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- Sep 26, 2017
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My three kitties are all strictly indoor cats. I'm very aware of which indoor plants/flowers are poisonous to cats, and don't have much of a green thumb anyway, so my homes have always been plant/cut flowers free.
However, last Mother's Day, my daughter picked some flowers from a bush in our front yard and put them in a vase on our dining room table. We rent the house we live in, and because our cats never go outside (combined with our general disinterest in things growing in the great outdoors), neither of us knew the name of the bush from which she plucked the flowers, nor whether it was one poisonous to cats.
You can guess where this is leading, right?
My cat, Nico, decided the flowers looked tasty, and unbeknowst to either of us at the time, nibbled a few. About an hour and a half later, Nico was running around the house as if he was being chased. The skin on his back was rippling and twitching, and he kept stopping to lick areas of his back/sides - as if he was being bitten by fleas. He was also panting.
That's when we noticed the stem from one of the flowers on the floor under the table.
My daughter immediately went outside to snap a photo of the plant, and we both began frantically Googling; a few minutes later we identified the bush as an Azalea - toxic to cats.
I whisked Nico over to the vet right away. 24 hours and $200.00 later, he was fine, thank God. My daughter and I are now aware of the dangers of Azaleas (and will never bring cuttings from anything growing outside indoors ever again without first properly identifying it as being safe around kitties).
However, in the months since the incident, I've begun to wonder; why do cats allowed outdoors (usually) seem to avoid the plants/bushes/flowers poisonous to cats, while strictly indoor cats appear to be drawn to ALL plants/flowers, safe or not?
In our neighborhood, azaleas, rhododendron, and tiger lilies are prolific, and many of my neighbors allow their cats to roam outdoors. Yet in the 11 years we've lived here, we've never seen a cat knawing on a poisonous plant (but we have observed cats chomping on grass), nor heard of any cat becoming ill/dying because they ate something they shouldn't (except my own cat, of course!).
I've tried, unsuccessfully, to research the answer to this question, except for the following I found and am quoting from -Beware Of Poison Plants For Cats:
"For cats living outside, [poisonous plants are] risky business, but they will rely on their internal alarms to let them know what to eat and what to stay away from."
I don't know how reliable this site is, and furthermore, this quote, while appearing to support my belief outdoor cats tend to avoid harmful plants/flowers, doesn't answer the question "Why?". If this "internal alarm" the quote alludes to exists, why would it not be present in indoor kitties?
Any ideas?
However, last Mother's Day, my daughter picked some flowers from a bush in our front yard and put them in a vase on our dining room table. We rent the house we live in, and because our cats never go outside (combined with our general disinterest in things growing in the great outdoors), neither of us knew the name of the bush from which she plucked the flowers, nor whether it was one poisonous to cats.
You can guess where this is leading, right?
My cat, Nico, decided the flowers looked tasty, and unbeknowst to either of us at the time, nibbled a few. About an hour and a half later, Nico was running around the house as if he was being chased. The skin on his back was rippling and twitching, and he kept stopping to lick areas of his back/sides - as if he was being bitten by fleas. He was also panting.
That's when we noticed the stem from one of the flowers on the floor under the table.
My daughter immediately went outside to snap a photo of the plant, and we both began frantically Googling; a few minutes later we identified the bush as an Azalea - toxic to cats.
I whisked Nico over to the vet right away. 24 hours and $200.00 later, he was fine, thank God. My daughter and I are now aware of the dangers of Azaleas (and will never bring cuttings from anything growing outside indoors ever again without first properly identifying it as being safe around kitties).
However, in the months since the incident, I've begun to wonder; why do cats allowed outdoors (usually) seem to avoid the plants/bushes/flowers poisonous to cats, while strictly indoor cats appear to be drawn to ALL plants/flowers, safe or not?
In our neighborhood, azaleas, rhododendron, and tiger lilies are prolific, and many of my neighbors allow their cats to roam outdoors. Yet in the 11 years we've lived here, we've never seen a cat knawing on a poisonous plant (but we have observed cats chomping on grass), nor heard of any cat becoming ill/dying because they ate something they shouldn't (except my own cat, of course!).
I've tried, unsuccessfully, to research the answer to this question, except for the following I found and am quoting from -Beware Of Poison Plants For Cats:
"For cats living outside, [poisonous plants are] risky business, but they will rely on their internal alarms to let them know what to eat and what to stay away from."
I don't know how reliable this site is, and furthermore, this quote, while appearing to support my belief outdoor cats tend to avoid harmful plants/flowers, doesn't answer the question "Why?". If this "internal alarm" the quote alludes to exists, why would it not be present in indoor kitties?
Any ideas?