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Five money-saving tips to help your cat get all nine lives
By Pet Connection Staff
May 25, 2010
We all remember the days when “Good ol’ Doc Jones” fixed our cats’ health problems for next to nothing. But things have changed, and while veterinary care can cost more, it can also give our cats many additional years of healthy life. In this week’s Pet Connection newspaper feature, our Dr. Marty Becker and Gina Spadafori share five tips for saving money by focusing on preventing problems, starting with this one:
Costs for everything have gone up, and “Good ol’ Doc Jones” is paying more to keep the hospital doors open, even before you consider all the new options veterinarians can offer today. The good news: If you practice good preventive care with your cat — which should, of course, include neutering — you can really keep costs down. ,
Top strategy for doing so: Close the door on your cat’s wandering.
A lot of cat lovers hate hearing this. They’ve always let their cats roam, and they’re reluctant to change. A free-roaming cat seems easier to care for, especially if the outdoors serves as a litter box (a policy that’s never fair to or popular with the neighbors).
But the things that can happen to a free-roaming cat can really cost you at the veterinarian’s. Outdoor cats are at high risk for poisoning, infectious disease, accidents and attacks, all of which can mean misery for your pet and expensive veterinary costs for you. Tips on converting your cat to a happy indoor life can be found on The Ohio State University Veterinary Hospital’s Indoor Cat Initiative’s website.
The other four tips are here.
As if the homegrown variety wasn’t bad enough, Dr. Marty Becker and Mikkel Becker Shannon report on the rise of overseas puppy mills:
Is the troubled business of high-volume dog breeding being outsourced? A report on dvm360.com points to an increase in puppies shipped into the United States as one sign that overseas puppy mills are a growing concern. California attorney John Hoffman told the veterinary website that more French Bulldogs are imported into the United States than are bred here because artificial insemination and delivery by caesarean can be done more cheaply without the assistance of licensed veterinarians. Health certificates must be signed by a veterinarian for puppies to be shipped, but activists say documents can be forged and puppies are being shipped too young to get them in front of potential buyers at their most appealing age. The increase may be in part a response to crackdowns on domestic substandard breeding operations. Officials in California have also noted an increase in puppies smuggled in illegally. In addition to cruelty concerns, officials worry about potential health problems for pets, people and livestock that such imports present.
Want more? Read the entire Pet Connection for this week, or download it just as we send it to our client newspapers every week (PDF).
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I have cats (well, one cat left now) and I find that feeding them a high-quality diet, both dry and canned, and getting their teeth cleaned makes a big difference. My cat Madeleine is 15 but people look at her and think she’s a young cat, and she can still jump up on my bed, the sofa, etc.
As far as keeping cats inside: I know this always ignites a poop-storm. I keep my particular cats inside because I live in a condo and there is no where for them to go anyway! Back when I lived in a garden apartment, I had a problem with cat-hating dogs on the loose, and a neighbor who blamed ALL the neighbors and wrote nasty notes when she found cat poop in her garden. Now that latter is a legitimate concern, IMO. I don’t think it’s fair to the neighbors to expect cat poop in their yards, and it’s not fair to them for the cat owner to fob their own cat-box issues off onto the neighbors’ yards.
There are cats, though, that when let out just hang around, sleep under the bushes, and watch squirrels, and don’t get out or bother the neighbors at all. YMMV. I had an aunt who lived on a couple of acres and her cats could roam without encountering a single dog or straying onto a neighbor’s property - and her male cat lived to at least 20.
Comment by CatPrrson — May 25, 2010 @ 12:46 pm
Personally, I’m turning into one of those people who hate outdoor cats. My mom’s neighbor has outdoor cats, and apparently my mother’s indoor/outdoor carpeted porch is much nicer than theirs because they chose to sleep/shed/hairball on my mom’s. But I guess the cats feel badly about it because they will periodically leave her presents of half-dead mice to make up for their indiscretions. Or maybe it’s to thank her for the garden mulch litter box she provides?
Comment by Original Lori — May 25, 2010 @ 12:56 pm
I have to wonder, in cultures like Western Europe and the UK where the normal thing is to let your cats outside, do they run into this neighbor problem? Do they have differently designed neighborhoods, fewer cats, or just more complaisant neighbors?
Because, IMO, the neighbor thing is HUGE when it comes to the question of indoor/outdoor cats. It actually seems to contribute in some measure to the dislike of cats in general (if you don’t have a pet cat, and your exposure to cats is the neighbor’s tom who uses your garden as a litterbox, then you might be disposed to dislike the entire species).
Comment by CatPrrson — May 25, 2010 @ 2:13 pm
Indoor or indoor/outdoor depends so much on the specific circumstances that I totally disagree with any blanket statements about keeping cats inside.
I also find it somewhat surprising coming from a source that, quite rightly, is firmly against taking a doctrinaire position on neutering of dogs or almost anything else involving pets.
Perhaps it would be better to apply some creative thinking to solve the neighbor issue, which certainly a problem with SOME cats, rather than deciding that the answer is to consign ALL cats to life indoors.
Vets see the ones who get into trouble in some way, not the majority, I believe, who don’t, so I think their view is somewhat skewed.
And since I have impression that it has been demonstrated that feral cats live as long and are no more prone to disease than owned cats, I don’t see that as a legitimate reason to keep them permanently inside either.
At the very least,IMHO,cats should always have access to fresh, outdoor air and a place to lie in the sun that isn’t behind a window.
And the last I read about it, cat rescues in the UK largely require adopters to allow the cat outside since it is believed that keeping them inside is unnatural.
Comment by Susan Fox — May 25, 2010 @ 6:11 pm
Susan, in this case the suggestion in the context of saving money. And a cat who isn’t exposed to the dangers of being outside isn’t going to end up injured or ill after tangling with them.
That’s the entire scope here.
Comment by Gina Spadafori — May 26, 2010 @ 6:21 am