I let the pit bull out into the backyard yesterday afternoon. Unknown to either of us, The Great Enemy, a large white cat was patrolling the area. Further, the next-door dog was out too.
When I heard the excitement, I saw The Great Enemy dancing in a furball atop the dog’s nose as she was on her hind legs. All an all, a remarkable display of aerobatic skills rarely seen in seen in mammals.
I ran out there and the cat bounded into the next yard, where the other dog awaited. Fair to say The Great Enemy had a great story to tell when he got home.
So this morning, I pulled a cat fingernail out of the dog’s face. She is limping, but there are no breaks in the bone of her left front leg. She has a tough time with stairs.
I know she is injured of course, but since there are no Limping Pills, ought we to take her to the vet? Really, what could I expect the vet to do?
If there are bite wounds from a cat, then there is quite possibly an infection brewing. Cat teeth may not leave a large hole, but they can puncture deep and deposit all that bacteria from their mouth in the wound.
I got bit by a cat and by the next morning my hand was swollen and painful and I knew it was infected. Antibiotics were definitely necessary.
Bwah ha ha! My pit got nailed in the face by a neighbor cat just earlier this week. She pouted for hours over that one. Her nose got sliced up pretty good, too!
Main thing would be to clean the wounds and keep 'em clean. Cat scratches are worse than bites because they dig their paws in the litterbox or dirt to bury their poo. You want to clean out the wounds with peroxide or just a soapy wet cloth and just watch for signs of infection. If it’s healing well and not infected, then I see no need for a vet. By now, the bleeding has probably stopped, but if you couldn’t get it to – that’s a trip to the vet. If there’s redness or swelling around the wounds after a few days, off to the vet.
The limping I would watch for a few days. If it doesn’t get better… off to the vet.
I’d probably take a carefully watchful DIY first aid approach myself.
Cats are badasses. I’m surprised and impressed when I hear about a 10-pound cat whooping the ass of another animal easily 5 or 6 times its size.
Limping because of visible wounds or just limping? I guess my choice of vet or home treatment would depend on the number, depth and severity of cuts/scratches, which is hard to assess from verbal descriptions.
I don’t have a yard, and my dogs are never outside without a human supervising…but as a general principle, posters on my dog boards often recommend checking the yard in person before letting the dog(s) out. Tales of cat maulings, skunk encounters, back gates left ajar, broken glass, and so on are not uncommon.
On a macabre note, cat-killing appears to be an acquirable skill – one poster (who is very unhappy about it!) reports that her dog got clawed up pretty badly the first few times he caught cats that wandered into the yard, but eventually seemed to master the technique and has, over the years, caught and killed several strays without receiving any scratches at all. So I hope your dog doesn’t become a cat-killer.
In our case, we have a poorly-socialized cat we brought inside when the neighbor moved away and abandoned him, and my pit bull is attracted to the excitement when he runs through the house, but she stops hard and sits on her fanny staring in awe if he so much as raises one paw casually. So he appears to have made his point.
This particular cat has sent at least one human to the emergency room…and he has a Hitler mustache. Yeah, a Kitler.
But that’s nothing – one time my pit bull got her butt kicked by an ant. I was walking her at night and she started limping and picking up one foot. I picked her up and carried her to the streetlight to check her paw, expecting broken glass. Instead, it was a single ant biting her toe (maybe also stinging, I couldn’t see for sure). I set her back down and asked her “An ant?” She just looked up at me with her golden eyes.
A lot of dogs are kind of dumb about cats. A dog will chase a running cat, but if the cat stands it’s ground, the dog may just get curious and investigate. A dog’s nose is his chief investigatory tool, and a cat’s claw is her chief way of responding.
We have scrubbed her down with a variety of antiseptics and now, 24 hours after the battle, her limp is gone. The cat however is still AWOL and I hope is also recovering.
We used to have a Siamese cat who simply owned everything. We brought her into a house where a German shepherd dog already lived and she would block him from going down his own stairs. In subsequent years she terrorized a Saint Bernard and a Weimaraner. Another Saint she gave up on. The dog had such thick fur that the cat’s claws had no effect. Also she was an extremely placid dog, and when the cat would growl, hiss and spit, and generally attempt to be menacing, the dog just kind of sat there as if to say, “Yes? May I help you with something? Duhhh, guess not.”
Anyway, seconding the suggestion to watch the cat scratches very carefully for all the reasons cited.
