Hissing And Growling At New Kitten Till His Voice Is Hoarse?

[Olwince]

This is my very first post on the forum, so hello everyone!

This has been a one cat family for over 7 years, our cat Gimli is 8.5 years old. About a month ago I adopted a new kitten, who is 5 months old now. Both are neutered.

For the first week they seemed like they were on the path to getting along, no fighting and just some minor hissing and growling. Gimli is a semi-outdoor cat, he hangs out with his neighbor cat on the balcony and the small enclosed yard. About three weeks ago Gimli's voice started to sound scratchy and soon he wasn't able to meow. He had a throat infection and coughed up a huge wad of smelly phlegm on the way back from the vet. We separated the two cats and after ten days of lysine, antibiotics, herbal tinctures and homemade chicken broth, he got his voice back.

Two days after we reintroduced the cats though, Gimli's voice is hoarse again, a very quiet and scratchy meow. He still hisses and growls at the kitten.

There has been no other obvious symptom, no discharges beside that one instant of mucus two weeks ago, he has good aptitude and thirst, and goes to the litter box fine, although for the last couple days I mainly see him doing his business in the yard. He only urinates at two corner of his litter box, but no poop.

He's begs to get into my room more often, which I only let him in occasionally. Over the years it has became kind of a "last resort" safe space for him when there are strangers in the house.

I'm not sure what to do now, is the voice lost caused by hissing and growling? In my opinion it isn't excessive, he isn't vocalizing unless kitten gets really close. Should I separated them again?

I would love to hear any advice or similar experiences. Feel free to ask any questions, too.

 

[susanm9006]

I would have the vet see him. He could have an upper respiratory infection or a throat infection requiring antibiotics.

 

[Olwince]

Hi susanm9006,

We did take Gimli to the vet and he's already gone through a seven day course of antibiotics, and he did have a throat infection. As I mentioned, he was meowing completely normal after that, actually he got better as soon as he got the phlegm out (which was in the car, on the way back from the vet). His meowing stayed fine for a couple days, until they spent more time together last night.

 

[susanm9006]

I would at least call the wet then. It could his throat is still a bit raw and hissing made it worse but it could also be that the antibiotics didn’t quite knock out the infection.

 

[Olwince]

It could be so. We think we will call a different vet we saw years ago, hopefully she's still around. We took him to the closest vet in our neighborhood, and it wasn't a helpful visit. The nurse took a questionnaire, the vet then came in and start saying the food is no good, no more treats, it's all junk food, that we must feed him one particular brand they carried. He didn't listen at all, so we just got the Clavamox and left.

 

[Olwince]

So after talking to a couple friends who are vet nurses, and reading more on this site, I'm giving Gimli lysine supplements (the very first thing I got was lysine chews, but that was a miss and he didn't like it. He's ok with powder mixed in food), probiotics (kefir) and herbal immune supplement droplets (echinacea, goldenseal, etc). Since he's got no other signs of sickness, we're hoping it's just a bit of lingering infection with some behavioral factor.

 

[Olwince]

I'd like to report back that after 4 days with herbal supplement + kefir and just two days with l-lysine & cranberry power (~500mg/day mixed in food, he actually don't mind this one), Gimli is vocalizing noticeably better this morning, although not completely normal. I did also spend extra time with both cats for a couple days - Netflix marathon and then sleeping on the sofa all night together. Still a mystery of whether it's behavioral, infection, or combination of both, but in any case, hope it'll all be normal soon, fingers crossed.