We have 2 cats - brother and sister. The female is healthy and , if anything, slightly over-weight. The male looks very skinny although he seems to get his fair share of the food we put down for both of them and the majority of scraps. Both cats are about 7 years old and are otherwise healthy - regularly de-wormed, flea treatments, injections etc. The problem is that the male goes through phases of "purging" almost daily - almost as if he were bulemic! We've felt round his stomach to see if he's in pain but can't find anything obviously wrong. We took him to the vet's last year when he became particularly bad and spent about 拢300 on tests only to be told that there was nothing wrong with him. I understand that eating grass to induce vomitting is natural, but surley not after every meal? Anybody got any ideas?
Answers:
Please keep a Cat Herk Diary! You will soon decipher the cause or related action for your male cat purging.
In your Cat Herk Diary keep record of Where the cat is fed, When your cat eats, What your cat eats, How much does the cat eat, What it does just before and just after eating, Who is around at cat feeding time, and When does the cat vomit!
After one week of the Cat Herk Diary you will soon see some strange connections. If you want to continue one more week of the Cat Herk Diary please do, to confirm your suspicions or to eliminate them.
THEN.. use your Cat Herk Diary to change one thing at a time or eliminate one item from the routine at a time until you find a diet/routine that your male cat finds less Herk inducing.
You may even find that you have to offer a leaf of spinach or some other veggie to your cats daily. (not a bad thing if you like to eat salad yourself) A veggie craving in your pet might be satisfyed with cooking a bag of baby carrots in a strong beef broth (2 beef bullion cubes to one cup water) and offering a baby carrot a day. watch out here, you might like them too.. lol.. but you can share with your pets. A change in cat food ingredients might be in order.. I have recently found that eliminating FISH from the cat diet helps in many ways.. (it Must be the mercury in the fish now).. a very good protein addition to try is a nice scrambled egg or chopped fried egg. Both cats will probably like this as it does make nice fur and doesn't everybody love nice fur.
NOW if you don't find Anything that might clue you into a change that helps your male cat.. Then I can only offer you this bit of observation...
YOUR CAT IS NUTZ from being neutered and trying to figure out what his equipment is for.. since he still has some male chemicals in the brain to be male, and has the instincts of a male cat, but lacks the operatives now. He is herking from frustration.
In a last straw attempt, before you want to have him euthanized, crosses your mind. Put a bit of REAL butter on the favorite licking spot on his paw Everyday. The female too or she will be jealous. It will give him something other than herking to look forward to. Keep the butter cold and only take a couple specks for Cat Entertainment. One stick of butter will last you a long time. an old tale of butter says that the fat in real butter helps move the fur balls along in the digestion. (Please don't try this on yourself, for your own frustrations, as cats will start following you) teehee Good Luck and Keep the Faith!
Cats like dogs, eat grass, it is a form of medicine, it help to settle their stomach.
most animals use this method to "clean" out their insides ..it is also a symptom that your cat has either an upset stomach or it has eaten something it should not have
Cats do this on purpose because their stomach is upset. Perhaps his stomach becomes upset because of the type of foods he eats. Maybe you should try a different brand of food and skip the scraps for him? Good luck.
it is actually trying to act like a dog.
Belly ache, it is classic, most domestic animals (dogs and cats) do this to help them vomit. Don't worry, it is their way of dealing with belly ache.
This is normal.
Cats use grass to the same way as we take medicine to cure some ill. Normally a cat will chew grass to clear the fur balls out of their systems. And also to clear the build of mucus hence why a cat vomits. Do you give your cat milk to drink if so change it over to water. Your cat will soon prefer water to milk.
Unless it is specially formulated cat milk in some cases cows milk can cause congestion and a cat will chew grass to clear this.
Nothing to worry about. The time to worry is when they don't do it.
it sounds to me that he has IBS (irritable bowel syndrom) my cat has it and i see it all the time at the animal hospital i work at. he needs to be put on a special food...you need to call your vet back and tell them that vomiting everyday is NOT normal, and you think he has IBS and want to try a prescription diet to see if it helps. and it will. the food will be expensive, but he'll start feeling better in about 3 weeks. and it's safe for your other cat to eat it too. good luck!!
Greetings. It could be a behaviour a Habit it's gotten into.
1.Try not feeding as much in portion size or as often.have a fasting day. 1meal not dry and later tinned food.this should cut down the times it acts this way if nothing else..
2. when you it's about to do it try distracting it with a clapping or clicking sound, or spray it with a little water, to deter it. Stop making the vomiting a habit it wants to continue.
Unfortunately Cats don't comply to retraining as easily as Dogs. But I hope this helps.
Ciao
I agree with Megan G. Try changing his food to something more organic. Call your vet and just ask - they can't charge you for advice.
It's normal for cats to eat grass and purge, but I don't think it's normal for them to do it as much as your little guy is. Just try changing his food, you can always switch back.
HI,
I WAS TOLD THIS WAS BECAUSE AN ANIMAL HAS A BAD STOMACH AND HELPS THEM TO BE ILL. MY DOG DOES IT TOO!
Cats don't eat grass for nutrients but to assist in regurgitation, usually to get rid of hair balls or small bones.
This is natural, and is particularly predominant in non house cats.
Owners are advised tio ensure that house cats should have grass made available for this purpose.
Google "WHY DO CATS EAT GRASS" for further information.
I'm not a cat person although I do like them. I'm sure I've heard that if they do this they're probably trying to bring up a hair-ball.
that's why cats do eat grass so they can vomit because if there stomach is hurting they know it will help it.
why is everybody telling you that cats do this like dogs??
I thought dogs do it to vomit but cats need the grass!!
I bought my cat the cat grass from the pet store during the winter because the grass has something in it that the cats need.
I would naturally think then that they should not be vomitting it up.
I am not a vet but I think the only natural thing for a cat to vomit is hairballs.
If this is something your cat has done though for the last 7 years I wouldn't worry. But.if this is a newly developed problem then maybe something is wrong.
I wish I could be more help but I think it's only dogs who eat the grass for vomitting!!!
Just like everyone had said, it's b/c they have an upset stomach. Have you ever heard of cat grass? It's grass for cats to eat. You can grow it inside your house or even use a small flower bed outside and grow it. You can train your cat to eat that instead of regular grass.
Eating grass is normal. Basically it's to do with hairballs. I always thought that it was just that grass makes them vomit, so when they need to cough up a hairball they eat a bit of grass to help them vomit it up. I have also read somewhere that there is something in the grass that actually helps break down the hairballs, but I don't know if that's true, as if it was surely they wouldn't have to vomit?
It is odd that he would be doing this after every meal though. If he is a long-haired cat? then I suppose he could have a lot of hairballs, but I wouldn't have thought it should be that severe. The cat I have now is an indoor cat so doesn't have access to grass, but sometimes she eats her food really quickly and vomits it right back up again!? I don't know if that's to do with hairballs, or if she's just made herself sick from eating too fast, but it doesn't seem to do her any harm.
If you haven't already tried these - there are malty snacks you can get (some in paste form - which can be a bit messy, and some in little crunchy snack form) that help break down hairballs (and incidentally cats go WILD for them - they must be very tasty!), so if the problem does stem from hairballs, I'd imagine if you use these your cat shouldn't have to resort to the vomiting option as much.
Another possibility is if the cat has dairy in his diet this can make him sick (although I'm sure the vet has been through all this with you anyway) APPARENTLY cats are lactose intolerant and it effects some worse than others. We had plenty of cats do just fine with cow's milk, but maybe your guy is particularly intolerant. I get the Whiskas cat milk for my cat now - it's a bit pricey, but they say it's better for them (they say dairy products can cause vomiting or diahorrea). Basically it's just milk with most of the lactose taken out - however they do that.
Failing that, I'm afraid it could actually be psychological - cats can be very weird creatures! I don't fully buy into all this, but they do say cat's can develop funny psychological problems. Maybe try feeding him on his own and make it more of a treat. Or even just change his eating pattern in some way so maybe it might break the cycle. Even if there doesn't seem to be any competition between the two for food, they can be quite possessive about their food, so maybe this is causing some weird reaction in your guy. I know this sounds like crazy talk, but it is worth a try if all else fails, cos it souns like it must be quite upsetting for this little guy to be vomiting all the time.
That's all I can think of - hope it's of some help.
get a new vet. you could try washing regularly instead of the dot flea treatments as they can cause barfing if they lick it. as can organ failure which is generally terminal but should not happen at 7 and should have been picked up if you had a blood panel run. daily barfing is not normal. eating grass daily could be if your cat just happens to like grass but with the weight issue with the barfing i think something is being missed. change vets and keep paying for tests until you figure it out.
when our dogs do this it means they have worms
take your cats to the vets to be weighed, and the correct dose of worming tablets given.
do not buy the cheap things from a store, they dont work, only use what the vets give you.
cleans the digestive tract settles their tummies 2. :)
If he goes through periods when he does this alot, could it be because he is loosing a lot of hair during that time? I think it's generally 1-2 times a year that cats loose a lot of hair because they are growing summer or winter coats. I think that especially if your cat has long or longish hair he could be loosing lots of hair and this is his way of dealing with this.
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