Little Kitty Cat TMI Moment

[silverthorne]

So lately, people in the cat comms I watch have had problems with their cats needing their anal glands expressed.

What I'm trying to figure out is why this seems like an epidemic of care gone wrong.
Because I've never had any of my cats need to get their anal glands expressed.

WTF? Is this more common than I thought? Did I just miss the signs on my own cats? (Although scooting and dingleberries are pretty hard to miss...and when my cats have had it, it was due to other things, like worms (ew) or having found and ingested one of my own Hairs of Doom, thereby making the wonderful 'poo on a string'...

So, guys, did you ever have to squeeze foul-smelling marking musk out of your own cats' arses?

Comments

[janewt.livejournal.com]

Oh, gawd, that. I think my family has only once had a cat that needed its anal glands dealt with; maybe some cats are more prone to it than others.

[silverthorne.livejournal.com]

Okay, so it's not as common as it seems, then. I was beginning to worry, because I've seen a lot of posts on it lately in the cat comms, and I was beginning to wonder if I was doing something wrong as a cat mom and somehow not noticing when it needed to be done. (Basically, it's been posted about enough that I was starting to wonder if this was some vital part of cat care I'd managed to miss in the 39 years of living with cats I have).

[janewt.livejournal.com]

Heck, now you're making me wonder too... Maybe everyone on the comms has started anxiously staring at their cats' bums?

[silverthorne.livejournal.com]

I'll be honest--I was starting to think I needed to have a good look at mine.

...And then I decided that surely, if it needed to be done, my cats would find a way to tell me that didn't involve feeling up their butts.

I do wonder though, if with the advent of all the 'natural' foods out there, if that didn't make a difference and made the problem more common. In the 70's, before the Science Diet and stuff was available to the public, our cats were fed the Purina foods...and then switched when Science Diet became available. And I'll be honest, my cats always seemed to have more stomach upset (and stinky poo) when I'd try to upgrade them to things like the Blue Buffalo and stuff that a lot of owners rave about now.

[kizery.livejournal.com]

I did, once with one cat. Though my kitten had a little bit of leakage a few days ago.

[silverthorne.livejournal.com]

I'll be honest--I've never seen leakage or anything from any of my cats. Heh. Guess I've just been very lucky.

[kizery.livejournal.com]

I'd never seen it just leak out like that before, either. He jumped off the bed and there was a brown stain. I'd also been eating chocolate ice cream... Thank god my bf works at a vet clinic and immediately knew what it was and that I didn't attempt to smell or taste it D:

[rebl1969.livejournal.com]

No.

[silverthorne.livejournal.com]

From what I've heard, we've both been extremely lucky then.

[rebl1969.livejournal.com]

My boys have particularly healthy butts! :)

[silverthorne.livejournal.com]

*ded* XD

[skywardprodigal.livejournal.com]

...I feel sorry for cats that don't have you for a cat mom. How's that?

[silverthorne.livejournal.com]

Oh, there's plenty of c=good cat moms. :)

I just thought it odd that the condition seems so common and yet my cats never had it.

Oh, BTW. *hugs* :)

[skywardprodigal.livejournal.com]

*hugs*

Um...I feel bad for cats that don't have cat moms that cat mom like you?

[silverthorne.livejournal.com]

:)

I just love the fuzzies.

...maybe a little too much. *g*

[leaveoutalltherest]

Here. http://www.dr-dan.com/analsac.htm

I only had to have it done with one cat, long ago, because he was on a purely REALLY soft food diet (...more runny than soft) so he wasn't able to do it naturally.

[silverthorne.livejournal.com]

Ah, okay. I must be doing good with the hard-to-soft food ratio, then. :)

Thanks, because it really was starting to make me wonder.

[leaveoutalltherest]

This is why I don't fall into that 'OMG! THE CHEAP FOODS ARE SO BAD OMG!' trap because it keeps me from having to stick my fingers in places I don't want too!

[silverthorne.livejournal.com]

Heh. I just stick with the Science Diet stuff, because I know it's good quality and isn't quite as obnoxiously priced as some of the others. I figure if the vets carry it (it's usually either the Hills stuff or the Purina stuff), it's got to be at least passable, and it's already been studied to death (unlike some of the other stuff on the market now, which is more 'claims' than science, if that makes sense).

[without-within.livejournal.com]

D: No and my cats would be on their own with that. I'll scoop their turds and that's where I draw the line. I worry about our pair having poo problems since apparently that's something Manx are known for.

[silverthorne.livejournal.com]

Yeah...Manx tend to have a week sphincter, IIRC, because of the way their tails/hind legs are configured, so sometimes it's hard for them to poo, right?

[paksenarrion2.livejournal.com]

I thankfully have never had to express a cat's anal glands.

Roarke-with his excessively fuzzy butt-sometimes gets a teeny piece of dried poo that sticks to his fur but a kleenex or piece of TP takes care of that.