Carlo and Bunny weight report

I just weighed the kittens.  Carlo weighs 6.8 ounces, and Bunny weighs 9.4.  It’s a huge discrepancy, but the good news is that Carlo has gained 1.4 ounces in the last 72 hours.  He’s still within the normal weight ranges suggested in the Neonatal Kitten Care Handbook (that links to a pdf), although he’s at the lower limits.  Bunny seems like a huge behemoth in contrast, so they won’t be fighting in the same weight class.  Today they are 18 days old.  I’ve been bad about taking photos because I’m so busy, and because they’re very labour-intensive and don’t leave a lot of free time.  They take ages to bathe, ages to feed, etc.  I can’t wait until they start to use the litterbox!  Bunny is showing interest in licking her paws, but it will be a while before she’s coordinated enough to clean herself properly.

Today we took Cricket and Phoenix to the vet for checkups and vaccinations.  Phoenix also had bloodwork for her thyroid, and urinalysis.  The bloodwork was somehow botched, so we need to return to have it done again, but I guess the urinalysis turned out fine.  I’m still amazed at how great she looks now, and perhaps we’ve finally found a diet which really works for her.  It’s been ages since she’s had an allergy shot, and also an eternity since her last ear infection.  She is still on low-dose prednisone (her allergies were always so terrible that it was unavoidable), but I think it’s time to wean her off that as well, and to see what happens.  Just for the record, she and Cricket both eat Eatables.

Our bill today was about $325, which included exams, vaccines, urinalysis, thyroid and heartworm panel for Phoenix, heartworm test for Cricket, plus six months of heartworm meds for all four dogs (two big and two little).  The vet was nice enough to toss in a few months worth of sample meds to help us save a bit.  I really resent having to use heartworm meds now… this wasn’t a problem until hurricane Katrina.  I’ve never even seen a mosquito here, but apparently our vet clinic has had one case of an infected dog so it’s now a necessity. 

We had a couple of other surprises today.  We found out that the vet who owns the clinic, who we rarely get to see, is six months pregnant.  That was a big surprise.  We also found out that our second-favourite vet (the one we see when the owner isn’t available) is leaving at the end of this week to move out-of-state.  Apparently it’s tough to get vets to stay in Las Vegas, as a couple of good vets have left and moved elsewhere.  It’s frustrating, because the vet who’s leaving was the one who gave me TJ’s testicles in a jar for my birthday, and she also does most of the work on our foster kittens, so we’ve built up a good rapport with her.  The last surprise was that the clinic owner offered to come to our house to vaccinate all our cats, to save us a trip to their office.  I appreciate that, because we can usually afford all the routine vet care we need, but it’s a huge headache to have to make so many trips.  I’ve got about five cats needing vaccinations right now (the vet wants to have all our cats vaccinated against FIV/FeLV because we bring foster kittens in), so we’ll have quite the lineup of candidates. 

Posted by Leigh-Ann on 04/10 at 02:11 AM

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  1. Thanks for the link to the handbook. Very useful information, and just in time for my first time helping with weaning.

    Posted by gottagopractice  on  04/10  at  04:48 AM

  2. What kind of scale do you use?  And is it comparable in accuracy to your vet’s?

    Posted by cheshire  on  04/10  at  02:42 PM

  3. Cheshire, I use a postal scale which weighs in ounces and grams.  I assume it’s accurate, because the post office never returns packages to me for lack of postage.  That happened a couple of times with my old scale, so I bought a newer (and hopefully better) one.  I’ve looked at veterinary scales, like the ones made by Detecto, and they’re soooo expensive.  I don’t know if my scale exactly matches the scale at the vet’s office, but my scale does seem to weigh items consistently.  So, even if it’s off by a couple of ounces, if it’s consistently off, I can still track weight loss or gain.

    GGP, I highly recommend a great book called, The Guide to Handraising Kittens.  It’s an excellent addition to the pdf file I linked to.  Amazon has another book about handraising kittens called, Bottlekatz: A Complete Care Guide for Orphan Kittens, but I haven’t read it yet.

    Posted by Leigh-Ann  on  04/10  at  04:46 PM

  4. Hi,

    I was pleased to see you recommended “Bottlekatz A Complete Care Guide for Orphan Kittens”.  I would be honored if you would consider reading it and would value your opinion.  I you are interested in a copy please just let me know where you would like it mailed and i will get it out for you. 

    I am very familiar with “The Guide to Handraising Kittens”, and found it well done with great pictures.  My book does not contain a lot of pictures, but was designed to answer all the very specific questions I have been hearing for years.  I wanted it to be easy to read, easy to use as a reference guide for someone without a good support system, and as full of specific, hands-on answers as I could make it. 

    Hope to hear from you soon with a mailing address.  Keep up the great work.

    Sharon Darrow,
    Author,
    Bottlekatz A Complete Care Guide for Orphan Kittens

    Posted by Sharon Darrow  on  08/05  at  02:37 PM

  5. Sharon, I know it seems like I never replied to you, but I’m actually the person who’s spoken to you via email, and who’s offered to help you with your website.  You gave me some good suggestions with regards to Carlo, my foster kitten with intestinal problems.  I do love your book, and in fact, I’ll put up a normal review of it in a few days smile

    Sorry I’m so late in replying.  I feel like I lost the month of August.

    Posted by Leigh-Ann  on  09/03  at  04:27 AM
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