Post Surgical Mother Cat in Trouble

The mother of the three bottle babes developed diarrhea the Sunday after surgery. This is the reason I had to find an option for her three kittens. I figured it might be stress. But this morning, she stood up and dribbled out a large glob of bloody something. I was not sure where that came from--rectum or vagina.

She stopped eating yesterday and drinking. I became extremely concerned, worried she had distemper but fairly sure it was not.

But what?

The FCCO tech thought colitis and advised I take her to a vet. I couldn't get in anywhere though and did not have the money to take her to the emergency clinic. A Brownsville woman asked if I had tape wormed her. She remembered getting some cats from a horrific Albany house saturated in urine and feces from cats and dogs and no cleaning. One dog pooped out pure blood. It was tapeworm caused.

So I tape wormed her this morning. Nothing. I was half frantic all day, trying to figure out what to do and finally resigned myself to the fact if it was something internal, a spay complication, there was nothing I could do and she would die. But if it was parasite caused or stress caused, well that I could help her with.

But this evening, I went in, to check on her, got her out of the carrier by lifting the top off and she went under the sink, where I had rigged a bed for her and immediately began to poop. But it was white poop. I thought "Oh no, her liver is not longer functioning." But then I looked closer. It was all worms she was pooping out, round and tape. She moved and pooped out more, than ran quickly to the litter box and pooped out still more.

Even though she is technically feral, I've been handling her and she wants to be clean and use the litter box.

I was relieved to see her problem is worms. That I can deal with. I took photos. Stop and quickly move to another website if your stomach be weak.

You can see both round and tapeworms in the photos if you know what you are looking for. Roundworms can kill cats and kittens. Only the mature worms in the gut die when you worm the cat. The larvae who migrate throughout the body, then "sense a vacancy" and move into the gut and mature. This takes about two weeks. In heavily infested cats, one must worm three times, two weeks apart. Tapeworms are gotten by ingesting an infected flea, most generally. They grow flat and long and are segmented. You usually only see segments stuck to a cats butt or the outside of the feces. They look like grains of rice.

Roundwormer is cheap. YOu can buy it in grocery store pet food sections or at feed stores. It is usually is sold under the generic names of either pyrantal pamoate or piperazine.

Back of neck treatment Revolution also kills roundworms.

Tapewormer is usually marketed as a pill containing the generic ingredient prazaquantal. Prazaquantal tastes horrible and can make the cat salivate terribly. It is sold by vet clinics and at feed stores. Vet clinics usually carry it under the brand name Droncit, a pill. You can get a pill called Drontal that besides containing tapewormer, also contains Strongid, a pyrantal pamoate roundwormer. You can also get a different tapewormer ingredient in a pill called Cestex. Or, you can pay out and get a back of neck treatment called Profender, that allegedly kills both tape and roundworms and is far easier than pilling a cat. Profender is available at most vet clinics.

I use dog chewable wormer tablets, but you need to know dosages to use those. I use the ones that contain equal amounts (114 mg) of prazaquantal and pyrantal. An adult cat dose (average cat size of 8 lbs) of prazaquantal (tapewormer) is 23 mg.

I often advise colony caretakers to worm their ferals. I tell them to tapeworm them once yearly and roundworm them twice, two weeks apart, twice yearly. You can mix these tapeworm pills, in tiny pieces, into cheese whiz, freeze it, and hide the bits in wet food (freezing it obscures its lousy taste if given while still frozen). This is effective especially if you deprive the cats of food for a day or at least of wet food. You separate the doses out for all the cats on small paper plates. Round wormer, often in liquid form, is easy to mix into wet food. This is very doable and really very cheap to do, also, and can make their lives so much better.