I’m worried about my kitty. Logan had bloodwork done earlier this week because of her starting on Bexacat. Her blood sugar was remarkably better after just three days on this med, but there were some other numbers the vet was a little concerned about. For now we are continuing the med and doing more blood work on Monday. Logan isn’t eating very well since she started the medication, so I’m a bit concerned about that. We will find out more on Monday or Tuesday.
Foster dog Skye is really a dream foster. This puppy is so good! She loves to go on walks, but can also calmly chill. She is content as long as she is by my side. She’s currently sleeping in her little pen right next to me.
Unfortunately, there is something about this dog that is totally freaking out my cats. The cats have not ventured far from the underneath of my bed since she got here. She hasn’t chased them or barked at them, but there is something about her that has them really shaken up. I was hoping that they would come around, but it has been several days with no change. I’m looking for a new foster for Skye, or I’ll have to take her back to the shelter tonight. Sunday, I’ll take her to an adoption event, hopefully her new forever family will be looking for her there.
The good news is that other than the cats, fostering has been a great experience. She’s been super easy to take care of, and even my husband is willing to try fostering again. My cats aren’t usually wary of dogs. My Dad’s dogs come over pretty regularly and they don’t care, so I’m hoping fostering might be more successful in the future.
With one very cuddled up Puck to welcome you back to the blog, here’s a quick update with a promise of more to follow. I have been terrible about posting and hope to get back to it on a more regular basis next year.
Cali is getting older. She’s 14 now and starting to have some kidney issues. We found out because she had a couple of back to back infections. The vet has prescribed some medication and a prescription diet. She HATES the prescription diet. The food is all low protein, so it is basically a bowl of rice. I’ve tried mixing in pumpkin, different baby food veggies, veggie broth, etc. She’s not having it. She’s losing weight and I’m not sure what to do about it. She seemed to like the Just Food for Dogs prescription kidney food at first, but she isn’t eating it very well anymore. I just ordered a bunch of Royal Canin renal health food, and she is eating that a little better. I’m nervous about her losing weight. A pound or two is a lot when your total body weight is only 11 pounds!
Logan the cat is also having kidney issues. She’s also on a prescription diet, but thankfully she is eating her food without issue. She is still having issues controlling her bladder, so she is still confined, but she is doing well and seems very content.
Bean is still just Bean. He’s happily keeping an eye on the Christmas tree for us.
I’ve had puppy fever really bad. I signed up to foster for a shelter thinking that it might help to ease my puppy wanting, but so far there haven’t really been any fosters available. There was one, but she was a very active adult dog, and without a fenced in yard I was worried about what it would be to take her in. I was told she wasn’t the easiest and maybe not the best choice for a first foster, and not wanting me first experience to be a super challenging one. I passed.
There was an adorable little dog on Facebook the other day that I came very close to applying for, but after ordering more prescription food for Cali, I decided maybe I should let the medical issues settle in a bit here before I actually do take on another dog.
Hector D. Byrd is doing great. She was pissed at me for a bit because we were doing some remodeling and we had to move her cage upstairs and out of the way for a few weeks. She’s back in her usual spot now and much happier. I’m happier too, I like having her near my work area.
Wishing everyone and their feathered, furred, scaled babies the very happiest of holidays! Hoping to be back more regularly next year!
Happy Hiking Dog! Cali may be little, but she loves hiking through the woods. I was so thankful the weather warmed up a bit last weekend and we got out for a nice hike. Now I just need to find time to give her a Spring haircut!
Before I talk about my new eufy pet fountain, an update on the Catlink boxes now that they are a regular part of my life. I LOVE THEM! They aren’t cheap, but they are worth every single penny we spent on them. Scooping litter boxes has become (mostly) a thing of the past. If I didn’t have a sick cat*, I wouldn’t be scooping boxes at all!
We have two Catlink boxes now, one upstairs in our laundry room, and one all the way downstairs under the staircase. I check the boxes once a day, honestly, sometimes every other day. I check to make sure there aren’t any clumps stuck to the top of the box, if there are, I just scrape it off with a litter scoop, and push the button to run the clean cycle, so easy! Once every 5 days or so, I check the bottom compartment to make sure it isn’t too full. When it gets full, I remove the bag, close it up tight, throw it away, and add a new bag. The whole process takes less than 5 minutes. One of the Catlink boxes will tell me when the bottom is full, but I’ve found if I wait for it to tell me, it’s actually a bit over full. Easier to check it every few days and change as needed. All of the cats have adapted to the Catlink boxes. I will say that the “optional” step really isn’t optional. It makes a huge difference. Not only does it make the box much more accessible for the cats, but it also helps keep any litter mess in check. Speaking of litter, cheap, scoopable, clay litter is all I’m using, most often TidyCat. The Catlink needs a litter with a little weight. TidyCat is cheap and readily available.
The only negative about the automatic boxes, and I think this is true of Catlink or any of the other brands, is that they are large. I’m very lucky I was able to find space for them where they aren’t in the way.
One more word of advice on the Catlink box, for reliability, attach it to a UPS/battery back up unit. They don’t deal well with power flickers. We lose power a few times a year usually, and often before the power goes out, we get flickers. Unfortunately, the Catlink box doesn’t deal well with the flickers and it sometimes stops working. We were having to reset the box with every power flicker, but that problem has been solved by plugging the boxes into a battery backup.
Another product I’m super excited about is the eufy pet water fountain P940. I’ve been using this fountain for a couple of months now, enjoying the simplicity of it. It’s easy to clean, and easy to use.
The eufy fountain is super simple to put together. It’s got a water basin, a tube for the water fountain, a filter and filter base, a stainless steel drinking surface, and the fountain spout.
Water Basin
Water FilterWater Filter in PositionFountain Unit and BaseFunctioning Fountain
It’s super simple to set up, just stack the pieces together and it’s good to go. The filter should definitely be rinsed before use so that there isn’t extra charcoal in the drinking water.
Assembled Unit on the Base
The tiny dot in the center of the white base is actually an LED light. If it’s red, the water level is too low and it’s time to refill. The water tank and everything on top of it easily lift off the base to refill. I pick it up, remove the spout, drinking tray, and filter tray, rinse everything and refill. Once a week, I do a more through wash of the whole thing before I refill it. With three cats and a small dog in the house, I am refilling every day, so I do wish the water storage was a bit bigger, but it works.
The unit plugs into an AC outlet, so there aren’t any batteries to worry about. For me this works out great, but if you don’t have an outlet near where you want to keep the fountain, it might be an issue.
Following are some visual from the box so you can see the setup diagrams:
And features:
Overall I’ve been really happy with this eufy fountain. I like that there is a stainless surface for the pets to drink from, so they aren’t drinking directly from plastic. I have had issues in the past with one of the cats breaking out on his face and chin, and the vet said it could be from a bacteria that gets into plastic surfaces, so now I only use metal food and water dishes. Refilling and cleaning are easy and quick. The filters are available to purchase on Amazon, or directly from the eufy website.
If there is one thing I would fix, I’d like a larger water capacity. Filling the fountain every day is fine, but it would be nice to have a large enough capacity to fill every other day. For most people, the capacity would probably be fine, but when we have four cats and the dog in the house, it takes more refilling than normal.
Martin is here visiting again, and he approves of the Catlink litter box and the eufy fountain! Anyone else use a pet fountain? What type do you use? What features are your favorites? Leave a comment and let me know or just say Hello!
————
*The reason I still have one litter box to scoop is that Logan, my old lady cat, is still living in her cat condo. She is lose for a few hours every day and uses the Catlink box, but she also has a regular box in her condo.
Remember the online dog training course I posted about? I was going to try it with Cali, see if maybe I could teach an old dog new tricks. Well, I failed. Not because the program was bad, or Cali was a problem. I was the problem.
I couldn’t seem to be consistent. I’d work with her a couple of times one day, and then get busy and not try again for a few days. I’m not totally giving up. I do think a refresher would be a good thing for Cali. I have some training treats by my desk and anytime I think of it, I ask her to come, sit, stay, watch me, down, etc. I’m also working on recall when I put her outside. It’s better than nothing, but it also made me realize that the biggest problem with dog training is most likely the human and not the dog.
It’s so much easier to be consistent with a new puppy. You are excited to have them, you are still learning the routines of dealing with the puppy, and we all know house breaking is pretty mandatory training.
For now, Cali is super happy chilling on our new patio couch and continuing her old, lazy routines, but I do want to keep trying to be a little more consistent with training reminders for her.
Just a reminder that with the Fourth of July holiday coming up to please be careful with your pets. Fireworks, cook outs, parties, can all be upsetting to pets. Keep an eye on them, make sure they don’t overheat, and make sure they are safely contained during fireworks time. Happy Independence Day!
May has been a super busy month around here. I’ve traveled to the other side of the country, and hit several different countries as well. Traveling always reminds me how small the world really is, and how similar people are. We all want the same things, happiness, comfort, and peace. We all love our families (and pets!)
I was away from my pets quite a bit in May. Thankfully I have great pet sitters for everyone, so even though I get very nervous leaving them, they are all happy and content. Everyone needs extra attention now that we are back home, especially the cats!
Hector gave me a scare this trip. I got a text from my sitter that she had tried to fly and landed badly. She was favoring one foot, and the sitter wasn’t sure what to do. I told him to leave her in her cage and keep an eye on her. I’d seen this happen before and she was fine after a short time and thankfully the same thing happened this time, but I was very happy to get home a couple of days later to check on her.
Cali loves to play dress up!
Going through my full mailbox when I got home, I found an email about a free 30 day perfect pet class. It’s by Zak George, a trainer I had watched before. I dug into it a little bit and it does seem to be totally free. It is affiliated with Pupford so there is some advertising to wade through, but it hasn’t been bad so far. Cali is 9 years old, definitely to a puppy, but she does have some annoying habits. I thought it might be fun to give it a try and share my results here. My goals would be simply to get Cali listening better. For example, she knows to come when call, but sometimes just ignores me, not a safe habit. She also barks, a lot, and if I could lessen that, it would make her a much nicer resident. If nothing else, a month of training will be a good refresher for both of us.
No one enjoys dealing with poop. It’s just part of life, and dog owners know it’s just something you have to deal with.
I’ve tried to teach Cali to poop in the woods, but apparently that’s just for bears, and she’s not into it. She likes a nice patch of grass, usually right in a path where we want to walk around in our yard.
So I scoop the poop, because poop happens. I’ve been using a connected scooper thing that I guess I should have taken a picture of, because I’m not finding pictures online. My old one was pretty beat up and dirty so I thought I’d spare everyone the pictures. It was just two wooden handles attached to a rake and a flat scoop. You separate the handles, use the rake to push the poop unto the flat part, then you can hold it closed with one hand and bring it to wherever you need to dump it.
I just bought this scooper set to try something a little different. I thought having two pieces might be a nice change, and I really like it. Instead of fighting to make sure the pieces line up properly to scoop like I used to have to do with the old one, now I just put down the little scoop part and use the rake to push the poop into the scoop and carry it off to be dumped.
Cali is little, so she doesn’t make giant poops. I’m not sure this little set would work all that well for a Great Dane, but for a little Morkie it works great. I can even pick up a couple of piles at once with it.
The surface is non-stick or lovely slick coating that rinses clean very easily. The rake part clips to the scoop part so they are easy to store together. Another bonus is that the scoop part has a flat bottom, so it sits nicely near the wall.
The unit went together easily. Each part was well marked and they just screw together. I saw some reviews that people said the parts kept coming unscrewed, but I’ve used mine about a dozen times now, and haven’t had any problems.
I can’t say that this new scooper has made me enjoy cleaning up the yard, but on a nice Spring day when the sun is out, it definitely isn’t the worst chore.
Spring is here, and for me that means extra pooper scooping so we can enjoy our yard. Time to upgrade my poop scooping equipment. Anyone have a system they love, let me know!
#With the colder weather, Logan and Puck have been snuggling more. Usually, Puck finds himself a cozy spot, and Logan works her way in. Bean is a solo guy, I don’t really find him snuggling with the other cats or Cali.
Puck was happily enjoying his cozy spot until Logan moved in.
Eventually, he figured out that she wasn’t leaving, and he went back to napping.
My new Sundays food for Cali shipped, so I’m still waiting on that. Looking forward to seeing how she likes it and sharing my thoughts on it. They have been sending me emails, and I’m intrigued about it being a dehydrated food, and having a “jerky-like” texture. I think Cali might really enjoy that. We’ll see!
Saw a Facebook post this weekend about a woman who was concerned her dog kept chasing and killing wildlife, chipmunks, bunnies, etc. Some people suggested muzzles. leashing, fencing, etc. I suggested a simple bell. It gives the wildlife a bit of a warning so they have a fair chance to get away. I always encourage people with outdoor cats to make sure they have bells on their collars as well. Why not give the chipmunks a chance?
If you are going to put a collar on your cat, indoor or outdoor, I highly recommend a break-a-way collar. I had a cat get stuck once, and it was scary. Thankfully, I was there to fix the problem right away. My indoor cats don’t wear collars anymore. They are microchipped, so on the off chance they were to escape, they have that for ID, but my cats are all pretty afraid of the great outdoors, and we are careful to keep an eye on our doors.
Cali got a haircut this weekend, well I cut her hair. I love how she looks when her hair is longer, but with her itchy skin, it just isn’t good for her. Clipping her short allows me to keep a close eye on her skin, and also makes it easier for her weekly baths. I find oatmeal shampoo baths really help with her itchiness. I’ll see how the winter goes. I like letting her hair get a bit longer when it gets cold.
The dragon is doing great. She seems to love her new terrarium set up and is making it her job to try and eat all the insects that are supposed to be keeping her tank clean. I’m guessing I’m going to be needing to add more bugs before they have a chance to reproduce! I did add some mealworms to the tank. We’ll see how they survive. It’s awesome to see how active she is nibbling plants, checking things out, digging, climbing, etc. I’m really happy for her.
Cali is not happy about her increased walk schedule and decreased treats, but she’s doing well. The lump is definitely just fat, so not a problem, just something to keep an eye on. She is slowly getting weaned off of Apoquel and doing well so far. I plan to take her in for another shot of Cytopoint at the end of the month, and we’ll see how it goes from there. Cali also had a bath and haircut last week, I miss her fuzz, but she seems happier to have some of that thick mess gone.
Hector is Hector. She is doing great. I was worried about her getting cold a couple of weeks ago when the house felt a little colder than normal. She usually hates having a cover on her cage, but with the cold, I wanted to insulate her a bit. She’s getting used to having her blankie on each night, and actually seems to like it. I just put a small fleece over the top 1/4 of her cage. It gives her some insulation, but doesn’t block her view. So far so good!
The kitties are all doing well. Logan’s blood work all came back within normal ranges, so she is scheduled to have her teeth cleaned and the broken tooth removed on Thursday. Bean is very excited about all the outside animal activity as the weather is warming up a little. He’s found a new spot to hang out and hunt.
The gliders are also doing well. I was getting a little bit worried about my little guy, Miney. He has been smaller than the others since I got them, but I started to worry that he might be losing a bit of weight. I reached out to a glider expert through a FaceBook group to get some advice. She recommended “Glider Crack” which is a high protein temporary diet to help add weight to a sick or needy glider. The problem is that my other three boys definitely don’t need extra food!
It has been a bit tricky getting him out alone, but I’ve been able to do it for the last few nights. I wait until it is close to the time I think they will wake up, about 9pm usually, and I disturb the pouch where they all sleep. I offer treats to the three other boys to encourage them to leave the pouch, and I make sure their food is all set up for them. Once I get the three big boys out of the way, I remove the pouch with Miney in it from the cage. I’ve been hand feeding him the special Glider Crack, and he loves it!
In case you were wondering what kind of deliciousness is in Glider Crack, it is canned chicken, avocado, scrambled egg, calcium supplement, and water, all blended together into a lovely green slime.
Miney seems to be doing well. Other than being a little thin, he seems totally fine and healthy. I’ve added more food bowls and separated things out more in the cage, so hopefully if he is getting chased from food, he will have a better chance to get at it now. I’ve hand fed him for the last 4 or 5 nights, so I plan to take a night off. I don’t want him to become totally dependent on hand feeding. I’ll offer him more Glider Crack tomorrow night, and obviously I’m keeping an eye on him.
With one very cuddled up Puck to welcome you back to the blog, here’s a quick update with a promise of more to follow. I have been terrible about posting and hope to get back to it on a more regular basis next year.
Remember the online dog training course I posted about? I was going to try it with Cali, see if maybe I could teach an old dog new tricks. Well, I failed. Not because the program was bad, or Cali was a problem. I was the problem.
With the colder weather, Logan and Puck have been snuggling more. Usually, Puck finds himself a cozy spot, and Logan works her way in. Bean is a solo guy, I don’t really find him snuggling with the other cats or Cali.
