Ragdoll Cat Forums

Lordy .. I feel as though Im not doing anything right as of late ...

A very good friend of mine needed help in the form of having his 15 week old kitten minded while his landlord goes over for an inspection. We are close friends so I volunteered to hold her for a night until after the inspection.

This is all fine as we have a decent sized cage in our living room which she is currently in where contact cannot me made except a paw through the bars. Earlier on we see black dots in her ears, some of which appears to be under the skin (ear mites??) and we were just told in casual conversation that she once had a weepy eye.

Yikes.

Are we in danger of contracting anything here?? The only contact that has occurred is between Lancelot and her but they only sniffed each others noses. We have washed our hands thoroughly each time after handling her.

Oh Dear, sorry you feel like this. I know you were only trying to do the right thing by your friend. I can understand you being worried though, I would be too, you just never know do you. Hopefully someone can reassure you.

Don't feel bad you were just being nice,, stuff like this can happen.
You have used good hygiene but ,I was told by the vet that virus are carry in the air .
so if she has a virus it will be a wait and see 7 to 10 days after contact. Do you use revolution I think that kills fleas and ear mites.
JanH I'm sure will be around to help out.

We do use Revolution and in fact they are all due for a dose tomorrow.

There doesnt appear to be anything wrong with her eyes now. They look absolutely fine apart from the crusty stuff around it (now removed). I have my eye on those mites though .....

Jan?? Input needed

You can get exposure from such contacts, but the most dangerous are blood borne, which was not possible from the cage. Vaccinations and probably past exposure are effective for good protection against the URIs. The Revolution should help on the mites, which seems the only active issue. Better to have avoided any contact.

Cat sitting in your home is not for catteries unless you have a quarantine type space available at the time and even then there is risk to it.

(08-29-2010 12:15 PM)JanH Wrote: [ -> ]Cat sitting in your home is not for catteries unless you have a quarantine type space available at the time and even then there is risk to it.

Thanks for your reply Jan.

You are indeed correct - catteries aren't meant for this kind of thing and we knew this before we accepted the kitten in. My friend was stuck though. He got the "Oh we are visiting first thing tomorrow" call and his parents are away on holidays. This will be an isolated incident as the parents should be home next time.

Mind you, if I didn't have somewhere to put her away from ours I would not have let her stay here regardless of the situation, but she has been sitting in a rather large cage where we can see her with no real contact with another cat. I am extremely paranoid when it comes to their safety though and even more protective of them, hence me asking this question.

Update - the little bub we were minding has been given the all clear by the vet *phew*! The alleged ear mites were in fact bits of dark ear wax (could've fooled me!), and she doesn't seem to have cat flu (or anything else that might cause eye crusties ew). Sigh of relief!