I am a Mighty Bug Hunter!
My name is Cleo. I live in Grand Rapids, MI. I live inside the house with 3 other cats. My mom is a vet. She doesn’t let me outside because she says there are too many risks in our area between traffic and getting into fights with other cats in our neighborhood. I know I would win those fights but she doesn’t trust me! So, instead I like to hunt in our house for bugs. We have air conditioning, but we still get some mosquitoes, moths, and other flying toys in the house periodically. Sometimes the mosquitoes bite me, but I don’t care. I keep hoping we get a bat in the house so I can catch a big flying toy- my mom says she sees that several times a year in her patients.
My favorites though are the bugs that crawl on the ground. Spiders, sow bugs, the occasional cricket and other creepy crawlies give me hours of entertainment. After I catch them and play with them for a while, I like to eat them. (I even caught a mouse last year and left the best part (the head) for my mom. She wasn’t too thrilled. Sometimes I get no appreciation for all my efforts. Sigh.
Most of the time my mom never even sees what I am hunting as I find the basement and other out of the way spots are the best places to find my prey. When she sees me playing with what I catch, my mom usually takes them away from me before I eat them. She says I can get parasites and other infections from them. I am not sure what parasites are, but mom says they can make me sick. Those parasites are why she keeps me on a monthly parasite medication year around, and keeps my vaccines up to date even though I don’t go outside. She says I can even get some parasites from walking through dirt or digging in potting soil and then washing my feet afterward. This is what she says I can get from:
- Mosquitoes- heartworms
- Fleas- tapeworms, Bartonella infection (cat scratch fever)
- Mice and other rodents such as voles, rats: tapeworms, roundworms, lung flukes, and toxoplasmosis
- Earthworms- roundworms
- Cockroaches- roundworms
- Snails and slugs- lungworms
- Crayfish- lung flukes
- Ticks- Bob cat fever (Cytauxzoon felis), Ehrlichia, Lyme disease
- Dirt and potting soil- roundworms, hookworms
- Outdoor water- Giardia
- Bats- rabies
I figure I am not going to worry about those things because my mom does the worrying for me and keeps me protected with the monthly parasite preventative and my yearly vaccines. Bugs of the world be very afraid- Cleo the bug hunter is on the prowl!
Help me, There’s a Ringing in my Ears!
A recent report out of Georgia where participants hooked up cameras around the necks of 60 cats and permitted them to roam showed that 44% (around 27) of them hunted. Now this is not especially surprising since that’s normal cat behavior, and we know that even the best-intended families can have their felines occasionally take a “walk on the wild side.” But this report underscores that it’s even more important to keep your cat healthy! Besides the deadly rabies virus found across the US (including a rabid bat on my front steps…), there are other diseases and problems which your cat could bring home in addition to the creatures which included lizards, snakes and frogs (41% of the hunters’ prey), chipmunks and vols (25 %), insects and worms (20 %) and, less frequently, birds (which represented only 12 % of the prey of the hunting cats).
What can you do?
- Keep your cat’s indoor environment enriched with cat trees, perches, interactive toys and food puzzles.
- If you do allow your cat outdoors, ensure that it’s supervised on a harness and lead or in an enclosure.
- Make sure your cat has complete identification including a collar with ID tags (and a bell if you think it may warn prey) AND permanent ID in the form of a microchip. Think your cat won’t keep a collar on? Scientific reports show that most cats will.
- For the health of your pets and your family, make sure your cat is on year-round parasite prevention. Even if your cat NEVER escapes, pesky parasites like fleas and ticks and the diseases they transmit can hitch a ride indoors on (or inside) other pets, people or a variety of critters. Flies, worms and crickets could be the secret passageway for parasitic or other problems. And remember, over-the-counter topical medications do not treat or prevent heartworms, hookworms and roundworms, and the latter two can cause devastating human illness! Visit the Companion Animal Parasite Council for more information, including a map of parasite disease incidence.
- Celebrate Take Your Cat to the Veterinarian Week with Petfinders.com and tips from CAT Stanley of the CATalyst Council and call your veterinarian today to make an appointment for your cats! Your veterinarian will tell you what’s the best food for your cat (and how much!), what vaccinations are needed for your cat’s lifestyle, and tailor a parasite prevention program specific for your cat to help keep it -and your family- healthy and safe. And while your cat may not have ringing in its ears, ear infections are common as are other often unrecognized problems like dental disease, diabetes or kidney disease. By taking your cat to your veterinarian regularly for preventive health care, other conditions can be detected earlier to help with better outcomes.
If you need help finding a feline veterinarian in your area, visit the American Association of Feline Practitioners’ web site at www.catvets.com.
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