This evening we noticed Dewey making “pee-posture” in a box, and Aaron scared him off. I put some new litter in his litter box in case that was what he wanted, and he ran in there and squatted and produced nothing. I was concerned, so I put him in a bathroom with a litter box all his own (to make sure any pee is his and not the other cats’) and it’s been a few hours and he still hasn’t peed. So, is this a “call now and damn the expense” question, a “call tomorrow on Labor Day Sunday” question, or a “call Tuesday and it’ll be okay” kind of question"?
Vet-now
Big emergency. BIG one.
IANAV, but my understanding is that anything involving kidney problems is a Very Serious Problem. I found a page describing urinary blockages in cats, and it sounds like you’ve got a “damn the expenses, call now” situation. Even if it’s not serious right now, it will become serious if you don’t do anything.
Yes, the big concern when a male cat isn’t urinating is that it might be a urethral blockage. If the urine backs up in their bladder then it can become a dangerous situation within hours, just like if a person wasn’t able to urinate all day.
Here’s some info on the condition:
http://www.veterinarypartner.com/Content.plx?P=A&A=1111
Call vet ASAP. “Take cat on Tuesday” is too late/risky.
Midnight on a holiday weekend - it’s like having a damned baby, I guess. (If I had gone when I first saw something wrong, I wouldn’t have the “post-midnight fee”, by the way. I wanted to give him a chance to go on his own. Go me.)
How urgently do you need some cat pee?
OMG :eek::eek::eek::eek::eek::eek:
PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE TAKE THAT CAT TO THE VET RIGHT AWAY!!!
Your cat will be in AGONY very soon and may die, and the longer you let it go, the worse it will get. Not to mention the more expensive it will get, if they catheterize the poor beast right away and give him medicine, he may recover. If not, he will die a horrible death at home, or will have to be euthanized at the vet’s whenever you get around to taking him.
Please, please take the poor animal to the veterinarian right away. Think how you would feel if you had to pee and noting would come out and your bladder exploded.
The sooner your cat is treated, the better its chances of surviving.
I had a lovable male cat many years ago. One day our neighbour called because my cat was laying on her lawn in obvious pain. I took him to the vet immediately, fearing he had been hit by a car, but it was a blocked urinary tract. His kidneys were too damaged by that time to recover and I had to decide to have him euthanized. Miserable day.
My brother and I were on a road trip and his friend, who was house-sitting his cats called and left a message that one of his cats was having trouble peeing. My brother took too long to decide to call the house-sitter back and have the cat taken for vet care and his cat suffered the same fate as mine.
Yep. Big emergency - go to an emergency vet NOW.
Cats always seem to pick the absolute most inconvenient time to get ill - I’ve had this very thing happen once on a holiday, the other on a Sunday. But it must be attended to immediately. This is actually a critically dangerous situation or at least one that can become so swiftly.
Best of luck.
Okay, it’s not a blockage and he is not in life-threatening danger. They don’t know what it is, maybe an infection or something, and if he doesn’t pee by tomorrow I am to take him back, but palpitation showed no urine in him at all. But he’s not at risk of shuffling off tonight, according to two vets.
Can you believe they didn’t charge me? Me either - I figured it didn’t matter what they actually did, the price was to have them there at ass thirty in the morning to begin with. Nice people.
Very good news. It’s possible they didn’t charge you as they didn’t need to treat the kitty. Maybe they waived the office fee as a reward for your prompt action.
Now the emergency is over-where’s the pics? 
Excellent :).
You want to see a picture of an empty litter box? 
He did pee a small pee overnight. He disdained the paper the vet had me leave in the box, though, so I don’t know what color it was. According to the vet there, if he makes no signs of distress and does leave clumps in the box, he can go to his normal vet on Tuesday, which is a relief.
Just a note: It’s good that the cat’s urinary tract was not blocked; but don’t let this stop you from seeking immediate help if the cat has similar trouble in the future. It wasn’t a blockage this time; next time it might be.
Kudos to you for rushing to the vet in the middle of the night!
Probably worth linking to Antigen’s thread in MPSIMS, if you hadn’t already seen it. Male cats got a shitty deal when Brahma was handing out urethras.
I’m avoiding that thread lately - makes me too worried.
Well, sure, Brahma gave all the good urethras to cows. If the cats knew what was good for them, they’d have asked Bast instead.
I once had a cat that died from a urethral blockage. My mother decided to wait “one more day” to take him to the vet but it was a day too late. 
As others have said, it’s definitely an emergency.