Hello, it's Anthony Chadwick from the webinarvet welcoming you to another one of our lunch and learns. Super pleased to have Kat entered you, I'm sure he's well known to many of you, we're gonna be talking about perfect beginnings, setting our our kitten parents up for success, and this has been kindly sponsored by Ever Clean Cat Litter, and I know that Cat's gonna speak a little bit about that during the presentation. Cat is a .
A great person to speak about cats because she's got the same name as them, which is always a good start. Er a a keen cat lover, a graduate of Bristol Vet School and has spent her entire career in first opinion practise. Her clinical interests include the senior pet, chronic pain management and dentistry, but her passion is and has always been communicating to clients and .
To help them to really understand their their pet's needs, and this is why she's also become a bit of a media star, a blogger, a social media influencer. Well known in the veterinary profession and the public space as a fierce advocate for both animals and her profession, and thank you for all that you do in that space. I've just spotted somebody coming in from Florida, it's early in the morning there.
If you are listening in from somewhere exotic like Southport, er, then put your, put where you're listening in from, anywhere in the country or or abroad, it's always nice to know where people are listening from. And of course any questions, put them into the question box, we've got somebody also Cat from Brisbane, so Chantal, good to see you in, but I'm gonna be quiet, I'm gonna mute myself, turn off the camera, and really looking forward to this talk, Kat, so over to you. Thank you very much Anthony, well thank you very much everyone for joining us.
What a wonderful international audience to have. So, er, yes, today we're going to be talking about giving our kittens the perfect start. Right, we're here to talk about looking after our kittens and giving our kittens and our kitten owners the best start.
Because we're really good at it with puppies, we're really good at it with the dogs, we see our puppies for their vaccinations, then we see them for their regular check-ins, for their weighing and their worming and their flea treatments. We are constantly communicating with our dog owners, but we're not doing that to the same extent I don't think with our kitten owners. And I think that we're possibly missing a trick here, first of all for helping our owners understand their kittens, but also for setting us up as a sort of trusted voice within that pet owner's life and within that kitten's life.
I think that, we all complain, don't we, that pet owners don't come to us, they come to the internet first if they've got any questions they ask on forums and other places, and I think that's, you know, to, to a certain extent that's completely reasonable, that's why. We all do when we've got an issue, but if we are more proactive with our relationship building and with our information to pet owners, we can start to establish ourselves as one of those trusted voices that they will come to directly, and it starts right from the start, so that's not just with cats, that's with, that's with absolutely everybody. And also we know that with cats, we do see them relatively regularly through the first year of their life, at the very least they're vaccinated, hopefully and neutered.
But then there is this massive drop off of cats coming to the vets, you know, they don't come for their annual vaccines as much as dogs, and there's this kind of like think, feeling that, you know, cats are independent, they look after themselves, they're very healthy when they're in their young years, all of which is true, but without regular vet check-ins, we don't know. And so I think we as a profession possibly are a little bit to blame for not helping pet owners. Cat owners understand why regular check-ins are so important and that's the other thing we can be doing in this early stages, particularly because so many of the very common health problems that we see in cats, obesity, stress related disease like cystitis, dental disease are related to aspects of their care, and if we can get that right, particularly their environment, we can, I think, have a hugely positive impact and by educating owners when their kittens are small as to what their cats actually need.
We can have this massive, massive impact, and I think we're not quite doing it as well as we can do. And of course the most important thing is that we understand our, we help our cat owners to understand their cats because cats are so different. They're not the same as humans and they're not the same as dogs.
Obviously dogs, we have this . Innate understanding between humans and dogs, we have evolved together over tens of thousands of years. What they like, we like, whereas cats are completely the opposite.
I often say to humans, to humans, owners, you know, to understand your cat, think about what you like. And then your cat will hate it. So do you like sitting down with friends to have a meal?
Your cat hates that. Do you like meeting up with friends you haven't seen for a while and chatting with them, your cat hates that. Do you like going for walks in new places that you've never seen before and exploring new territories?
Yep, your cat hates that. So I think that we need to have this kind of shift in, in what our cats want because we don't understand that, we are very different and that can be a problem. And I think there are a lot of cats out there that are coping with the environment that they are living in.
They're managing what they're being given, but are they thriving, and we want them to thrive. Here in the UK, I know we've got some international people watching, here in the UK for our cats to have outdoor access, free outdoor access, is really, really normal. And I think that there's a lot of cats that possibly aren't being provided with all the things and all the resources they really need inside, but because they have the outdoor access and therefore have choice and control over what they're doing, that means that their indoor life, they're managing their less than ideal indoor life because they have that outdoor access.
In other parts of the world, outdoor access for cats is a complete anathema. I understand that, you know, having spoken to colleagues in America, it's considered completely. Terrible to let cats out, so obviously if those cats are indoors it's even more important to educate our kitten owners on exactly what they should be, should be having because of that misunderstanding and those mismatched expectations, that's what causes problem, it causes conflict, resentment, stress when the cat is scratching.
Up the sofa, when it's weeing by the front door, when the cats that you've got because you wanted the cat to have a friend that aren't getting on, and there's low level stress happening in the house, all of those things cause resentment, and that's problem, you know, it damages that animal human bond, which is so important. And prevention would be so much better than a cure. And so I think this slide, we are gonna cover all of these various bits through this talk, but I do think it's just worth reminding ourselves and using these principles to bounce off the advice for our owners.
You know, cats are predatory animals, we're used to them. Being hunters, but they're also prey. That's why they need to feel secure, that's why they like to hide when they rest, that's why they are nervous if they are in a new environment, you know, they're independent and they don't like to share, you know, so this messaging about.
Cats and how many resources you need if you do have a multi-cat household is just so important, you know, we sit down to a meal with friends, so many cats are brought together because it's time for their wet food meal, maybe the biscuits are out and they can graze, but you know, no one's gonna, you know, everybody, no one's gonna leave wet food out or it's time to open a couple of packets and the cats are all there. But, and so from the human eyes they come and then they're enjoying it, but. Are they really?
Are they really enjoying it? They need to feel, they need to have choice, and they need to feel in control. So sometimes I, well, quite regularly, I describe cats to my owners as tiny little self-centered megalomaniacs.
They want to do what they want to do when they want to do it, and they don't want to have to change their minds. And again, in multi-cat households, that often is not happening. They have to change their minds, or they have to share, or they can't do what they want when they want to do it.
And it causes the cat an enormous amount of stress, but often because they are so sometimes undemonstrative, very often undemonstrative with that stress, the owners aren't aware. And unless we are actively telling them, how are they going to be aware, they have these strong hunting instincts which must be fulfilled. And again, in the UK.
With our cats having outdoor access, a lot of them do hunt, sometimes successfully and they bring it in to gift to us, which is delightful, but a lot of the time they're probably going through the hunting sequence of watching and stalking and pouncing without it being successful, but they're getting rid of that out of their system. There is some evidence to suggest that there's a paper came out a couple of years ago to show that if we played with cats. And let them express those hunting instincts, actually that reduced the predation of those cats or it appeared to, so.
They don't, obviously they don't hunt for food, very few domestic cats provided with food in the house are hunting to satiate hunger, they're hunting to satiate behaviour. And again, it's just a really important behaviour that we have to accept from our animals, but we can channel it and provide suitable resources. They're territorial, but they need that territory to feel secure, which I think is two different things.
And again, I often will have conversations with cat owners, particularly again in the UK we see, relatively frequent cat bite abscesses and fighting, so we need to help owners to understand that territory, how can we help them feel secure, how can we help them secure their territory, all of those things. And that territory doesn't need to be big, that's the other thing that sometimes I explain to owners, it's like, it, they don't always mind how big it is, they don't want a huge, necessarily huge acres to roam. They just need to feel safe because they are also prey.
And that is the point. And they're high frequency, low intensity interactions, interactors, which is, so they come, they brush your legs and they go off again, that's them saying, I love you, hi, I'm just off now, which can again be in conflict with what the human wants. They're tiny fluffy babies, we want to cuddle, we want to smoosh them.
But a lot of cats don't like that, and again it's that resentment that builds. Interestingly, in the UK recently we have just had pedigree cat ownership overtake domestic moggy cat ownership, and I wonder if one of the reasons is, is because a lot of our pedigree cats are bred and sort of selected for more affectionate. Interactive behaviour, which obviously people love, and on the back of that we are seeing more cats being kept indoors in the UK.
So again, we need, whereas previously I don't think we've been very proactive about advising on the ideal indoor environment for cats because so many of our cats are going out, so it's not as vital. I think now our conversations are going to really do need to change. And so talking of kittens and things, I think it is quite helpful obviously as this whole talk about kittens is to talk about the socialisation period of kittens.
But again, it's actually a lot earlier than dogs, so 2 to 7 weeks, but flexible up to 12, but most kittens are coming from the owners at coming to the owners at maybe 8 or 9 weeks if they are moggies or unprofessionally bred. For want of a better term, if they are from the General Council of Cat Fancy, so the cat equivalent of the Kennel Club, they generally are coming 12 weeks and fully vaccinated, so well out of their socialisation period, so it is a huge responsibility on the person who has bred these cats to socialise them to everything that they're going to need to see within the human, within a human life. And so hopefully some of the breeders, the more professional or the pedigree breeders are getting, are doing that.
But, and they, again, this talk is very UK centric, but so a lot of people, the, the girl cat's been let outside. She's come back, suddenly there's a litter of kittens in the sock drawer, you know, and we really are trying to discourage that, we're trying to get lots of neutering because there's far too many cats and, you know, that we've, we've not got enough homes for them. But that means that as a profession, we're not very proactive about giving information about socialising of kittens because it's kind of a bit of a difficult point, isn't it, because we don't want to be seen to be encouraging.
People to breed or educating people how to breed, but without that information out there, how are we going to help these kittens to be really good and sociable family animals? It, it's, I think it's, it's a bit of a dichotomy there and, and we have to walk a very fine line. At the back of this talk there are some links, and useful resources, and one of those is from the Cats Protection is a socialisation experience guide for kittens which, you can, you know, if you do come across people who have accidentally bred or they're on the phone like, wow, what do I do, this, this suddenly kitten's in the sock drawer, you can say, oh great, well I tell you what you need to do is you need to do all of this.
To set them up for success. And I think a lot of the time if they're being bred in a family home, there's probably some kids handling them, generally it all gets done by accident, but again, can we be more proactive with that advice? Because cats who are happy in human contact, with human contact and in, in human proximity and really happy with that, will be happier cats going forward.
Of course, the one time when the veterinary profession does get involved is when we hand rear, and I might be talking, I might be teaching some hand rearers here to suck eggs. But we all know what Andrea kittens are like when they're adults. They're nightmares sometimes because they're just too habituated to humans.
They're not intimidated by us, and they, and sometimes just awful to try to handle or do anything with because they don't have that inhibition that other cats do. But one of the theories is that actually what hand reared kittens really lack is, is to learn frustration, because when we're hand rearing them, we feed them on a strict schedule, every 2 hours for milk, every 3 hours, and then when they finally wean, you know, the food is available or we're feeding them on a, on our schedule. So they become very habituated to that and they're never made to wait, like mummy cat might be out hunting, she might not be back when you're hungry, or she might be tired or you've bitten her and so she's gonna kick you off, or you're gonna have to share with your sisters for some food, and so, One, if we can do something with the hand rears, then, you know, just varying that schedule, making them wait, ignoring the cries for a bit, so they get used to having to deal with frustration and they also need socialising, you know, so if you've got a single hand rear, having them have playtime with kittens or something, maybe adult cats, but again, that's kind of difficult because they're not that sociable, but if you are hand rearing, that is, and you aren't already doing that, which many of you may well be, it's, it's something to consider teaching them.
Somehow getting some frustration in their lives. So what about pre pre pre-kitten preparation? Wouldn't it be wonderful if owners came to us and asked our advice before they got a pet?
They never do. And that's with every pet, you know, the puppies, the rabbits, the kittens, they all just turn up on the, on the consulting room table for their vaccinations, and that's wonderful, at least we've had that degree of check in. But if we can pre-prepare people for responsible, responsible adoption, responsible purchase, getting themselves set up ready for this animal, there's a lot of things to buy, can we direct them to purchasing the good stuff rather than stuff that's less ideal, that would be amazing.
But what we're gonna have to be is we're gonna have to be proactive with these conversations, and this is. For kittens, but it's also for other animals, but I think we are much better at it with the dogs, you know, lots of clinics, whether it's taken up or not, offer pre-puppy consultations. How many of us are offering pre-kitten consultations, I don't think many.
But obviously there's, so we need to be proactive with reaching out to pet owners, and again I think this kind of principle will help us to be. Seen as, you know, a source of information and resource and approachable for questions and that trusted person within their, within their lives, because if we can direct them, even if it's a simple direction to some good advice on the internet, at least we're directing them away from the bad stuff. So it's things like obviously our social media, you know, that's where, where we're going to do most of our kind of spontaneous communication.
Pre-adoption consultations, wouldn't it be wonderful, we can have them on our website, we can offer them with our nursing teams, but you know whether they'll be taken up or not it's an entirely different story. Collaboration with local charities, you know, a lot of us do neutering and things for the local guys. Can we work together to create some sort of setting your kitten up for success programme, leaflets they could give, can they direct people to us, you know, pre-vaccines even.
You know, can we work with other stakeholders within this field, Obviously there's our websites with lots of advice, leaflets in clinics, some people still prefer a piece of paper, and there's preemptive conversations, you know, when they say to us, oh, I think my cat might be lonely on its own all day at home. I think I might get another kitten, rather than sort of nodding and smiling, we need to be like, you can, but did you know that cats are selectively social? If you're going to think about getting another one, here's the resources you need.
You know, if, if, if they come to us or happen to mention that in conversation, we need to be ready to be skilled and to be able to give them some information or direct them to resources. So social media is kind of my thing, so here's a list of ideas and resources that you can access. It is a little bit of do as I say, not as I do, because I spend so long doing things like this that my own clinic, I recently opened my own clinic, our social media is a little bit neglected.
But you know, I should try to inspire myself as well. So it's things like shopping lists, what do you need for a kitten? You need a scratching post and you need a cat carrier, and you need a food bowl and you need a litter tray, but there's good ones of those and bad ones of those.
So could you direct people to good ones, you know, here's your shopping list, this, not that. Don't buy this piddly little kitten scratching post because it'll grow out of it almost immediately and then turn its attention to your sofa. Buy a great big one straight away.
Did you know, did you know that cats are selectively social? Did you know that cats are natural hunters? Did you know that they are prey as well as predators?
You know, the perfect litter tray, the perfect cat carrier, the perfect, you know, give that information out to people. We're not selling them this stuff, they're gonna go buy it on their own, but they have no idea what they need or what they want to buy. You know, that cat carrier where you've got a, the, the million.
And little screws to get out before you can get the cat out, or a backpack, no good. Here's what we really want you to buy. You don't have to reinvent the wheel with this kind of thing.
The ICACA has got the most phenomenal amount of resources, loads of PDFs that you can share away on your pages. If you can think of anything, anything at all to do with cats and advice, they have done a PDF on it and they are very happy for you to share it. Same with the cat's protection, they slightly less extensive.
There is this amazing programme called Kitten Kindy, which is, I think it was a more, it started in Australia. Which is like a kitten socialisation programme, so like literally puppy classes for kittens, I've linked it, linked to it in the back. It basically talks a little, a lot about what I'm gonna talk about today, and you can base a lot of training or posts or things to talk about with owners.
Off the back of that and that was set up specifically for this kind of thing to try and set our cats up and our owners up for success in helping them understand each other, and the kitten Kiy programme was like getting them in for like classes, but you don't have to do that, you can, You know, do this, give this information away spontaneously, and of course Everclean, who are very kindly sponsoring today, they and I are working on a kitten project at the moment, later on in the year on both their channels and mine, there'll be some shareable videos focusing on lots of different bits about kittens and behaviour and socialisation and, and development, and so, you know, there's no need to invent the reinvent the wheel here. So how do we do it at our clinic, because this is something which actually we thought of when we set our clinic up a year ago is that we wanted to be able to focus on the kittens as well as the, as well as the puppies. And so we call this our kitten classes.
It's just, it's 1 to 1 appointments with the nurses like puppy checks, but it, it rhymed, you know, there was an alliteration there, so they're called classes. And this is how we do it, it has changed over the time because we were sort of, sort of. Thinking about getting them in every, on a monthly basis, but you realise there's not a lot of point.
They develop very quickly. The owners don't want to be coming, it is slightly more of a faff to get a cat to the vets. So we've scaled it back a bit, so we obviously, we see them for their first vaccine and health check.
Their second vaccines, they go to the nurses, and once the vets have dealt with their health, we talk about behaviour. The pre-neutering check. Their post-operative check, that's when we do weight gain, we do the 9 month kind of check-in, sort of halfway in between, so we're just making sure they're not getting too fat.
At some point or other we're going to discuss about letting them outside, how we can do that safely and well, what they still need to provide in the house, what they provide outside, and then the 6th check is their, is their first vaccination, and then we do have a 6 month, a free 6 month health check built in to our schemes if they want, if they want to come, so we really do try to keep that relationship going. And in addition to talking about behaviour and weights, we always demonstrate practical skills, tableting spot on, snail trimming, how to do a physical exam, all really, really important for that, setting them up for success for the rest of their lives, because we, it's no good us handing out the tablet. I mean we can feel all smug about handing out the tablets or, you know, giving the owner medication to give if they've no idea how to give it.
And so it's part of that sort of training the owner as well to do all of those kinds of things, because eventually at some point or other they're gonna have to care for their cat in that way. And what about the perfect kitten home, because that's the key. Where the cat lives, the most common source of stress for cats is, is often in their immediate environment, and if we can provide them with things that they need, we will have a much happier cat.
Hopefully a better human animal bond, and we may, well, we probably will go a cer a quite a significant way in preventing health problems. So cats and kittens need a three dimensional environment. They live their life in 3D.
They need to go up, they need to go down. They need resting places that they feel safe, again from that predator, but also prey. They, they want to rest, but they need to feel safe when they rest.
They need to observe their surroundings and seize what's going on, they want to watch their territory, they want to keep an eye out. They need those outlets to play that mimic that hunting sequence, that stalk, chase, pounds, catch, kill. Really, really important, and if we don't provide them with that resources, they'll go and find it themselves, and that might be our ankles, and that's no good.
They need to be able to scratch, scratching is not only for nail health, but also territory marking, that's why they'll often scratch it. You know, the bottom of the stairs where the door opens to the house or something like that, and also we need to give them suitable resources because that's a huge source of conflict, isn't it, if they scratch the brand new leather sofa. We've got that understanding of how they interact.
That food and drink, obviously we need to provide it, but how we provide it is as is as important as what we're providing, and of course they need good litter tray management. Even if they've got outdoor access, the ideal is that we're still providing them with a litter tray, but everybody wants the perfect toilet and our cats are no different. So first of all, food and drink, if you follow me on my pages at all, you'll know that nutrition is something that I really enjoy talking about and discussing and then, but like I say, in addition to what we feed, it's how we feed, and it's really how we feed that's really important for cats, and their nutrition and their hydration and their water intake.
Obviously we should always be recommending for our babies a complete and balanced diet for growth, you know, really trying to move away from. Home cooking, I don't think there's many people that home cook for cats, but we should be recommending those diets, cats are naturally neophobic, so they don't like new things, you know, they are independent creatures, they are responsible for themselves alone when they are adults and in the wild. No one's going to help them hunt, no one's going to bring back a kill and share it.
So what that means is if they get sick, there's nobody to look after them. So what cats. Cats know what they like, and they like what they know.
But if we can get them used to variety when they're young, they're going to be far more likely to accept variety when they are older. Now we might not need to particularly vary their diet when they're young, but if they develop a health problem as they get older, and we're gonna need to move them onto some sort of therapeutic diet or particular texture or flavour, if we have varied their diet when they're younger, they're going to be far more successful. We're going to be far more successful in getting them to eat the new food when they're older.
And that's not chopping and changing every meal, but I, and they should have gastrointestinal systems robust enough to manage with swapping, you know, if, if every time you change the cat's food, it develops diarrhoea, I think that's clinically I think that's a problem. But we should be trying to offer different flavours and particularly different textures. They get very texture focused, so we want pates and flakes and jelly and gravy, particularly for the wet foods.
So we have, they have that, what they, they understand that just because it's different doesn't mean it's dangerous, because that's the natural instinct of cats, and this is the time when we can really manipulate that to our favour in the long term. They're grazing eaters in the wild, a cat will hunt and potentially make 10 to 12, possibly even more kills a day, so they eat little and often. So we need to, mimic that.
In captivity and, and in pet homes, and if they will eat little and often that suits their metabolism, that can help them stay a healthy weight. I do find that the cats that are obese and we struggle often have disordered eating and often are gorgeous and they will just finish off a plate of food which for a cat actually is quite unnatural. So we need to, and the, the, the key to that is just leaving the kibble out, but of course sort of kibble is boring, it's boring in the bowl, so again, making them work for food, making, putting it in treat bowls, scattering it somewhere, using a puzzle feeder, or, you know, a slow feeding bowl or something just to make it a little bit more of an, an interesting workout, and again, sort of, giving them that mental stimulation, and I think we talk about, again, I talk.
So the puppy's a lot about slow feeder bowls and that kind of thing, but if, you know, I'm not very good at talking about that for cats, and you know, I think we should. Obviously food and water need to be very separate, I think a lot of us know that now. Naturally cats will not drink near to where they eat because in the wild it's likely that the prey have contaminated the water source where they catch them.
So, and that instinct is very ingrained, so we need those very separate, and again, you know, you get these two bowls, don't you, in the supermarket or wherever you're buying it, one for food, one for water, it's even got the picture on the packaging. Unless we tell owners not to do that, of course they're going to do that, and the cats are not going to maybe drink as much as they should. And hydration is very important for cats, our cats aren't wandering about chronically dehydrated if they're only being fed kibble, as the internet would have you believe.
But equally, we need to be, they're not big drinkers, they naturally have a very low thirst drive. If we don't provide water in a way that they would prefer it, they're going to drink even less. And that potentially might predispose them to health problems.
So again, it's, it's literally having just these proactive conversations. Or underwater fountain. Again, they're a bit Marmitey.
Some cats love them, some cats hate them, but moving water is quite a natural way for cats to drink. And again, if we offer kittens water, water fountains. They get used to it when they're young, it's going to stay part of their normal when they're older, and again, help with that hydration, particularly important if they develop things like kidney problems or bladder issues, the more they drink, the better.
And so if they're used to drinking like this, we're going to set ourselves up for success, which is the theme of this talk. Litter trays, obviously this talk is being sponsored by Everclean, who produce cat litter, so clearly we're going to talk about litter trays, but litter trays are a really important part of cats' lives, even if they don't go outdoors, even if they do go outdoors. You know, everybody needs a good toilet.
And again, I think until you talk to people about litter trays, they haven't really thought about a litter tray, or you just put a litter tray in the corner and you just get on with it. Or I've got 2 cats, so there's 2 litter trays over there, they've got 1 each, it's absolutely fine. But really, having good toilet facilities is really important, and so we need to be having these proactive conversations.
The litter trays need to be, in a quiet but accessible part of the house. It doesn't want to be miles away, but it doesn't want to be in a thoroughfare. You know, a lot, in.
Don't know what it's like abroad, but in er in the UK we've often got like a utility room that leads to the garden, or a boot room, so it's a, a bit of a in and out space, but it's at the back of the house, and that's where the litter tray is. That might be OK if it's a big enough space, but if it's a real thoroughfare, it might not be, you know, nobody wants to be sat on the toilet and then suddenly a door opens and somebody's walking past. And again it feeds into that prey, but also predator.
Often we will see litters, litter trays with roofs over the top, perfect for the humans, keep it all in one place, the litter doesn't go everywhere, it contains the smells. We like to be on a toilet with the door locked and feel private, but cats actually want to keep a bit of a lookout cos you're kind of vulnerable when you're pooing. If somebody jumps on you, you're not going to be able to get away easily.
So if you're, and particularly in multi-cat households, there's often a bit of bullying and guarding of litter trays and litter tray entrances. If you're trapped inside a litter tray. Probably not the best place you want to be.
And you probably maybe held on to your wee or your poo a little bit longer than you really should have done, you're kind of putting it off. So, you know, the ideal litter tray is large, so the cat can get comfortable and bury what they do. It is high sided, which is practical from the point of view.
If they want to stay half hidden, but not completely hidden, also keeps the litter in, which is helpful for the humans. It needs to have a low entrance, so it's easy to get into, particularly when they're young and when they're old. When they're adults and active, you can get these ones where they sort of have to really jump in, but ideally it would be an easy low entrance.
And obviously, if you, you need more than one tray, then there are cats. So you've got 2 cats, you need 3 trays, you've got 3 cats, you need 4 trays. Because of that choice.
If a cat wants to go to the toilet, and they walk to the toilet and there's another cat there, that cat has then got to wait. Or change its mind and not go to the toilet. And that is no good, that cat doesn't like that is a massive source of conflict and stress for cats.
And we, until we tell people that, they're not going to know. But of course the litter is also important. The perfect cat litter should ideally it mimic quite a natural substrate.
We all know where cats like to go in gardens if they're uncovered, it's sand pits. Or soil, sandpits particularly grim. So the perfect cat litter needs to be soft underfoot, comfortable to get settled on, nobody wants a spiky toilet.
It needs to be light and easy to move so they can bury what they're doing, because burying faecal. Matter and urine is really important. Again, they will use them to territory mark, but they will also want to hide a lot of the time where they are.
So being able to bury them to their satisfaction is very important. Should be dust free, you know, so they're not breathing in lots of dust particles, particularly important when they're young. They should be deep, so they can bury it properly.
Clumping is helpful from a human point of view, for hygiene and for easy cleaning, and also to be economical. If it doesn't clump and it goes miles, you're gonna be chucking away loads of litter tray, loads of litter all the time. And the cats like it because then they've got a neat little pile to bury, not a huge great big puddle.
And odour eliminating, you know, if we can keep the odours in, again, that human-animal bond, poo is kind of smelly and not terribly pleasant, we need to be providing litter trays, that's really important. But we want to ideally make that as acceptable to human noses as possible, so a litter that will trap the odours and keep them in. Again, it feeds the human need for cleanliness, and probably also to a certain extent the cat needs, but we can balance just because we have to give our cats everything that we, they need and want, doesn't mean that we can't look at what the humans would ideally want in that situation and provide for that as well.
We can balance our needs and sometimes they're aligned. And, oh, there are some graphics missing from this, but this is the, Elean cat litter. That is part of their new range.
They do litter for kittens, they do litter for senior cats, and they do litter, lots of variations for litter for adult cats as well. And there are genuine differences between them. They're dust, it's dust free, it's made from a natural clay, bentonite clay, and it's unscented.
Because I think particularly when they're young we don't want to be, upsetting little noses we want to make going to the toilet pleasant, easy, a good habit to establish. These are all really important things. Clumping because they go little and often because they're little people, little creatures, and the larger granules have been designed so it doesn't stick so much to their pores, so it, it, it doesn't, .
It, it does, they don't track it around, and it's not sitting there for them potentially to need to clean off themselves. If you look at the difference between the ordinary everclean and the normal Eclean, the, the litter, the clumps, the pieces in the kitten are larger. So definitely something to consider, but otherwise the principles of litter stay the same.
00, here they are. Oh, I didn't know they were going to do that. Oh, my apologies, anyway, so it's 99% dust free, it's made from a natural formula and it's unscented for small noses.
So the other thing that cats like to do is sleep, so we need to provide them with great places to do that. Again, it needs to be lots of variety, so they've got the choice, do I want to be on the sofa today, do I want to watch on the wall, where do I want to be? They need to be covered, they need to be raised, they need to be covered and raised.
Give them that choice, let them choose what they want. They like to observe, I think this is something which I'm not always very good at telling owners about, but it's really important, they want to watch their territory, that's why they sit on the window sill and watch the garden, which can be a source of stress if there's cats in the garden, and inside and out, you know, so they've got. Those observation posts, both in the home.
I love these ones that ratchet to the sucker to the windows. How cool is that? You know, and, and we've all got big, you know, well, most of us have got big windows and things that we can let the cats look out of, which is lovely, but also outside, I think we miss sometimes the outside, and if we can.
Because cats wander in the UK and we don't have control over where they wander and people do worry about that. I think there's something to be said for providing them things like observation posts within their gardens, if we're lucky enough to have a garden, because they're far more likely to stick around if the resources like that have been provided for them locally. And scratching, of course, very natural behaviour, marking behaviour for cats.
The scratching posts need to be large enough for them to put their full weight against and pull. So these little piddly ones that wobble, absolutely no point to them at all. You buy them as a kitten, the kitten might use them twice, and then think, oh, this scratching's good, but I don't like this anymore.
Here is the sofa, brilliant. So we want big ones, you know, and you say, I'm a vet and I'm about to save you money, don't spend money on that little one, go buy a big one and then you'll save money. And in, in areas where cats want to scratch again, it, because it's this marking behaviour, if there is the ability, if there is the ability for us to allow them to scratch at entrances and exits, maybe not like the front door, but possibly if the owners have got some patio doors out the back, you know, that's often a place for a cat treat anyway, isn't it?
So I think a lot of the time owners accidentally provide what cats need. But sometimes they don't, and that's when maybe we could move in and go, oh, you know, they're stress related behaviours, or have you thought about this or that. There's this really cool product that wraps around the sofa, which I love, and, you can, this fairly scratch by fairy way is something that you can spritz onto things that you want to scratch, so if you've got a cat that's scratching somewhere else, or if you want to train your kittens to scratch somewhere perfect, something like that.
But we need to reiterate, it's, it's, and I think once you understand it's a marking behaviour, it's a bit, you know, they have pheromone scent glands in their paws, they're physically marking it with scratch marks, but they're also scenting it. Once you say that to owners, it becomes much more understandable why cats are doing it, maybe where they are, and how can we manipulate that to help them to. You know, to help the cat do what it wants to do in a way that is, is acceptable to the humans.
Cat carriers, they always come with a cat carrier because they've bought the kitten and they've bought the cat carrier, and how many of those cat carriers are rubbish. Not as many as there used to be, but still so many, so many, and again we can. Give them this information, you know, it needs to be firm, these ones that kind of flop apart, you, you zip it and the whole thing, you unzip it and the whole thing collapses in on the cat, brilliant for storage for the owner because you can hang it up flat at home, rubbish for the cats because they don't feel safe, and then rubbish for the vets because you're trying to scrabble about while the cat's sitting in the back of this half collapsed cat carrier.
You know, I see why they're popular, but they're not ideal. We need the cat to be able to hide, and again, owners don't think about that. They think, oh well, he wants to see where he's going, isn't it wonderful?
He's looking out as I'm carrying along the street and sitting in the waiting room surrounded by dogs. Again, it's that, it's that difference between how cats think and how we think, so get one that they can hide in, they can still breathe, you know, I, I always love it when they come with a cardboard box with loads of holes in the side, I'm like this cardboard box is not airtight, but fine, if you want to have holes in the side of your cardboard box, fine. But you know, and a top that lifts off, easy examination, you know, you just lift it off, ta da, there's the cat, they stay in their safe space.
A comfy blanket that's been used at home, and ideally can it stay out in the home, these are the things which are so obvious when you think about it. I spoke to a lady on the phone just the other day, it was about an adult cat and she was coming in and she said, oh, I think she'd missed an appointment because she couldn't catch the cat, so it was an absolute nightmare. I've got to make sure that there's someone else in the house to help me catch him, to bring him.
And I was like, right, well it's Thursday now and you've booked your appointment on Monday. Get the cat carrier out, leave it out in the house, put it in her bed, cover it over, leave it out now, and she went, oh. That's so obvious, I'd never even thought of that, what a brilliant idea.
But unless we say these things out loud, unless we help our owners to understand, they don't know. This is my two cats, that's Ember and Henry, and they have, that's their cat carrier. Which is, it's really cute, it's sort of shaped like a caravan and it's got these open sides and it's got like a little viewing platform.
But it's been, it's made by a company that have specifically designed it to be attractive enough to stay out in the house. And it does stay out in the house. They're still not that keen when I zip them up in it, but at least it's not been dragged out of the shed with a couple of spiders along for the ride, as so many of them are.
And then obviously there's the feely way there to to spritz it in. Play, obviously kittens play, obviously they do, but that play has a purpose they're learning, and this is the time to learn healthy appropriate play behaviour. We don't play with hands, we play with toys, we don't leap up people's legs obviously they're going to, but you know, and training them not to, and, and that hunting sequence, search, stalk, chase, pounds, kill, eat.
It's so ingrained in them, so we want to discuss appropriate toys, fishing rods, treat balls, scrunched up bits of paper, cardboard boxes, it doesn't have to be expensive, and I think that . You know, going, telling owners, go out and buy 10 cheap little toys, don't buy one great big expensive one. Somewhere I've got this brilliant video.
And I didn't put it in the presentation because I just don't trust videos to play of my cats with this like little robot thing that's, it's spinning, it's got a little spinning feather on it, and they're just sat watching it. Looking at each other like what, what is this thing, and they're supposed to be catching it and they just, they were not interested at all, but give them a piece of scrunched up paper, entertains them for hours. And of course the one inappropriate toy that we need to tell people not to buy is a laser pointer, absolutely no laser pointers, terribly entertaining watching the cat go after the, go after the little red dot, incredibly frustrating, terrible for cats, gets them all aroused, nothing to grab, nothing to stalk, nothing to pounce on.
Dreadful, dreadful, but until we tell owners not to buy them. They will go and buy them, and then there's this evidence that if we play with them, if they have play, and little and often is the play, little and often is the key for so many things with cats, eating, playing, interaction, it's just 2 or 3 minutes and then they're done. And so, and if we can do that, then it'll reduce hunting behaviour if they're going outside or or it might, hopefully it will, but it's so for our indoor ones, we've got to give them that outlet, we've got to.
And indoors or outdoors, so like I said, in the UK outdoor access for our cats through the cat flap, come and go as you please, really normal, really, really normal, and. But they all have to stay indoors till they're 6 months old, really, we want them microchipped, we want them neutered, we want them big enough to look after themselves in the big wide world. There's a lot of people now that I think are choosing to keep cats as 100% indoors, maybe because they're pedigree, maybe because they live in a busy area, maybe because they just feel better like that, they love.
Their cats, people love their cats, they're desperate to look after them well, they're desperate to, they're part of the family, but I think whereas we've always had this focus on dogs for so much of our things, our medicine, our nutrition, our behaviour advice, you know, cats have always been the forgotten species, but there is a. Big and growing population of cat owners that are absolutely dedicated to their animals, and I think a lot of them are keeping them indoors because of that, so we need to be able to make sure that they have all these resources and understand how to keep a cat indoors, entertained and happy. It can be done, but it is harder work and I think probably our colleagues over the Atlantic and in Australia are probably better than us in the UK because it's so much more normal for you guys to keep cats in, indoors, .
Outdoor cats, should we be advising on cat proofs or cat friendly gardens? Again, this worry about them going, being roaming, well, can we provide everything they want in the garden? Can we provide them with observation points?
Can we provide them with things to watch? So, I'm no gardener. My husband will tell you, but you know, planting catnip or flowers that attract insects, so they can, and butterflies, so they can watch them and practise stalking those, we don't want them to hunt the birds, it makes me so sad, but is there a way that they can watch the birds in the trees, and, a good toileting area outside so they can feel secure.
But talking of toilets again with that security of going. Our outdoor cats probably should be still provided with litter trays, because a lot of cats do want to come in and poo in peace and quiet in the house where they feel safe, and I think that's quite reasonable. But I think that, you know, once we are letting them out and about, we probably think, oh, they don't need a litter tray anymore.
But actually, would the cat be very grateful to have a litter tray? I think a lot of them would, if the owners were to. Them and then that helps us to keep an eye on what they're doing, you know, we miss a lot, we may well be missing a lot of chronic diarrhoea, PUPD may be picked up on later, and obviously that's a long way away hopefully from our kittens, but it's establishing good habits now, which are gonna stand these owners in wonderful stead when they're older.
And every so often we need to catch a, we need to catch a urine sample, don't we, so if they're used to using a tray that makes that an awful lot easier. And finally, introductions to the resident cat, because often the kitten is the second purchase. I thought my cat needed a friend, so I got them a kitten.
And you're like, OK, well, it's probably easier to introduce a kitten to an adult cat than another adult cat, but again, it's this difference in focus for humans and cats. We love to have friends. Cats not so much.
So, what we want to be telling them right from the start is you want, if, aim for them to be housemates, chips in the night, living in the same space, but tolerating each other and not at the very least not getting annoyed by each other, . And I put there a couple, but sometimes couples are a bit like that. But you know, a couple that gets on.
If you can bond to unrelated cats, you have done a stellar job. If you get mutual grooming, sleeping curled up together, well done you. But that should not be what the aim, the aim should be comfortable housemates.
So, and again that's with those resources, providing lots, but those introductions, place the kitten in a room, scent swapping. Under supervision, the kitten's gonna make a beeline for the grown up cats to play with. Again, it's a bit like a puppy, that's great, we, we, you can play, but our job is to move in when it all gets a bit much, give the adult cat the ability to get away, you know, if they've got that nice resting place they can reach without the kitten, so they have, they're gonna be far more tolerant of a baby if they know that they can get away from them.
A bit like your children really, you need a break. You need a break every so often. It can be done, but again, if that kitten comes in and you know looking at the history that there are some adult cats, there really should be an active conversation happening about introductions and what they need now.
They are a multi-cat household. That is a really, really important conversation to have, because if we can, again, if we can just feed them that information before it becomes a problem, or. Even if it doesn't become a problem in their eyes, there's a lot of cats suffering in silence, I think, in less than ideal households where they're being forced to share and there aren't enough resources, but because they're not actively fighting or going down with blocked bladders or cystitis, nobody really knows.
And so, I mean how many cats move out? I, I gained it from a neighbour, it just moved out and moved in with me. They vote with their own feet sometimes, and, but they probably wouldn't have left if what they were being provided with was ideal.
And nobody wants to lose a pet. So, again, it's that human-animal bond, how can we prevent these problems from starting? So in conclusion, kittens need our attention too.
They are important, valuable animals, we know that, but I think they are slightly neglected. Cats are very different to humans and dogs, and we need to equip owners with the ability to understand their pets. They innately understand dogs, we innately understand dogs, we do not innately understand cats, but people think that they do.
So we have to equip them with that information and by starting early. And giving them that information in a proactive, simple, friendly, approachable way is not only going to set them up for success with their kitten for life, it's going to position us as a really trusted confidant and resource for that cat's life. And it's gonna have a hugely positive impact hopefully on the health and welfare of the animal as it goes through life.
And don't buy too much kitten specific stuff because they're gonna grow out of it really quickly and it will become pointless. Tiny litter trays, tiny scratching posts, don't bother, just buy the cat sized stuff, they're gonna be pretty much cat sized in 6 months or less. So, and there we go, and we can end on a cat and a vet saving an owner money.
So, so thank you ever so much for listening everybody. If you have got any questions, I would love to take them. Very happy to have a chat.
Thanks so much Kath, that was great. I think a few people, Katie and Elizabeth have said belly scratch might not be in production anymore, so we probably just need to, oh whoops, sorry. We need to check up with er Siva on that, but obviously they've got so many really good er products haven't they for for cats on the Flyway range.
Yeah, that's sad, but . It's such a natural behaviour if we can, if we give them something suitable to scratch on, hopefully they will scratch on it. And it's possible if you ring them up they'll just say just use Flyway, but yeah, it's probably very, I, I used it to great effect with my cat with my a cat we had once.
It's interesting, the cat who adopted us during the pandemic, buddy, we, he's sleeping outside, I just sent you a photograph and . We get baskets for him and he looks at them and turns away, so you know, trying to get them things that you hope that they're going to use and then they don't use, as you said, cats do the opposite of what you think they should be doing, and if you realise that and you realise that the sassiness, it, it's much more fun having one. Every single time, yes, er and our job is just to provide them with what they want.
And contin and cycle through the options until we finally figure it out. And I was at ISFM at the weekend and you know again, Sarah Heath was talking about behaviorally, if you get the behaviour right, they're probably less likely to get some of the conditions that we see because those medical and behaviour are very much mixed together, aren't they? Huge, huge, so the amount of stress related cystitis we see and obesity and yeah, physical and mental health are so intimately intertwined and particularly I think for our cats who just internalise all their problems, at least the dogs sort of have an emotional outlet with the human in their life, whereas cats just very stoical.
But it's interesting again this cat buddy I'm I'm talking about that came into our life and and was really quite feisty when he came in, he'd come from a, a mixed cat household, kids, other dogs. He was a 14 year old cat, he, we just had a 20th birthday party for him which about 30 of our friends came to. He got cards, he got presents, it was great, mainly those little sticks that he loves, and.
And I think You know, he was quite feisty, he didn't want to go near us, but then if you give them the choice now, the minute you sit down he jumps on your lap, but if you try and drag him onto your lap, of course it won't, it won't work, so they, they very much need to be in charge, as, as we always say, you, you never own a cat, you're merely. One of their servants, aren't you? Absolutely, and it's in the ideal world.
Yeah, and it's so true, but they're also needy and everything that, everything a cat does makes sense to the cat. The cat is, cats are incredibly logical. You know, so when they are inappropriately urinating, you're like, well, is it by the front door?
Yes. Well, that's because he's, he's scent marking, you know, so you just, I think we have to see the world through our cat's eyes, don't we, and this is, you know, we've got this wonderful opportunity with our kittens, even if they turn out to be the kind of owner that, you know, brings them for their kitten vaccines and neutering and never ever again. If we deliver that information at that age, we're hopefully going to set that relationship and that health of that cat up for success, and then we can educate them on what to look out for if the cat is poorly.
So, so many people, they're not neglecting their cats, they just don't understand them, and it's, and it's hard to get a cat in a box to the vets, it's an absolute nightmare. So again that, if we get them used to getting in the box, if we get them used to being handled at home, if we get them used to being medicated. You know, so many of those barriers to wonderful care will be lifted, and we can do this, obviously we can do this at any age, you know we're not getting our kittens right, you know, all our patients right from the start, this new clinic that we've set up, obviously we're seeing.
Of kittens, but we're also seeing an awful lot of second opinions and adults coming, and we are genuinely very, one of our nurses has got ISFM extra qualifications, she's our feline queen, and, and so we are quite, we are very focused on giving them this information, and I cannot tell you the amount of clients who have been so grateful for that more proactive approach and it's, and it's gaining as a really good. A really good reputation and we're having people come to us because of that, so it, it, it works for everybody, it works for the cats, it works for the owners, it works for the business. And it works for your staff because if you have got people who are interested in cats, let them give them their head and their freedom and, and let them be, you know, let them indulge that passion because it will pay such dividends.
And I like the sort of 12 month plan because as you said, you're setting up the cat to have a successful life and a, and you know, a, a good relationship on its terms with with its servant. Yeah, exactly. Exactly, and hello from somebody has said hello from Wolverhampton.
So we've got Brisbane and, but I love that. I used to work in Wolverhampton, my first job was in Wolverhampton, so I have very fond memories of Wolverhampton, and quite exotic. Wolverhampton just for occasion on the, on the train.
Certain parts. Christine just said lots of thanks for your clear story. So it's you don't hear the tumultuous applause after webinars, it's one of their negatives.
But er people are appreciating what you've said. Liz is asking any breed specific advice or too big a question? Well, I think cats in gen, cats are fairly similar across the board, aren't they, you know, that we don't have that breed variation of need that we definitely do for our dogs, but yes, I mean they are different, a rag doll is very different to a Bengal.
I think the and I think the Bengals are the owners that need the breed specific advice, you know, it's a bit like, when somebody comes in with like a working breed of dog, you sort of have to sit them down and you say, do you know what you have done? Are you aware? Of the challenge you have set yourself, and just guiding them because a lot of Bengal owners keep them indoors and I just, I, I can, I understand why, from the point of view if they've bought a very expensive pedigree cat, but also again, you have to have that conversation of like, You're now gonna have to work super hard to keep this, to keep this cat entertained, but generally I think there's not, there's not as much variation with needs is there with cats as, as, as there is with dogs, and again that doesn't do them any favours in our eyes because we're like well it's just a cat.
Here's, you know, here, off, off you go, but yeah, I think. Yes, I'm glad you mentioned Bengals cos that would certainly have been the ones I would have mentioned, they are . The characters fun but er yes they they demand attention don't they?
They do, wonderful creatures, I'm not sure I could live with one, I certainly couldn't live with one as as an indoor cat, er, but I think they are behind an awful lot of these, you know, a wild cat's been spotted on the moor story, yeah, I bet I know what kind of cat it is. And then someone had said, advice for a client that's just had a baby. Do you know, I bet if you go to the ICA Care website, they've got a PDF on that.
They 100% will. Every single question like that, it will be there. And I think it, you know, it's just a case of similar to bringing home a kitten, do some scent swapping, monitor their interactions, obviously make sure that the cat can't get access to the bassinet or the Moses.
Basket, you know, we don't want them sitting on the baby. I think most people know that, but anything new or change if it's a sensitive cat is going to upset them, you know, so it's about slow introductions and, and getting used to a new and it's with any cat or dog, you don't leave a baby or a child, you know, with that, with that animal. Yeah, but on that point actually.
One more thing, in addition to the cat's protection, having a, tick list of socialisation for kittens, they also have a sound, sound recording. You know, the Dogs Trust do the sound scary for dogs. So I didn't know this until I started, researching this talk, in fact, I think the next slide, I think I might have lost control, but the next slide after this one.
It, I think has all those links, and they have it, there we go, and they have somewhere on there, they have a, a recordings, you know, so play them recording the screaming baby before it arrives because everyone's gonna have to get used to that noise when a new baby arrives. Anything you can do to slow introductions, introduce them to change, that kind of thing. There's another, there's another question, .
Is there any way to fix an incorrect introduction between two cats? I have two cats aged 3 and 15 who have ended up in the same household but don't get on at all. They live on separate floors of the house, they've lived together for around 2 years now.
Thanks, and that's from an anonymous attendee. I think, I think it's really hard because I think changing a cat's mind is very difficult. And cats at different age, you know, if you've got a 3 year old and a 15 year old, they're at very different ages in life, you know, the 15 year olds are likely suffering with a bit of arthritis, so dealing with chronic pain, there might be some dementia creeping in as well, so they're not going to be in the best frame of mind to cope with change, I think that if you can get them, if you provide each cat with the resources it needs in a way that it's not gonna have to share or have much interaction, then.
That may well be the best you can hope for, but the other phrase I use a lot with my clients is like the less you force your cats to be, to come together, more likely they are going to be friends. If you try. Again, you have to make it their idea.
So if you pretend that they don't ever have to talk to each other, they might start to talk to each other, but if you try to bring them together, you will fail. So, so yeah, but I think, and, and you know, things like there's the Flyweight Optimum, the plug-ins, all of those things are very helpful, the calm diets. You know, if you are dealing with stressful situations, I think all of those things can help, but ultimately we have to just be led by the cats and if they're not going to get on, you have the ability to give them everything that they need and want.
Do that, because that may well be the best solution. The majority of them want solitary lives, don't they, you know, this is very much again, buddy, you know, we know that that would not be a good thing. To bring a young kitten in and sometimes people go oh he seems, as you said during the talk, he feels a bit lonely, let's get a kitten, it's just the absolute wrong thing to do, isn't it?
Yeah, and they can gain companionships, they're not, they are selectively social, so they can be. Social, it just has to be their choice, and so that's why, you know, if you're gonna, if you feel like you might want more, more than one cat in your life, then litter mates are the best way forward, but even that can have a relationship breakdown or you know, their personalities clash. So you just have to accept that you might have housemates, and if you have, then you're going to have to work a little bit harder to be as, as, as harmonious as possible.
But it, but it can be done. Pat, thank you once again, thanks Ever Clean for making this possible. Do go and have a little look on their website, you know, if it's litter tray that, you know, maybe could be useful in practise.
Yep, there's another talk actually, if you've been litter trays, isn't there? I've done a couple of talks now on the webinar it for, for Ever Clean. We did one last year about senior cats, so entirely the other end of the scale, and I feel like I've done one where I talked about nothing but litter trays.
So you know, if you're into litter. Trace, there's something for everybody on the webinar that. Thanks Kat.
Katie has said brilliant session, thank you, Liz says thank you, and Gloria says from France, thanks a lot, very interesting and useful information, greetings from France, Mercy, Gloria, and Abiento. See you all soon and thanks for coming on the webinar. Hopefully see you on a webinar very soon and Kat, once again, fantastic as always, see you soon.
Take care, bye bye.
