Apollo and The Wart....

Well, Apollo has had a small, benign, slow growing wart in the corner of his right now for about 1 1/2 years now. We had already decided that unless it really increased in size and begun affecting his vision, that we would leave it alone. Apollo is almost 12 1/2 yrs old and we do not want to put him under for something an small as this...so, we have left it.

Apparently, Apollo decided that he could easily remove it for us:) The other evening, Rob and I were in the kitchen and Rob noticed suddenly that the wart was GONE!!!! After looking closely at Apollo's eye, I remembered seeing him earlier in the evening rubbing his face with his paw and then rubbing his face on a chair. Hmmm......just call him DOCTOR APOLLO!!!

I've kept an "eye" on his eye since and you cannot even tell where the growth was.....LOL...GO FIGURE!!

FEBRUARY 2010 NEWSLETTER

THE NATURAL PET HEALTH STORE
February 10, 2010

CHRONIC DEHYDRATION IN CAT’S

DID YOU KNOW, CAT’S THAT EAT DRY FOOD AS THEIR MAIN DIET HAVE A HIGHER INCIDENCE OF DEVELOPING URINARY TRACT ISSUES AND KIDNEY PROBLEMS?

CAT’S, UNLIKE DOG’S, DO NOT CONSUME LARGE QUANTITIES OF WATER ON A REGULAR BASIS. THE FACT IS: CAT’S AS A SPECIES, JUST DON’T DRINK A LOT OF WATER, PERIOD. SO, WHEN A CAT IS FED STRICTLY OR MAINLY A DRY DIET, THEIR BODIES TEND TO STAY SLIGHTLY DEHYRATED. THIS FORCES THE KIDNEYS AND BLADDER TO WORK HARDER TO RID ITSELF OF TOXINS FROM THE BODY.

A CAT THAT IS ALLOWED TO EAT RAW PREY (MICE, RODENTS, RABIBITS, ETC), A RAW DIET, COOKED DIET OR CANNED DIET HAS MORE WATER INTAKE VERSUS A DRY FED CAT. STUDIES HAVE SHOWN THAT CAT’S RECEIVE ONLY ABOUT 10% WATER WHEN EATING A DRY DIET, WHEREAS A CAT GIVEN RAW PREY, RAW FOOD, COOKED OR CANNED INCREASE THEIR WATER CONSUMPTION TO 75-85% AND A CAT THAT WAS LIVING IN THE WILD WOULD ALSO HAVE A WATER INTAKE OF AROUND 75-85%.
THIS HIGHER WATER INTAKE HELPS KEEP THE KIDNEYS AND BLADDER FLUSHED OF
HARMFUL TOXINS AND KEEPS THE URNIARY TRACT HEALTHY.

IF YOUR CAT EATS MAINLY A DRY DIET, THINGS THAT YOU CAN DO TO INCREASE WATER CONSUMPTION ARE: SWITCHING HE/SHE TO A CANNED, COOKED OR RAW DIET, ADD EXTRA WATER TO THEIR DRY DIET, CONSIDER BUYING A FREE FLOWING WATER FOUNTAIN, AND KEEP MULTIPLE FRESH WATER BOWLS THROUGHOUT THE HOUSE.

YOU MAY THINK…MY CAT EATS ONLY DRY FOOD AND I SEE HE/SHE DRINKING WATER REGULARLY?? THIS MAYBE THE CASE, BUT JUST CONSIDER THIS….IF YOUR CAT WERE GETTING THEIR REQUIRED 75-85% OF WATER INTAKE IN THEIR FOOD EACH DAY, THEN THEY ACTUALLY SHOULD BE DRINKING LESS WATER, BECAUSE THEIR BODIES ALREADY HAVE CONSUMED THEIR REQUIRED AMOUNTS IN THEIR DIETS.

THOUGH A WORD OF CAUTION: IF YOUR CAT IS DRINKING EXCESSIVE AMOUNTS OF WATER (NO MATTER WHAT DIET THEY ARE EATING), PLEASE CONSIDER HAVING A THOROUGH PHYSCIAL EXAM AND POSSIBLY BLOODWORK AND URINALYSIS DONE. EXCESSIVE THIRST, URINATION COULD BE SIGNS OF A MORE SERIOUS HEALTH ISSUE. OF COURSE, BEFORE BEGINNING ANY DIET CHANGE, CONSULT YOUR VETERINARIAN.

FOR MORE INFORMATION ON CHRONIC DEHYRATIOON IN CATS, CHECK OUT THESE SITES: WWW.CATINFO.ORG/ WWW.PROFESSORSHOUSE.COM/ WWW.CATSFROMAUSTALIA.COM
-TAMMY STARKEY (THE NATURAL PET HEALTH STORE)

Missing Our Sadie (one year later)

Today is our 1 yr anniversary of losing our beloved little girl Sadie. There is not a day that goes by that we do not miss her still. We have snow (rare in central NC) last weekend. Rob and I both realized how much Sadie would have loved it. She always turned into a puppy again in the snow. Chasing the birds, squirrels, antagonizing her brothers....she was such a ham:)

Till we meet again,
Love Mama, Daddy and the boy's

Where has the time gone?

Time sure does get away with you!

Rob and I had a wonderful Christmas with all our furkids and friends. The only difference, our beloved Sadie was not here with us. This was our first Christmas without her in 11 yrs and she was very truly missed and still is.

A bright note: my wonderful friend Siglinda finished Sadie's urn and it is beautiful, a fitting tribute to our beautiful girl.

Our other 11 furkid's are all doing well. Apollo is such a trooper....some day's I cannot even believe that he is almost 12 1/2 yrs old!

Apollo Health Update.....

Well...Let me catch everyone up on our old man Apollo. We found out a few weeks after his surgery to remove a tumor that we thought was cancerous..that it WASN"T cancer!!! It basically was an inflammation that may be from a vaccine reaction. Though, it more than likely WOULD have become malignant at a later date. I'm just thankful that it wasn't cancer:)

We feel so blessed that we have had 2 tumors removed from Apollo in less then a year and both came back benign. The first tumor was a large growth on his spleen last October, so his tumor AND spleen were removed and sent off for a histopath and came back clean!! Attached are the pics of his spleen and tumor once they were removed. We decided to see the humor in it all and named his tumor "Butters." LOL

Apollo is doing great! We will be celebrating this amazing boy's life and 12th birthday in a few weeks with a Birthday Bash with all our closest friends! Won't Apollo be the center of attention!!!

Tammy

Playing CatchUp....

Well.....It has been quite an eventful couple of months...I always INTEND to get the blog up-to-date, but LIFE get's in the way:(

Anyway, my husband and I are still dealing with missing our beautiful Sadie daily, but it helps to know that she had a wonderful life with us. My wonderful friend, Jan Gibson with http://www.petstoposies.com/ created a beautiful portrait of our Sadie to honor her memory. I will try to get it up on the blog within the next few days. Jan has an amazing talent of capturing the "essence and spirit" of all of her subjects.

We have been having a stressful time for the last 2 weeks. We found and had surgically removed a cancerous tumor on Apollo's rear leg last week. I has gotten infected and he is pretty weak in the leg, but we are hoping for a full recovery. Our local holistic vet will be injecting some Neoplesene (bloodroot) into the surrounding tissue within the next few weeks to hopefully kill any lingering cancer cells.

I will keep everyone updated on how things are going.

Tammy

Our Very Saddening Loss...

On the morning of Feb. 6th 2009, we unexpectedly lost our precious baby girl...Sadie. We adopted Sadie at the age of approx 6-7 months from Neuse River Golden Retriever Rescue in Nov 1997 and we were blessed to have this angel in our live's for 11 yrs.

Never let someone tell you that the loss is not the same as losing a person in your life. Sadie's loss has affected me the exact same way as when I lost my dad. Some day's the loss feels less than other's. Some day's, I can talk about her passing without shedding a single tear, some day's I can go almost an entire day without thinking of her.

I know that time will help to heal our grief. But, our family will still be missing that Sadie smile, that Sadie grin ,that happy, excited Sadie bark, that Sadie howl, that Sadie yodel and especially, that warm, furry Sadie body.

Fly free and happy Tater Tot....until we meet again.

Love,

Mama, Daddy and all your furry siblings