglected matted fur. So cats don't shave in this part of the world. Only humans shave. (You can see why. Their facial hair is so bristly and odd - neither proper whiskers nor proper fur.)
However, I do acknowledge that some cats need to shave, particularly if they are living in hot climates and have too much fur. Is it possible to have too much fur? I fear that in hot climates it is. Long fur, of the kind humans cannot grow for themselves, is extremely helpful for cats living in cold climates, but difficult for cats in hot places.
Once again, the fault lies with humans. If they had left our species alone, we would all have naturally adapted to whatever climate we live in. My ancestors in England might have grown slightly longer hair, while cats in Finland would be very furry indeed. New Yorks cats would be sleek and short haired.
Humans have stopped us breeding naturally and have invented all kinds of breeding programmes that result in long fur, snubby faces, weird coloured fur, strange ears, and even stumpy legs. Frankly, it is not right. Some of us now suffer serious health difficulties because of a limited gene pool.
It is moments like this that make me feel it was a mistake to domesticate humans. That we have domesticated monsters who now have too much influence in our lives. I mean, it isn't as if they have good pedigrees, is it? Celia is just a mongrel. There's no class there. So why should cats have to have pedigrees? I am happy to say that I don't. I wouldn't like to have so much hair that Celia had to shave me. On the other hand, I might look rather cool like you if she did.
Love
George.
PS. It's important not to let shaved or hairless animals to spend too much time in direct sunlight, according to a vet that works in Spain. They can be sunburned very easily.

Hats, cats, and bunnies - does my bun look good in this?

Dear George,
It's not just cats that can wear hats you know, whatever Harry Spotter may think (see a posting two weeks ago). With the help of my carer's husband, Mike, I have been trying to decide if a bowler (like Harry Spotter's) or a para red beret would suit me best. What do you think? Do I look really amazing in these? Or do I look sort of odd? Janet, my chief carer, finds it difficult to decide. I wonder, are the humans making fun of me with these images?
Yours Cautiously (in view of your past record with rabbits)
Harve. (http://harvey-diaryofaninspirationalbunny.blogspot.com)

Dear Harve,
I think that the bowler suits you best, as you are a rather British kind of rabbit, stiff upper lip, liking your daily routine, generally anxious to make sure your humans keep to the correct kind of behaviours at all times. Janet and Mike are almost like your butler and parlourmaid, to my mind. You accept their care with a very correct kind of upper class acceptance.
The red beret, on the other hand, is military verging on the savage. Better for tough cats like me, who are quite prepared to go in there and slaughter whatever wildlife we can. We go for the kill. Rabbits like you just don't do the carnivorous thing at all. So to my mind, it's a bowler for a bunny.
More on fashion for cats next week. I hear you are on Facebook....
My only anxiety is that humans will get above themselves and (instead of using Photoshop) start dressing up cats. We cats have dignity and style without any nonsense about wearing clothes like pathetic humans.
Love (oh yes, I love bunnies)
George
PS. Celia has signed the petition on my behalf against poisoning feral cats in Australia.

Scraaaatttching......Are nail coverings safe?

Dear George,

Here we are - Yuppie & Anji – two cute brothers! We are almost 1 year old and share a house in Atlanta with a funny human pet!

We found your blog as being very informative, especially on human training.

Too bad we can’t spend too much time in front of a computer as we get easily exhausted.

Our human pet refuses to act as our secretary! What can we do? How can we train her? We also go for fancy things like…. acrylic nails covers! See, we are at that critical age when we scratch everything and feel the urge to shred everything to pieces.

We think this is fun but our human disagree…so we compromise.

Are these nail covers a good thing? Definitely they are better then declawing, but are they safe? George, we really need some advice and especially…. tips on human training!

You are the expert!

Waiting

Yuppie & Anji.

Dear Yuppie and Anji,

We have to scratch. We scratch to condition our claws, but we also scratch to leave messages - to our selves, and to any cats who happen to be passing by. It's an emotional thing. Scratching marks our territories not just visually but also with scent - which only we can read. We scratch when we are stressed and we want to feel better.

We British cats don't understand how Americans can possibly declaw their cats. In the UK it is a banned operation and any vet who did it would be in trouble with our cruelty laws. We don't much use nail caps here in the UK either - probably because most of us cats have access to outdoors and can scratch the local tree trunks. I think nail covers are safe, but they are a bit of a bore for both cats and humans. However, they are much much kinder than declawing.

Go for the natural kind solution. Instruct your human that you need a proper stable scratching post in every room where you might want to scratch, not just in one room. It must be large enough to allow us to stretch while we scratch. Don't let her get rid of an old scratching post. The tattier and smellier a scratching post gets, the more we cats like it. There is a depth of scent which a mere human will never understand. (Humans have pathetic claws, really pathetic!).

Some of us cats prefer horizontal scratching posts, or slightly angled ones. The surface has to be just right for us. People studying feral cats have noticed that they scratch along the walkways of their territory - but only on certain trees, not on others. Some trees just don't have the right physical surface. Incidentally, some of us enjoy scratching those roughly textured plant containers bought at garden centres (weighted down by a bag of sand in the middle). Some enjoy a tree trunk placed indoors. Others like cardboard scratching pads. Get that human of yours to offer you several kinds of scratching materials and see which you prefer.

Personally I enjoy the creative side of scratching armchairs, wallpaper and the side of the bed (so useful for waking your human up when it is time for an early hours snack). Here is a photo of me in artistic action. But Celia has fought back in a way I consider thoroughly philistine. She buys double sided carpet tape (or Stickypaws) and places this on the side of the bed or on the furniture. It feels really awful and I stop scratching on the site for at least a month, sometimes three months at a time. I had plans to redecorate the whole house with frilled curtains, frilled soft furnishing and really nice catseye-level frilled wallpaper - and she put a stop to it.

Humans.... they don't get it do they? What a selfish species.

Love

George

There's a big Facebook group Claws 4 Paws. Join it to show you are against declawing.