cats, actually

I’ve been teaching Kitten Kindergarten classes for a few months and it’s been a super interesting process. Kitten behavior is so different from puppy behavior, so I had to play around with the class structure quite a bit to find something that works. Each class we work on socialization to new people, animals, stimuli and places, introduce a behavior to train, and walk the owners through cooperative care strategies.

https://www.dropbox.com/sh/s43ps2cywycvnpn/AABkSXkkzLddg9fcDTbWN3mca?dl=0

Turned out that someone in the family had brought lilies into the house and put them up high, thinking that the cat wouldn't get to them. Alas, even a lick of pollen from lilies causes fatal kidney damage in cats.

Said cat was not epileptic. Her kidneys were fried, so she lost her life at one year of age.

The Food and Drug Administration is warning the public to not feed dogs Raaw Energy dog food because samples have shown contamination with multiple pathogens that are dangerous to both people and pets. The FDA requested the company recall its implicated products, but the company has not done so. The implicated dog food has tested positive for one or more of the following bacteria: Listeria monocytogenes, Salmonella, E. coli O157 and Campylobacter jejuni.

Frozen dog food is contaminated with bacteria that can kill your dog if you feed it to them. And the company refuses to recall their product.

They don't use lot numbers, only manufacture dates. If you have any of these Raaw Energy products in your freezer, with these date codes, throw it out:

Do not feed your dog or cat human food tomorrow. No, not even a bit of your mashed potatoes. No, not even just a bit of turkey. No, not even the green bean casserole. All of these foods are traditionally prepared in such a way as to be unhealthy for your pets to eat due to the richness of the foods.

If you want them to have a treat, a small bit of plain boiled potato (no butter, no gravy, no cream/milk/cheese, no added salt, etc), some raw or lightly steamed plain green beans (again, no salt, butter, spices, etc), a small amount of plain boiled, skinless chicken breast (no salt, spices, etc) are options (allergies and other health factors permitting) that you can specifically prepare for your animal friends.

And if you have a counter surfer, they need to be locked up during meal time, prep, and clean up. If your pet gets into the trash then the trash goes out immediately to the bin outside. Do NOT give them corn cobs to chew on. Do NOT give them any bones, raw or cooked, from your meal.

A really big chunk of it is training. When the kittens were little, I started them in one room where there was really nothing they could damage, and then let them into new rooms one at a time under close supervision. You can see here Mayhem (then Jane) and her littermates going into the kitchen, with stuff blocking them from going into other areas.

While in the new spaces, I would carefully monitor and immediately correct if they were getting into something they weren't supposed to. The trick is to not put them in a position where they can break a rule and not get caught right away, and to give positive reinforcement when they interact with 'problem items' in a way that they're allowed to. Eventually the novelty of the space wears off and they learn what they are and aren't allowed to do, and generally they tend to stick to that. Obviously, you've already got your cat used to your house, so instead you could try moving a plant down into cat range, and monitoring them as they explore, and then putting the plant back out of reach when you're not going to be supervising any more, and then repeat until the cat doesn't seem interested in the plant any more.

A good chunk of the behavioral issues have with cats come from their cats being understiumlated and wanting stuff to do or attention. I'm by no means an expert, but when my cats were wanting to bite my plants all the time, I just got them wheatgrass to eat and play with and encouraged them to do that. If they're causing problems and you immediately give them lots of attention, even if it's negative attention, then they're going to learn to do that when they want your focus.

So just...give them attention when they seem to want it. And sometimes the problems are unintentional--cats aren't always as graceful as one might hope, and at a certain point it's easier to just clear a path where they want to go.

This is why I hate outdoor cats. Yes, they cause environmental damage. Yes, they’re going to be killed by cars or coyotes or assholes. But on a completely selfish level, I know that because of people’s normalization of outdoor cats if my indoor, microchipped cats ever got out there’s a good chance I’d never see them again. People see a loose dog running around and they assume it’s lost. They try to catch it or call the dog warden. People see a cat running around and they ignore it. Maybe they feed it for months and never even think that that cat might have someone out there worried sick.

yeah

You still there?

yeah

You still there?