Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs)

1. So what are you. some kind of an expert or something?
• No, just a pet owner who reads a lot and pays attention to what works and what doesn’t. My cats live a long time, so I must be doing something right.
2. Are you always right?
• No, but I’m never deliberately wrong.
3. Can you name every cat you’ve ever had?
• Not counting the ones who belonged to everyone in the family when I was a child, and kittens which were given away before they got names, my cats were Kitty, Schickelgruber, Jude, Cousin, Little Girl, Baby Girl, Cutie, Lydia, Bird, Obadiah, and Esther. Except for Esther, who found a good home, these cats were all a part of my life for several years. I don’t know what happened to Kitty and Jude, as they just never came home one day, but, as for the others, Schickelgruber came to me as an adult cat, whose owners I wasn’t able to locate, lived with me for about four years, then left me for a family down the block, who may well have been her original owners. Cousin, Cutie and Lydia’s great-grandmother, preferred rural life, so I let her remain where she seemed happy, and with people who had already given her a good home. Baby Girl died of cancer a few months ago, and the others are still with me.
4. What can I do if I want my cat to live a very long time?
• Two things: feed her right, and don’t let her play in traffic. Seriously, cars rank very high on the list of threats to our feline companions; and of the medical threats, cancer being high on the list, proper nutrition can go a long way toward helping your cat’s own immune system fight off many of the problems that it may otherwise encounter.
5. I like cats but I hate fleas. What can I do to avoid having fleas?
• The most important thing that you can do is to feed your cat right. There are other things that you can do, while avoiding poisons and, while I can’t guarantee you’ll never see a flea, you should read the page that I have on fleas for some other ideas.
6. Are you some kind of a health freak?
• Not at all, but while I am free to make the wrong choices with my own health, my cats are dependent upon me to make the right choices for them. When you let your cats go beyond being mere pets, or playthings, and allow them to become your friends, and part of your family, you open yourself up to ideas that will allow them to live longer than five or six years. To accomplish this, we have to not only protect them from physical harm but give them the resources, through a healthy diet, to protect themselves from anything that might otherwise go wrong inside. Many, if not most, of the medical emergencies that your cat might face can be avoided through proper nutrition.
7. What about vaccinations? Can’t I avoid most of these problems through regular vaccinations?
• Vaccinations are important, but we are overdoing them, and to the detriment of our pets. Recent research suggests that repeated vaccinations can contribute to a suppressed immune system, which can itself result in disorders such as arthritis, skin disease, epilepsy, and cancer. Long term reaction to repeated vaccinations may also be a contributing factor in the development of other auto-immune diseases leading to heart, liver, or kidney failure. I am not suggesting that you not vaccinate your pets, as some laws require it, but we should realize that many of these laws are contradicted by the medical research, and may be outdated. Rather than automatically vaccinating our cats each year, we should take a more intelligent approach. Please read the page that I have included in this site on vaccinations.
8. Is it really true that people frequently ask you these questions?
• No, people don’t generally talk to me very much at all, so I made all this stuff up.