- Thread Starter Thread Starter
- #2,121
- Joined
- Sep 7, 2018
- Messages
- 12,695
- Purraise
- 25,237
We tried the shooter.There are two pet food stores I primarily go to because of their combined ability to keep Rawz in stock. Sometimes one is out and I go to the other. Or sometimes Krista has a flavor or batch preference that only one of them can satisfy. One of the managers at one of the stores was the one who recommended the cat-only practice and the particular doctor that Krista is now seeing. By funny coincidence, I ran into an employee from the other store yesterday at the vet's office. Apparently, this is the place that those who feed my cat take their own. I just came back from the first one's store and had a good conversation about how to pred Krista.
A few of the ideas we came up with:
1. Powder it up, mix it something sticky, and push it in her toothless mouth.
Pro: compliance is nearly guaranteed.
Con: probably the most miserable of the options because she will taste the pill and continue to taste it for a long time after.
2. Leave it intact or maybe half it and push it in her mouth.
Pro: compliance easier, but not nearly guaranteed.
Con: still an ability for her to taste it or spit it out.
3. Pill it whole or halved, coated in something smooth like food or yogurt.
Pro: Compliance easier to monitor.
Con: Potential wrestling matches. She is toothless but not clawless. Whatever it's coated in can make things "exciting" on the back end.
4. Pill shooter, followed with a squirt of water.
Pro: Accuracy and with practice, I just might be able to teach her, "pill means treat food"
Con: Potential wrestling matches
There's a pred pill from last night that didn't make it in her. I taste her liquid medicines. I tasted her liquid pred so she never had to. Awful stuff! I'll bite into last night's soggy rejected carpet pred and see what I'm putting her through before I try one of the methods where she might taste it.
But the moment I get her mouth open, her tongue is darting back and forth. "I'm ready to spit out whatever you're going to drop in."
I tried putting the intact pill into her raw rabbit treat portion after I realized she was halfway into it, and the pill was still stuck in the shooter. I'm jumping the gun on the raw rabbit because I need this to be a high value reward that follows. She ate all around it. Then she tried a few times to pick it up and gave up when she couldn't bite into it. I don't blame her. I wouldn't eat something I couldn't get at least one bite. "Why am I eating a stone?"
In the end, after a couple tries at #4 including one where the pill never left the shooter, I decided on a hybrid approach. I pushed the pill into her mouth from the side, held it closed, then squirted in some water.
Once I was sure she swallowed it, and she wasn't just waiting to spit it out, we began her regular dinner since she already finished the treat rabbit portion.
She polished her dinner plate, did a brief groom, and fell into a deep, relaxed cat croissant sleep like a cat that hasn't had post meal pain for months now.