My friend Mitzi (not her real name) genuinely loves animals. She’s devoted to a couple of big crazy rescue dogs, and she petsits for neighbors. However, she just had a sad incident with a kitten in her care.
The kitten is a new addition into a 2-cat house, separated in a room for now. Their human is not exactly Mr. Responsible: he’s gone for the long weekend with no contact info - not even a vet’s number. Mitzi comes to feed and water and feels sorry for the kitten being alone. She takes cat toys and strings them up from a ceiling. Kitten enjoys this. Mitzi figures things are fine and leaves the kitties till next day.
Next day Mitzi arrives again. The unsupervised kitten has gotten one front leg grievously entangled in the string; it is badly swollen. Mitzi can’t undo the string without causing the kitty horrible pain. A $500 emergency vet visit ensues, with anethesia, antibiotics, etc. Kitten will survive; leg may have to go.
Moral, I guess…We need to think ahead about the dangers that pets, especially small playful ones, can get into. Even when we give them something, or let them do something, because we care.
You always need to think and make sure you care in the right way.
And humans, leave your frakking number and your vet’s!
If you have a sewing or embroidery hobby, never leave length of thread lying around. Even worse is a thread on a needle.
Cats don’t just play with threads, they eat them. My vet had a furry patient who had eaten embroidery floss, and had it looped under her tongue. Sometimes a cat can eat thread or string without harm, if it goes through in a wad. Sometimes, going through long-ways, it can gravely injure the kitty. Many a cat will eat a thread, and find the needle when it’s too late to decide not to eat the thread.
That’s why if you let your cats play with string, you never let them do so unsupervised. We have those wands with the long strings, and the cats love them, but we don’t leave them alone with them. (Besides, it’s more fun for them if we make them chase the strings and such)
Although my sister used to amuse herself by tying a ribbon to Buffy’s tail and watching Buffy run around in circles. (She did NOT leave the cat alone with said ribbon)
One of my former cats became traumatized when I adopted a little kitten. He acted out in some strange ways, including cracking open a cassette, and eating the tape (this was pre-CDs). I couldn’t afford a vet back then, so I patiently cut off pieces of tape as it emerged from the other end.
Never underestimate the trouble a cat can get into . . . or the length of a cassette tape.
I’m sorry that happened to your friend, but I’m glad she didn’t arrive to find the kitten had strangled/hung itself on the toy. I’ve only just stopped tucking up all the pullcords on the miniblinds, and my youngest cat is… well, let’s just say he’s no longer a kitten.
I’ve had to be extra scrupulous with my girl cat who is a string fiend. I used to leave my bathrobe lying on the bed until I discovered she had eaten at least half of each thin ribbon used as the interior “modesty” ties on the garment.
Cats have a tendency to eat anything that resembles intestines. I have one cat who will literally tear out nylon threads from bedding. He once ate a 2 1/2 foot length of pull string from a cat food bag in seconds when my back was turned (years back when I was feeding my cats dry food). I have two other cats (brothers) who love, absolutely LOVE plastic shopping bags and would rather eat those instead of food.
The basic rule of thumb is to never leave anything around that a cat might ingest – this includes any and all cat play toys you may buy at the pet store.
No kidding! Is that related to the hunting and prey-eating process? I never imagined Rocco thought he was stalking a mouse intestine when he chases a piece of string.
Cats (at least all the ones I’ve ever had) seem to get triggered by the feel of an object in their mouth. They may chase after a string like it’s prey, but once they bite into something, a whole 'nother reaction seems to take place.
Yep, string and cats can be a bad combination. I had a incident with my oldest cat when she was a wee thing, she swallowed a short length of yarn (which she got god knows where, I don’t keep yarn around or use it for anything) and couldn’t get it to come up or go down… much vomiting of all the water she tried to drink ensued (of course on a day when I worked a 12-hour shift and wasn’t around to help her) and I was about to rush her to the vet - luckily I spied the end of the string coming out mid-puke, grabbed it and out it came.
It was like my cat and the darn foldout couch. OK the cat has like 500 places to hide, it can outside or inside or where it wants at will, but you unfold the couch and bam it runs an makes a nest under the part where it’s guaranteed to get injured if you don’t shoo it out before you fold it up first.
Twice now we have had Mr Cat to the vet for abdominal surgery to remove a wad of string/shoelaces/rubberbands/hairbands - at a cost that would cause lesser mortals to seriously consider felinicide.
The rule in our house is no shoes/strings/rubberbands/hairbands anywhere where Mr Cat can get to them.
Also, if you see string coming out of either end of a cat - DO NOT PULL! it may be wound up in the intestines and you don’t want to pull those out, m’kay? Immediately go to the vet - do not pass go, do not collect $200.
My amateur theory is that, as cats like to eat fiberous plant matter (grass) to aid in regurgitating furballs from their stomachs, they also eat stringy stuff for the same purpose.
