Holy Crap, Catman!

Do you want to read one of the most bizarre things I have ever read?  Check out this page, and then go out and adopt as many cats as you can properly care for.

 

Videos for Cats, Plus New Toys and Food

Yes, videos for cats.  We have one.  We've had it since before Ivan and Boo were even born - we'd purchased it for Aggie and Ian.  Ian was oblivious, and Aggie showed some interest.  But we were rewarded when Ivan and Boo were transfixed by it!

So what kind of video would cause cats to watch TV?  Why, videos of birds, mice, gerbils, butterflies, and several other prey animals running and flying around, with nice animal chattering and birdcalls for a soundtrack.  The specific video of which we speak is the original Cat Sitter, Vol. 1, on DVD. It's available on VHS or DVD at Pet Sitter Videos.  Our two city cats sit in front of the TV and watch intently, and as critters run out of the camera shot, to the right or left, the cats both jump and put their paws between the side of the TV and the entertainment console in which the TV is housed.  They also run to the side of the console, looking to see where those tasty-looking mice and gerbils and birds got to.  It is quite hilarious!

On that same theme, we were watching Planet Earth (the one narrated by David Attenborough)

and Boo sat and simply watched almost the entire two episodes we watched!  He did sniff and bat at the television screen several times, but mostly he sat intently and watched.  We wonder if it has anything to do with the fact that we were watching the program on a High Definition screen.

On another topic, you may recall that we have discovered Ivan and Boo really like "snakey" toys. They are attracted to snake-like movement.  So we have several toys that are long pieces of fabric on the end of a stick.  We can drag those and swing them around so that they look like snakes slithering along the carpet.  We found a new one.  It is longer and thinner than the last one we found, so it moves even more snakily.  The fabric is light but sturdy, not to mention colorful.  And while the photograph at right doesn't show how long the strip of fabric is, we measured it and it's 52 inches in length - long enough to drag around and wiggle it and get the cats' attention.  This product is made by Cat Dancer Products and was only $5.99!  You can find it even cheaper from pet product web sites - just search "Cat Charmer" toy on Google.

Now on to food.  We wrote about switching to EVO kibble and canned food, as well as Primal raw food.  Well, we went to Pet Food Express here in the Bay Area, and unfortunately they do not carry EVO.  They said that another pet food supplier in the area has a contract with EVO.  Well, that seems silly, to have an exclusive contract with one small supplier (of course, we found EVO at another place in San Jose, but it's not always easy to get over there).  Sheesh.  So we needed some canned food and checked out Weruva.  

Weruva is not all grain free, but each variety is labeled  as to whether it contains grain or not.  We purchased a few of their 3-ounce cans to tide us over until we can get some more EVO.  The cats tried the Weruva tilapia this morning and sucked it down.  Of course, we were going for EVO because it claims to be "minimally cooked".  But we did check out the Weruva web site.  They use some pretty amazing ingredients in their cat food:  prime, human-grade meats and fish.  Wow.  So if the cats continue to like it, we may feed that to them in conjunction with the other canned or raw foods we feed them.  We may try to eventually remove kibble completely.  Really the only reason we keep kibble is that we think it's good for the boys' teeth.  As the Weruva web site says, cats were not meant to eat kibble.  It's too dry, and cats are not ones to drink a lot of water - they evolved getting much of their moisture from their food (prey).  Weruva believes so strongly in this notion that they do not even make kibble, which is where pet food makers generate most of their money.  So if we can find the Primal "Raw Meaty Bones" somewhere near here, we'll try keeping those on hand instead of kibble, wethinks.

The cats were out of sorts today as we had a visitor.  Some visitors they warm up to fairly quickly, others they do not.  Today's visitor has a pet boa constrictor back home, so we wonder if the cats could smell the snake and decided they weren't too sure about it?  Just because they like snakey toys doesn't mean they'd like a living, breathing, real snake.  Anyhow, now that the visitor is gone, they are back to normal, sleeping on their backs in the middle of the living room floor, cruising around and asking for treats, head rubs, brushing, and play time.  We got a good shot of Boo yawning the other day.  Here he is:

The VPI Saga; Feline Heartworms; Etc.

Sorry, just  had to show you the ridiculous picture of Ivan sticking out his tongue, at left.  OK, now that that's out of our system...

We mentioned in our last blog entry the problem with VPI (Veterinary Pet Insurance) denying Dev and Belle's first claim (for their baptismal vet visit).  We talked to VPI, as mentioned, and they indicated we simply needed to talk to the vet, find out what "kitten vaccination" means, and then call VPI back and let them know. Entirely resubmitting the claim was not required.  Yea!  Well, of COURSE when we called VPI back to tell them what the vaccination really was, they said the rep who told us this could be done soley by phone was WRONG!  What?!  We made a fuss and VPI said that, since there was a miscommunication in this instance, their claims  adjuster would call the vet to get the scoop on that vaccination.  Which was FVRCP (Feline Viral Rhinotracheitis, Calcivirus, and Panleukapenia (Distemper)), by the way.  So that's fine, but the kittens had to go back for boosters, etc., and, of course, there on the second invoice is "kitten vaccination" again.  Dang it!  So, knowing that VPI wouldn't accept that, we called the vet's office.  The woman who took our call was indignant: "I've dealt with VPI for 20 years and never had a problem!"  My response, "I don't make the  rules.  I can only tell you what they're telling me."  So she agreed to note exactly what the vaccination is on the invoice and send it to us.  Sheesh!

We can report that VPI covered everything on the kitten's first vet bill except for $10.  Amazing!  We know they won't cover anywhere near as much on the second invoice, but that's to be expected.  However, we are considering making The Cat Hospital our vet for the kittens (even though it's five hours away!) because their prices and procedures seem more reasonable (hey, a vet in a small town can afford to charge premium prices as there's no competition!) and The Cat Hospital doesn't seem to give our cats things they don't need.  I stress the word "seem".

The small-town vet sold us a 3-month supply of "Revolution Feline".  This is a combination heartworm and flea medication (it is also touted as preveningt mites and tapeworms!). Heartworms in cats?  Apparently so.  This came up with Ivan and Boo at their last vet visit at The Cat Hospital a few months ago.  They both pant after heavy exercise, so we were a bit concerned, and we came across articles on feline heartworm when researching poossible causes.

However, we talked this over with our wonderful new vet at The Cat Hospital, Dr. Mattern, and she told us that The Cat Hospital had never seen one case of feline heartworm, so they do not

routinely give the heartworm medication, especially not to indoor cats.  But when the small-town vet prescribed it, we did a bit more research, looking for the incidence of feline heartworm in California.  This is what we found:

It shows that, in the San Francisco Bay Area, there are between 1 and 25 cases of feline heartworm reported per clinic.  Yikes!  Why has The Cat Hospital not seen any cases, then?  I hate to say it, but is it possible that they are misdiagnosing feline heartworm cases as asthma?  Feline heatworm presents radically differently from canine heartworm and causes more pulmonary

problems than cardiovascular problems, or so says Charles Thomas (Tom) Nelson, DVM, in a 2007 article written for the newsletter Know Heartworms: Inside and Out.  Granted this newsletter, the product of a partnership between The American Heartworm Society and The American Association of Feline Practitioners, is sponsored by Pfizer Animal Health, and Pfizer makes - surprise! - Revolution, the heartworm medication we mentioned above that our small-town vet sold to us for Belle and Dev.  So it is difficult to rely solely on Dr. Nelson's article.  We are going to do more research on this topic, and we'll share what we find in a later entry.

OK, we have to give Boo equal time - here he is showing off those amazing eyes and his namesake spot on the nose ("Boo" is, as much as I hate to admit it, short for "Boogernose").

Oh, and we finally started using the PerfectLitter that we purchased a while back (buy one, get one free).  The cats would have nothing to do with it, so we did as directed on the package -- we added a layer of their regular clay litter on top of the PerfetLitter.  That did the trick for at least one of them (Ivan), but so far the conversion is tenuous.  We'll keep working with it.  It definitely is very absorbent with regard to liquid AND odors, and it is amazingly light and dust free.

Before we close, we must admit that we watched the television program "Greatest American Dog" this summer (hey, we recorded it on the DVR and fast-forwarded through the boring bits), a "reality" series in which 12 dogs and their owners competed before three supposedly renowned judges.  The prize was the title "Greatest American Dog" and $25,000.  Each week one contestant and his/her dog was eliminated.  The premise was intriguing, but the execution was poor.  However, we did get hooked by the interesting dogs and humans in the competition.  If you happened to catch it, allow us to say that we think J.D. and Galaxy should have won.  If the show had not been heavily edited and rigged to let the cute, single guy with the cute dog win, J.D. and Galaxy would have gone home with the prize.  As 

consolation for J.D., we offer you a link to his web site., K9 Kings Entertainment.  J.D., if you're interested, drop us a line and we'll fix up your web site and make it slick and cool and more in line with the great work you do with your dogs!

HUGE Price Difference!

YIKES!  We paid over $50 for Primal Feline Chicken and Salmon frozen raw cat food at NationalPetPharmacy.com (shipping was free).  I checked Pet Food Express, which is a brick and mortar pet food store here in the SF Bay Area, and they sell the same 4 lb. bag for $21.99!! Holy cat food, Batman!   (Pet Food Express has a web site , but one cannot purchase food at the web site.  However, one can check to see what the brick and mortar store carries.  The web site also boasts a "buy 3, get the 4th free" special in the store.) 

Unfortunately Pet Food Express does not seem to carry  EVO, made by

 Natura, a local SF Bay Area company.  That's what Ivan and Boo are eating, along with Primal Feline Chicken and Salmon.  But there are some other pet food stores in the area that carry Natura's products, or so the Natura web site says.  We will pay a visit to one of them, Sam's Downtown Feed, which we have passed a million times but never visited. They have a large model horse in front of the  store.

Because of the cost of the Primal food, we were not going to

continue feeding it once the 4 lb. bag we have in the freezer is gone.  However, now that we see how comparatively cheaply we can buy it, we may continue it!  And if we can find Primal's "Raw Meaty Bones" for cats being sold in our area, we may try those as well.  However, we do foresee a problem with those.  We currently give Ivan and Boo dried chicken breast pieces as treats and also to satisfy their chewing obsessions.  We give those to them on the dining room carpet, as they are dry.  However, because of that, we envision them taking "raw meaty  bones" onto the dining room carpet, too.  That would not be good.  We'll see what happens!

On another front, VPI Pet Insurance denied our claims for Dev and Belle's first vet visit!  The paperwork said the claims were denied because the vet's invoices were not itemized.  Hogwash! They were itemized.  So I called VPI and the customer service rep was as puzzled as I. She finally found out that one item on the invoices, listed as "Kitten vaccination," needed to be better defined.  She said that if I could get details about what exactly that vaccination was, and call VPI back with the information, I would not need to resubmit the claim.  Of course the vet was closed today (Saturday), so this will have to wait until Monday. 

We purchased a new type of cat litter to try with Ivan and Boo.  It's called PerfectLitter.  The PerfectLitter web site is a bit annoying, so here is a link to information on the product from

PetPlace.com (but you can click on the PerectLitter image here to go to the PerfectLitter site, if you feel brave).  It is touted as being 70% lighter than clay litter, flushable, dust-free, four times more absorbent than regular cat litter, and if your cat develops a urinary tract infection, his/her urine turns the white litter pink.  We haven't tried this litter yet, but as soon as one of the litter boxes in our home is ready for a complete litter change, we're going to try PerfectLitter. PetPlace.com suggests having one litter box with your regular clay litter available as your cats get used to PerfectLitter in another litter box.  A good suggestion!

Microchippies

We now call Ivan and Boo the Microchippies because we had them microchipped a couple of weeks ago. The cost at our vet is $37 per cat, and pet insurance paid $20 each. They were a wee bit sore between the shoulderblades for a week, but now they are fine. The vet said there are no known health problems from microchipping (i.e., she has never seen a cat get an infection at the injection site, or cancer, etc. The chip is about the size of a grain of rice). By the way, some other collective names we have for Ivan and Boo are "The Celebrity Catheads," which was the name of a band in the late 1980s in Houston, Texas, and "Va Bruvahs," which is Cockney for "The Brothers" (sort of).

The company that manufactures these chips and keeps records that will help reunite you with a lost and found microchipped cat is HomeAgain. Not only do they keep your contact information, but they also send e-mail to area members, vets, and shelters any time a pet is reported lost. This increases the chance that your pet will be found and reunited with you. On one hand it is a bit sad to see the number of pets who get lost (as indicated by the number of notices we receive in e-mail), but on the other hand it is good to know that the Internet is being harnessed for such worthy purposes. A one-year "subscription" to Home Again is $14 per cat. Our vet said that any time a new cat is brought in, they scan it for a microchip, just in case someone found the cat and adopted it, thinking it was a stray. There is a story on the Home Again web site about that very thing happening! A cat disappeared, only to reappear two months later when the lady who had found her took her to the vet to get her spayed!

While microchips are great for locating lost pets, they do not protect pets from ingesting evil substances. Ivan did just that yesterday. We purchased some "glow necklaces" for use when camping. These contain a substance that, when activated, will glow for several hours. The substance is a fluid. To see how much light the necklaces actually produce, we activated one of them. They are actually just long flexible tubes that can be joined at both ends to create circles that fit over the head and around the neck. Once the glow died, we were going to throw the spent tube away. We unhooked the ends so that it was a 22" straight tube. Before tossing it in the trash we noticed that Ivan was interested in it. We dragged it around on the floor and he became obsessed with it, running back and forth like a mad cat to chase and grab it, and flying through the air like a gymnast to seize it, his eyes fully dilated as though he were chasing some serious prey. After reading the package and noting that it is non-toxic, we decided to keep it and use it as a toy for Ivan, but we made a mental note to put it away each time we finished playing, as we did not want Ivan to puncture the plastic and get to the glow goo inside the tube.

Yesterday we pulled it out of the fridge (where we have to keep it or he would find it and chew it to bits) and played with Ivan for a while. He is so obsessed with it that Boo doesn't even want to try to play with it - Ivan runs right over him! We had a good play session with Ivan. We let him "catch" the tube occasionally to keep him interested. When he catches it, he usually lays with the tube between his paws for a while, until we get the tube and play with him some more. However, after letting him "catch" the tube last night, we turned away for a few seconds to get something. When we looked back, Ivan was backing away from the tube and shaking his head. We thought he had gotten the connector off the tube and was chewing it, but there was nothing in his mouth. We quickly inspected the tube and saw that he had punctured it with a tooth, and some of the fluid had escaped. Ivan started running around in distress. We couldn't catch him for a minute or so. At one point, as he ran around, we saw a lot of saliva coming from his mouth. This was alarming! We finally caught him, examined his mouth, and then took him to the sink and rinsed his mouth out. Once we rinsed his mouth he was fine, ready to eat a handful of treats and play again as normal. But we were freaked out! We later determined that the substance either tasted bad, or it stung his mouth, or both, and his body's natural reaction to something undesirable in the mouth was to produce extra saliva to wash the substance away.

The puncture was barely the size of a pinhole, so a very, very tiny amount of the glow goo made it into his mouth. We threw the tube away promptly and won't be letting him play with those again! We would not even have considered it if they had not been labeled NON-TOXIC.

The ASPCA says that many pets are poisoned each year by all sorts of things, including chocolate, grapes, onions, the sweetener xylitol, coffee and houseplants. This article talks about things we might never suspect would poison a pet, as well as more obvious poisons (like antifreeze). It is recommended reading for any pet owner.

We think Ivan liked the tube because it looked a bit like a snake. He and Boo seem to LOVE snake-like toys and objects. They go crazy over some of my necklaces if I move them around in a snake-like fashion. We have started looking for snakey toys in the pet store. The first one we found is the Swizzle Teaser (also called Swizzle Bird) by "Dr. Noys' Pet Toys for Cats with an Attitude". This is a division of Kong Company at www.kongcompany.com - they make the Kong toys that are so popular with dogs. Unfortunately, the Kong web site does not include the Dr. Noys' products. The above link for the Swizzle Teaser goes to an Internet pet store with which we are not familiar, so if you order from them, let us know what you think. Anyhow, we bought the toy at PetSmart (there's a PetSmart about a mile down the road from us, so we frequent it). The cats seem to like the Teaser, and we can get them interested in it most of the time, but they don't go crazy over it like Ivan did over the glow-goo tube! We have yet to find something to replace the tube. The photo at left shows Boo playing with the Swizzle Teaser. The feathers at the end attach via Velcro, and you can purchase replacements if the original feathers gets chewed on a bit too much.

Ivan and Boo: Successful Vet Visit, and Raw Diets

We have a standard plan policy with VPI (veterinary Pet Insurance) for Ivan and Boo (and we just purchased standard policies for Belle and Dev). We feel insurance is a necessity as pet medical care is almost as expensive as human medical care, and we want the option to treat medical conditions that we otherwise might not be able to afford to treat! The plans we have, which include a "Core Coverage" rider, partially cover two vet visits a year per cat, standard testing and vaccinations, and even micro-chipping (we'll talk about that in the next blog entry)! So we took Ivan and Boo in to see the delightful Dr. Mattern at The Cat Hospital in Campbell, California on Monday. It's been about six months since their last check-up.

Having lost two cats to lymphoma a couple of years ago, we want Ivan and Boo monitored closely to watch for problems like that, especially since cats are adept at hiding ill health. So the two-visits-per-year coverage gives us some peace of mind. Dr. Mattern says they are both very healthy, though a bit overweight, and she recommended a low-carbohydrate diet (free of grains, especially corn) to help get their weight down to normal (they are 13 lbs each!). She specifically recommended two brands of cat-food, but the one she seemed to prefer was EVO.

We researched EVO on the internet and found many web sites that sell it. Dr. Mattern mentioned that there is at least one store in the San Jose area that carries it, but we found some good prices on the internet and decided to go that route instead of burning a lot of time and gas. We ordered EVO dry and canned food from PetFoodDirect.com as they had some of the best prices on pet foods and shipping, and the site got decent reviews on review web sites. While exploring the PetFoodDirect.com site, we also found a section of "raw and frozen" diets, and this intrigued us, so we did some research.

Apparently there is a growing group of veterinarians, researchers, and pet owners which believes that a raw diet is best for pets (there is a parallel raw food movement for humans, as well). This does make sense on its face. For millenia the genus Felis ate raw food. They killed their vegetarian (or possibly insectivorous and/or omnivorous) prey and ate it, benefiting from almost all parts of the prey animal as well as everything the prey animal had eaten. They did not cook their food! Besides, cooking changes the chemical properties of food materials, especially the fats in meat. Since we did have two cats with lymphoma (in addition to other health problems like pancreatitis and urinary tract infections) in the past, we felt that one area to scrutinize rigorously was diet. We wanted to feed them wholesome, organic, and proper ingredients. As we researched EVO dry and canned foods further, we discovered that it is "gently" cooked and billed as a good alternative to raw food, so this was an added bonus. However, we liked the idea of frozen raw food, as it is closer to what cats would eat in the wild (other than being frozen, of course!). So in addition to the two types of EVO, we ordered Primal brand frozen cat nuggets from PetFoodDirect.com. The shipping on the Primal food was free, and this was a true deal, as they have to ship it UPS Two-Day to insure that it stays frozen during shipping.

Unfortunately, PetFoodDirect.com did not send us a confirmation e-mail, and we have gotten out of the habit of printing order information from web sites as we always get a confirmation e-mail! So while we have received the frozen part of the order, we have not yet received the EVO portion, and we have no easy way to track it. If it does not arrive on Monday (which will make it one week since we placed the order) we'll call them up, as we did make a note of the order number (not sure what inspired us to do THAT!). So that's our one complaint with PetFoodDirect.com so far.

Back to the Primal raw food. It's a four-lb. bag of small, ice-cube shaped nuggets of raw chicken and salmon with lots of vegetables and ground up chicken/salmon bones (the ingredients are listed in detail on the Primal site). Of course, those distinct ingredients are not recognizable as, when a nugget defrosts, it is a mush. We mixed it with the Science Diet "Nature's Best" kibble for the first time this morning, and the boys loved it! In fact, they ate around the pieces of kibble to get to the mush! Wow! And they have had canned/soft food perhaps one time in their lives previously. They are currently eating their dinner portion of the raw food and Science Diet kibble, and they are gobbling it up (Ivan leaves the kibble behind at first, but Boo eats it all at once). This morning we put the defrosted-but-refrigerator-chilled raw nuggets, which we'd placed in a zip-lock bag to defrost overnight, into a sink of warm water to warm them a bit before feeding, as suggested by the manufacturer. However, just now, we gave it to them right out of the fridge. No problem for them, apparently! That removes a step in the process for us, at least! (Not only is refrigerated food foreign to wild animals, but cold food also puts off less odor/scent, and cats rely heavily on scent to interest them in food. Apparently Ivan and Boo were pretty hungry!).

The raw food is way too expensive to be the boys' primary food. Instead, we think we'll continue to use it in addition to EVO (assuming they will eat the EVO, but they do not appear to be finicky guys). The Primal food was $51.99 for the four-pound bag! However, that computes to two weeks of food for two cats if we are using it along with EVO. Perhaps we'll only feed the raw food once a day, and stretch it to four weeks. We'll experiment and see what works. The Primal web site contains a lot of information, including a calculator to determine how much of their food to feed your cat for specific needs (weight loss, maintenance, weight gain, etc.). The calculator, as well as lots of other good information, is on Primal's Feeding Recommendations page. We halved the number they recommended for weight loss (two nuggets per feeding) since we are using the Primal food in combination with EVO (or Science Diet until we get the EVO food). In comparison, the 15.4 lb. bag of dry EVO was $37.99, and 12 13.2 oz variety pack cans were $25.99 (they were out of the 5.5 oz cans). However, we will attempt to do more research on this topic and see if anyone has compared the effects of a pure raw diet with those of an EVO diet.

In our research, we found that a lot of vets and owners recommend digestive enzyme supplements for cats who do not eat a 100% raw diet. We did some digging, and Total-Zymes seemed to be the most-recommended product. Primal actually recommends that it be used when a pet is first being transitioned to their raw food. So we ordered Total-Zymes from Pet Food AZ. They had the best price and the cheapest shipping. They DID send us a confirmation e-mail, but their ordering system is a bit confusing, as we wanted the product shipped to Mrs. A's office, but our credit card billing address is different from the office address. It was unclear which address they were using for billing and which for shipping until after the order was already placed. Thankfully it worked out correctly. By the way, the AZ part of their name appears to be for Arizona. That's one reason their shipping was cheaper than other pet food web stores' shipping. A lot of these stores are in the central or eastern U.S., and we're in the west. We were surprised how few web stores that carry these products are on the West Coast! You'd think California would be the Center of Natural Pet Food! Anyhow, we'll let you know what we think of Total-Zymes some time in the future, after we've had a chance to give it to the boys for a while. It's apparently a powder that is added to their food. Should be interesting. In the meantime, here is some "propaganda" from the Total-Zymes web site.

We'll provide updates in the future on how the boys are faring with their new diets.

More Kitten Photos Plus Product Reviews

The orphaned kittens, Dev and Belle, are doing just fine. They are still small, but they're only 3 months old, after all! Here they are about to attack a dangling toy. They are sitting on a normal, three-cushion couch in this photo, so it gives you an idea of how small they are - smaller than the average person's butt (arse for you in the UK, etc.), that's certain!

Dev is definitely the cuddler of the two, but both are absolutely devoted to Mr. Aleurophile, who did the bulk of their raising (as I was traveling for business). Belle is the noisy one, making big scary cat noises the entire time she is wrestling with Dev or playing with a toy. Mr. A did a fantastic job of socializing them with humans - so far they're not afraid of anyone. They also tolerate loud noises as Mr. A practices playing drums and other instruments fairly frequently around them. They've also been socialized with at least one other cat - Jericho - who tolerates them, but just barely.

We haven't seen the sibling that their mother took with her. That one, Belle's twin, may not have survived.

We are feeding them premium kitten food, but of course Jericho helps himself to that when he can! We also keep plenty of fresh water about. There are plenty of toys to keep them busy during the day. And their big playpen is available for them to play in if they wish.

Dev took to hiding to sleep for a while; he still does it occasionally. Here he was hiding under a pillow, which we moved to take the photo. Then we replaced. He did not stir! The first time he hid under the pillow, Mr. A was frantic when he realized he was missing and couldn't find him! It didn't occur to Mr. A that Dev would sleep under a pillow on the sofa, but when he lifted the pillow in desperation, there was Dev!

Weaning them from kitten formula to solid food was relatively easy. They now eat dry and canned kitten food. They have gotten over their fear of water, too!

Boo and Ivan haven't met them yet. That probably won't happen until some time in September. Boo and Ivan have met Jericho, and they do fine with him, so we are hoping for the best when they meet Dev and Belle.

Ivan and Boo are doing fine, by the way. We have purchased them some new little toys. They love the Fat Cat (www.fatcatinc.com) "Mouse-A-Roni & Cheese" toy - it's a stuffed fabric mouse with catnip. Ivan holds the mouse in his front paws and kicks it with his back paws, but he also licks and chews it (loves that catnip!). Fat Cat recently joined the Bamboo family of pet products. We have reviewed Bamboo products here in the past.

We purchased Ivan and Boo a new waterer: the Drinkwell Platinum water fountain. It took them a while to get used to it - at first they looked at it suspiciously! So I left their regular water bowl out for a week or so. They eventually came to prefer the Drinkwell. Boo will lap out of the fountain stream, then stop and stare at the bubbles that result from him disrupting the flow of water. Once the bubbles disappear, he drinks again. And he repeats this process a few times before he gets his fill of water. Ivan drinks from it, but of course he also plays in it (!). The fountain has a reservoir, and when it senses that more water is needed, it glug glug glugs as the water empties from the reservoir into the fountain. Ivan is absolutely FASCINATED by this. If he hears the fountain "glug glugging" from afar, he comes running. He even bats at the clear reservoir as it glugs (as he sees bubbles rising). Fun for the whole feline family!

We've got a few more cat products to review, so stay tuned.