Posted on 02/22/2005 7:52:56 PM PST by Dinsdale
It wasn't smart of them to test only for rabies. If the cat ingested a toxic substance, they'd be better off knowing if it is something they have inside their house. Especially with a child living on the premises. A vet or an animal control officer could have caught or sedated the cat, and caged it for testing. It's done all the time.
Sudden onset of that type of uncharacteristic behavior sounds far more like the cat was poisoned, seriously injured or partially electrocuted than it does anything else. Shooting the animal in the chest wasn't a solution, it was a failure of human intelligence.
"That cat got into something. If rabies and previous head injuries were ruled out, it's gotta be chemical."
That was my assessment as well.
Weird, I use bleach on everything and have always had cats. Had one cat that would sniff and sniff and sniff the bleach on the floor, but never had bleach make one mean or crazy.
I bet it was strychnine. It's the main ingredient in rat poison, and works by over-stimulating the nervous system. Light, sound, touch, it all triggers so many fireworks in the brain that the muscles spasm and eventually a heart attack occurs or something like that. A really cruel way to go, I always thought. It's also present in small amounts in most modern-day LSD. Anyway it would explain how the cat took a long time to die even after being shot, "hopped up" like the officer said.
Whatever the cause, poor little thing. My own long haired, orange and white kitty is lying here peacefully snoring next to me (yes she really does snore!).
If you have pets, make sure the D-Con is safely out of reach!!!!!
Yep, not much nastier than a nesting trumpeter swan.
Gosh, we always used the kind with warfarin in it...but your idea sounds very likely. That's something I didn't know.
My cat snores something terrible. The sound of a cat snoring is so weird sounding that you look and look and look for the source of that strange sound.....and get hit by the "Oh for Pete's sake" factor like a ton of bricks when it turns out is was the cat sleeping peacefully beside you all along.
Hee hee hee, and it's so CUTE!
LOL...once you finally realize what it is.
Re: Bleach and cats
I've been learning from cats for 55 years - started when I was minus 5 - and I'm confident there was a good reason for the cat going ballistic. Am also confident there was a way to get it through this awful episode, but I don't condemn those present for being mystified.
Arasina and Calpernia have learned something I learned just a year ago, when I caught my two (loving but) emotional cats trying to mash themselves into a bleach spill on the concrete. I only know that the fumes make me very ill, so I can imagine how it would affect a small animal. Some chemical in bleach (simple as chlorine?) definitely arouses the cats' systems; their eyes will dilate, and you definitely want to approach them gently, if at all. Just shut them up in whatever you can get them to (with a broom? I shake plastic bags to shoo them) for an hour or so, and they will be back to normal.
One other possibility is that the cat was like the one in "Ghost," which saw an evil spirit. Okay, laugh at me, but they can do that. I think. So. Kick me outa here...
Smart Dad. Smart you. Works like a charm, AS LONG AS favorite wet food is fresh enough for fussy kittie. If my old girl won't finish, I add people tuna to sucker her in. My vet says old girls can have some tuna.
By the way, would you ask your Dad about the current epidemic of thyroid condition being caused by pop-top wet food cans? My particular cat is 17, and didn't have the condition until she was fed only "Science Diet" in pop-top cans for four months. She lost seven pounds, so the vet did some homework, and found this information on a veterinary hotline. She is a totally controlled subject, so we sure wonder.
"...the feline leisurely walked downstairs."
"But when Mickey emerged from the basement-area of the home, it was “ ... a different animal ... it looked as though it was possessed.”
"There was a concern the animal could get lodged in the crawl space of the home, which was under partial renovation."
Like other people here, my first guess is that the cat consumed something in the basement. The cat could have had strychnine poisoning, but I think the cat ate some kind of toxic fluid or material containing lead being used in the renovation of the house. I remember reading the warning label on a large container of material used in construction, it contained lead.
Some symptoms of Strychnine poisoning are agitation and excitability.
Some symptoms of lead poisoning are fits, excitation, and hysteria.
Am I the only one that finds this rather bizarre.
AND it took the cat five minutes to die... that must be one anemic cartridge load...
The bizarre ordeal began when the family’s 12-year-old daughter arrived home from school Wednesday evening and fed the feline, ‘Mickey,’a sugar cube that the nice man by the fence gave her.
You might think so... but an autopsy on a small dog cost my mother over $1000. That was a lot of cash merely for curiosity...
They didn't have to do all that to get rid of their cat...
Boys Eat Cat That Stole Christmas Dinner
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/news/812630/posts
Any lab anaylsis looking for own known agents has to be expensive.
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