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Post by whollygoats on Aug 22, 2016 17:17:28 GMT
So. Cleo is a nipster. A catnip addict. This was confirmed yesterday when, in the process of culling the weeds from my basil pots, I pulled out a weed that looked a mite familiar. I threw in the pathway to be gathered and composted later and moved on. I happened back by that spot to find Cleo in full-out nip binge mode, rolling around on the ground in the weed I'd carelessly tossed to the ground. She ignored me.
Later, I threw the culled weed up on to the balcony, where I found her later, in binge again.
Murray seems entirely unaffected. Clueless, even. He gives it no mind whatsoever and seems to wonder at her behavior in its presence.
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Post by Mari on Aug 22, 2016 18:57:42 GMT
Hehehe, mine couldn't care less about catnip, but Oprah likes eating it. Dunno why.
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Post by Moose on Aug 31, 2016 0:15:10 GMT
One of mine loves the nip and one does not respond to it - I can't off the top of my head remember which is which. Apparently some people do not respond to LSD either. I've never grown it myself though..
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Post by whollygoats on Sept 17, 2016 18:23:24 GMT
My pair, gargoylating on the balcony handrail.
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Post by whollygoats on Sept 17, 2016 18:33:20 GMT
I just had to apply the flea & tick treatment to Murray. Boy, is he Mr. Suspicious. I was all, "Everything is just fine and dandy and boy, don't you look comfortable there, lounging in your tower?" He was properly appreciative of the attention he was getting. I kept it up while I fetched the treatment vial. With it in hand, I continued the petting. He was fine with that. When I turned away, ever so briefly, and snapped the top off the plastic vial, thereby irrevocably committing myself to applying that crap somewhere, and then turned back, Murray was down off the tower, on the floor, ambling toward the hallway. I threw my best melliforous tones to his retreat. He stopped on the landing three steps up to the upstairs and solicited more petting. That's when I applied the dreaded flea treatment to the back of his neck. I got the whole damned vial on, too. A first.
He was pissed at me for a day, and spent that night sleeping on the far edge of the bed, pouting.
Now, Cleo could not give a flying fig. She prances up when you have vial in hand, you apply it to the back of her neck, and then she just prances away. Oblivious.
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Post by whollygoats on Dec 1, 2016 19:13:43 GMT
Murray just celebrated his third birthday. He spent most of the day sleeping on the bed.
He has established his daily habits: Up, eat, and, after sister rousts the doorman, out in the morning. Back in to eat and then nap until midday. A quick outdoors trip midday and back to nap away the afternoon, in either bed or tower. Up at dusk to eat and go outdoors, back well after dark to romp with sister and hang with the hoomin minions. Snooze time alternating with romp time while minions recharge. EVERY transition should be accompanied with much adoration and massage therapy as possible by hoomin minions.
Remember what I told you about Cleo singing in the shower surround? Well, Murray, who is not really the conversant type, and whose voice is rather like a poor squeak toy, does like to engage in limited conversations with hoomins...in the stairwell. His squeaking is far more complicated and nuanced than Cleo's outright demands for service; he sounds like he is actually trying to master 'words'. Evidently, Murray is of the opinion that hoomins listen better in stairwells.
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Post by Mari on Dec 1, 2016 20:06:55 GMT
Time flies! My Tybbe also thinks the stairwell is the perfect place for his yammering. He generally does yowling really loudly well, cute noises aren't really in his vocab.
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Post by whollygoats on Dec 1, 2016 22:14:27 GMT
That's our Cleo. She's howling Abyssinian loud. Like Siamese. Stairwells don't do anything for her, but she loves to 'sing' in the tiled shower surround in the upstairs bath.
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Post by whollygoats on Mar 16, 2017 14:45:17 GMT
Heh...The vet was here yesterday and it was fraught with the usual crises.
Because of Murray's background, we found a vet that does housecalls, so we needn't go through the trauma of crating him to take to clinic. So, she comes to us (and she's our favorite former clinic vet). Still, because he is super suspicious of any interlopers and does not like to be held, much less manhandled for a vet exam, we have come to use drugs...a small dose of relaxant that is applied several hours before. That duty falls to me because he trusts me the most...still, it is always a challenge. I'd even given him an old syringe to play with a couple days beforehand, so he wouldn't be skeptical about a newly introduced tool at application time.
Any way, Murray was drugged and the visit went fine and they got weighed, examined and vaccinated in the upstairs bedroom (aka 'the lair') where they'd taken refuge. Cleo weighed out at 11 pounds, while Murray tipped the scales at 17.5 pounds.
The vet sez Murray should probably be about 14 pounds and Cleo about 10 pounds.
In scoping out the living situation, she encouraged continuing with the dual bowls in separate locations, as it would help with managing the feeding situation. Her first check was the food...and, as she suspected it was the highest caloric count she'd ever seen in a catfood (it's Buffalo Blue). Which probably goes a long way to explain why the fuzzwads were never interested in any other foods, wet or dry, once they'd established this as their preferred.
It has been provided on an 'always available' basis.
I haz fat cats.
Dey haz to dyette.
The vet sez: 1/4 cup special diet cat food per cat in the morning and another in the evening.
Hahahahahahahha....
I suspect that I am about to experience a blossoming of dramatic skills amongst my fuzzwads.
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Post by Kye on Mar 16, 2017 15:11:55 GMT
My cats have food available to them at all times, but they're not particularly fat. They do a lot of chasing around after each other and that keeps them in good shape I think. I give them grain free kibble and no table scraps or wet food. My big problem is clipping their nails. They hate it and will bite me after a nail or two. Not fun!
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Post by whollygoats on Mar 17, 2017 2:08:15 GMT
Hmmm...You probably don't feed your fuzzwads the high calorie Buffalo Blue catfood.
And, you probably don't have a self-indulgent bedlump like I do....Murray is never in a hurry; he is very deliberate and skeptical.
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Post by whollygoats on Mar 17, 2017 2:13:45 GMT
I just realized that the brunt of this will fall on the hapless felines during my absence from the scene.
Of this I am glad.
When I return home, I will not be tainted with the stench of the enforced austerity program.
I may even be greeted as a returning hero.
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Post by Mari on Mar 17, 2017 17:37:49 GMT
My cats chase each other a lot, but need strict monitoring of their food intake nevertheless. Plus, one of the three is food obsessed, so...
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Post by raspberrybullets on Mar 19, 2017 9:36:43 GMT
My Lily was over 8kg at one point. We tried putting her on a diet but it never seemed to work. Wasn't even like she ate particularly a lot. Then she finally lost weight when she got old and sick. It would make me so sad to see her looking so small when she used to be so lustrous and big.
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Post by whollygoats on Mar 19, 2017 15:08:01 GMT
Heh...Day One passed without trauma. We had waited until the formerly full bowls had emptied. I then rationed out the requisite amount per bowl. Murray ate most of his, leaving enough for a small snack later. Later was midday. By dinner time, he was snacking on Cleo's bowl. Cleo makes multiple trips to her bowl (and presumably his) throughout the day and doesn't eat the volume Murray does. This morning, Murray's bowl was spotlessly clean. He again picked up a small snack from her bowl before his morning constitutional. When they both came in, he got his morning ration, half of which he ate.
The new diet kibble has not yet been put in play.
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Post by whollygoats on Mar 20, 2017 1:33:44 GMT
The new kibble was blended in both bowls today.
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hexgoblinweb
Junior lady
Learn to take full responsibility for your own actions, life will respect you for it.
Posts: 106
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Post by hexgoblinweb on Mar 20, 2017 13:24:10 GMT
I have a kitten. Her name is Boo Sophia, long story about that. She is a 10-yr old long-haired American mixture. Of 7 in the litter, there were 2 girls, and one long-haired kitten. All of them are gone now except my baby. They became indoor/outdoor and none of them past their 3rd birthday. My little girl weighs probably a little more than 11 lbs by now. She is a loner who prefers to stay away from people and other animals, although she did have a friend in my sister's cockapoodle, who has passed away. Boo is a gray over white with beautiful gray/green eyes, one of which has a brownish flaw which makes her eyes even more beautiful. She and I have conversations on a daily/nightly basis with me talking and her "blurping". She very seldom will meow unless her desire is extreme. She is a good listener although I think she lets a lot of what I say go in one ear and out the other. Her food is dry kibbles which she nibbles at throughout the day and night.
WG, from your descriptions of Murray and Cleo I suspect Murray is your tuxedo cat and Cleo is the calm, mediating cat in your picture.
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Post by whollygoats on Mar 20, 2017 15:15:17 GMT
Murray is indeed the tuxedo. He's also a Manx with a stub tail and polydactl with 4, 5, 6 and 7 toes on various paws. "Mr. Big Mitts" is a nick.
Cleo is part Abyssinian and has all the traits we were warned about when we adopted. She is perpetually active when she is awake. She is rarely 'calm' in that she is insatiably curious and is always 'in to things', like the closed cabinets, or papers on the table. She loves to sort through pages of paper or crumple noise plastic. She is either physically active or curled up tight, asleep. She is demanding, usually about doors which need to be opened. We used to think her role was to keep Murray active....she leads almost all play. Lately, however, he has decided he wants to dominate, so there is more time spent apart, as she just applies the kick-face and clears out once he bullies.
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hexgoblinweb
Junior lady
Learn to take full responsibility for your own actions, life will respect you for it.
Posts: 106
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Post by hexgoblinweb on Mar 21, 2017 13:43:14 GMT
Cats truly are a world of entertainment.
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Post by Elis on Mar 21, 2017 23:56:41 GMT
One of the pupils I tutor at their home has a cute kitten. Still quite young and curious and absolutely adorable. I wouldn't want to have a cat myself, but that one is really cute.
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Post by tangent on Mar 22, 2017 0:38:45 GMT
I wouldn't want to have a cat myself, but that one is really cute. I'm sure the guinea pigs would agree with you
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Post by whollygoats on Mar 22, 2017 3:43:32 GMT
Yeah...Kittens are easy to fall for. That's how we got Murray. He was mostly ears, paws and big marigold yellow eyes.
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Deleted
Deleted Member
Posts: 0
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Post by Deleted on Mar 22, 2017 14:00:04 GMT
I wouldn't want to have a cat myself, but that one is really cute. I'm sure the guinea pigs would agree with you Pigs and cats can live happily together
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hexgoblinweb
Junior lady
Learn to take full responsibility for your own actions, life will respect you for it.
Posts: 106
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Post by hexgoblinweb on Mar 23, 2017 13:35:51 GMT
Animals of different species, usually those who are respective enemies, can live together peacefully. Wouldn't it be nice if people would learn from animals and stop thinking of themselves as being the intelligent creatures?
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Post by whollygoats on Mar 23, 2017 15:37:53 GMT
I had an adopted street cat, a stray that my wife and I adopted, which shared our house with a house bunny. They got along famously.
I suspect, though, that it was just as well that Simon, the cockatiel, had passed from the scene by then.
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Post by Mari on Apr 3, 2017 18:46:16 GMT
My sister had a cat, a dog and three rabbits. The oldest rabbit dominated them all...
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Post by whollygoats on Mar 3, 2018 16:03:04 GMT
No doubt. When I hear of such conglomerations, I often ask as to which is the dominant animal. Expect the unexpected.
Around here, the dynamics of the surrounding wider cat community has changed significantly recently and subsequently changed the home behavior of our two. I think I noted that Siddhartha (aka 'Sid'), the huge tuxedo Maine coon who lived in the duplex next door, took a shine to the new neutered pair that moved in next to him (my cats) and basically 'sponsored' them as his 'proteges'. They were in his territory and under his protection.
So, ever since Sid moved away, the whole outdoor scene is changing. I've seen new cats I've never seen before in the neighborhood. Sid has a near look-alike replacement in a longhair tuxedo I just noticed last week. It looks more Persian than Maine coon. I've seen him thrice now and today's sighting was accompanied by Murray pointedly claiming me in view of this new cat.
This explains to me why the behavior of Cleo and Murray has changed regarding transits to the outdoors. Cleo used to be the early and eager leader to go out (and back in, and back out, and then in and back out again), while Murray would go out, but he'd have to consider it, and maybe look out and sniff around before exiting. Cautious, y'know? Well, now Cleo is in no hurry and Murray seems eager (although still deliberate), as though he was getting out to meet a friend....
Today, I saw the 'friend'. I think Murray has a girlfriend (yes, he's neutered). Or, maybe it's a boyfriend, I dunno. It's not the big tuxedo Sid replacement, its a coal black Turkish Van (more svelte than Persians, with longer fur in tufted chops, breast and tail). The chasing (Murray chasing the interloper) was more play than threat and they exited the yard in a romp and he returned twenty minutes later. I do not suspect violent territoriality on Murray's part....He is a big wuss, Cleo kicks his face regularly. Swimmer says there is another Russian blue shorthair cruising the neighborhood, too.
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Post by whollygoats on Mar 7, 2018 16:57:06 GMT
Today is annual veterinarian visit day.
We have a vet who comes to the house to do annual check-ups and health checks. She has a nearby clinic with which she can get access to surgeries.
But.
Murray is Murray. Murray who does not allow us to pick him up and is innately deeply suspicious. Murray gets drugged each year for this event.
In the next ten minutes or so, we will initiate the "let's try to fool Murray into believing we want to play with his gums with this fun little plastic toy".
*sigh*
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Post by whollygoats on Mar 7, 2018 21:17:10 GMT
Well...I pissed off Murray with that. I had to hold him by the scruff of the neck and administer the med. I got most of it in, and by the time the vet arrived, he was managable.
He weighed in at 16 lbs., down 1.5 pound from last year. His goal weight is 13 lbs. His gums are a bit inflamed, but for no known reason. He had a nearly ingrown claw.
Cleo weighed in at 11 lbs., which the doc said was just great. I wasn't part of her exam.
The doctor is happy with the weight loss, but emphasizes that Murray needs to lose more, while Cleo needn't.
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Post by Moose on Mar 7, 2018 21:54:47 GMT
He sounds like a big cat .
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