Monday, March 1, 2010

Cleo's skin problem

One of my adult cats, Cleo, was having a bad skin problem since months ago.  She had these bald pink patches in the lower part of her body.  I've taken her to vets, and they said it's nothing serious.  Probably caused by stress.  All the vets could do was to give her a steroid jab, but that did not quite help either. 

Cleo is rather stressed as she has had to fight for her place with the alphas, Cow and Bunny, but she is a fierce little thing, and has managed to establish her rightful place in the house (after a period of being challenged).  Cats politics!  Even we humans can't intervene much.  But my husband has been protecting her a lot, and that helped. 

We used to say Cleo is the only "bumiputera" in the house because she was born inside my daughter's wardrobe.  So, rightfully she should be Queen!

But anyway, here's a sharing on Cleo's skin problem.  I started giving her raw chicken breast meat plus the skin about 1 1/2 months ago, and I've seen tremendous improvement in her skin. 

Here's what the bald patches used to look like (photo taken months ago):

She had it on both sides of her body.  The other side was much worse, and the patches bigger.

From bald pink patches, this is what it looks like now (photo taken today):

It looks completely healed.

The other side used to be much worse, with large pink patches.  Now, the fur is growing back and it is no longer pink.  This is already a tremendous improvement from what it used to be.

The Calico queen.

Those who swear by BARF (Bones and Raw Food) will testify its goodness.  But there are some who say otherwise, so it's up to us to try.  Moderation is the key, I suppose.  It may work for some, but may not, for others.  But there's no harm trying if we do it gradually, and monitor progress.  After all, it's using natural foods, and not drugs.   

I started by giving Cleo small amounts, and now, she gets only chicken breast meat and the skin (she LOVES the skin) in the morning.  It's still kibbles at other times of the day.  She did not like bones or other parts of the chicken. 

The Queen dictates what she wants!

The vets have advised that it may be good to frequently deworm a pet who is on raw food.  But some BARF exponents say this is not necessary as their gut has enough flora to handle the worms. 

Play it by ear, I suppose.  And always do things in moderation.     

2 comments:

lupie said...

Very likely stress - one of my cat TIGER started turning bald - with patches all over her ... we tried shampoo, took her to the vet, can't find any mites, gave her those flea spray .. still she continued balding until we let her lived outdoor!

She is a furball now - I guess she liked the outdoor better plus she looks happier with the other strays though she hiss and spat at them!

Anonymous said...

My cat had it once, one vet said it was stress, nothing else and asked me to treat her like a queen and advised all sorts of de-stress actions. A second vet suspectied some allergy and promptly inspected for fleas and did an ear swap. After searching and searching under the microscope, h finally found ONE single mite in the swap from ONE ear which had traces of some very, very faint dirt (found none in the other which looked very clean) and prescribed ivermec. Problem cleared at once. Yes, she behaves like a queen too. If not hormonal, might be some bite allergy. Frontline-combo-ed?