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Animal Rant

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Ok, next. LOL
Well, we moved into the house. I have 3 cats, 2 dogs, a rabbit, and my chickens. The cats, dogs, and rabbit are all indoor animals.
My MIL has 2 cats that she used to let roam outside when she lived in Missouri previously, but kept indoors only in Texas.
Well, about 6 weeks after moving in, I started noticing an odor. I knew what it smelled like, but couldn't figure out who or where. Yes, I knew it was cat urine. My MIL started blaming it on Georgie, my 4 month old kitten. I didn't correct her because he was a male, and had not been neutered yet. It could have been him. We had 2 litter boxes upstairs and 1 downstairs in the bathroom. And these aren't regular littler boxes, but the long under the bed sweater containers. I use those because my cats are rather large, not fat, just very tall and long. I found they had trouble getting inside the regular litter boxes.
I found out that it wasn't my Georgie, at that time anyways. It was MIL's female cat. I caught her in the bathroom, spraying the wall next to the litter box. This continued. I would clean the spot, move the litter box over, and the next day, she's spraying a new spot. She's sprayed in the dining room, the kitchen door, MIL's bed.
About a month after this started, Georgie started acting strange. Constantly roaming the house and crying. Then he started jumping up on the coffee table and peeing on things right in front of you. I immediately started keeping him in my bedroom only and started antibiotics for an urinary infection and started him on distilled water only. I also had him neutered after 2 weeks of antibiotics.
During all of this, some of the cats would jump up on the kitchen counters. Now this is a definite no no for me. My 2 older cats knew not to do it, but MIL's cats had been allowed to jump on the counters all they wanted. And of course, Georgie, being so young, would follow their example. I bought a water pistol to keep them off the counters. MIL started using it to spray my cats whenever they were doing anything she didn't like. Which included them wrestling in the middle of the floor, chasing each other, or trying to play with her cats. I finally got tired of it all, and my poor cats were so traumatized. They would slink around the house, head down, tail tucked, afraid they were gonna get sprayed with water. I moved all my animals upstairs to my bedroom.
I mean all because I had been keeping the rabbit in his cage on our enclosed back porch until she kept complaining that "He's gonna get too cold!" and then moved him inside. I usually give the rabbit his pellet food free choice, and 1 baby carrot and 1 piece of romaine lettuce twice a day. MIL started to feed him grapes, apples, and anything else she could think of. The rabbit started getting diarrhea. I told her it was the fruits and thing she was feeding him, but she wouldn't stop. So to keep the poor rabbit from becoming dehydrated from constant diarrhea, I moved him up to the bedroom.
The dogs had a food and water bowl in the kitchen to begin with. But every time they would get off the couch to go eat or drink, MIL would freak and yell at them to get back on the couch. And I was going through tons of dry food because her cats would keep eating it instead of their dry food. So I moved the food bowls up to the bedroom. Seeing a trend here?
I breed bantam Silkies, a type of chicken. I incubate and hatch the eggs instead of letting the hens do it. I had set up the brooder boxes in the garage because I really didn't want the chickens in the house at all here. Gee, that didn't last long. She griped about them getting too cold again, even though they have heat lamps on them. So into the house they came. I told her, I will give them food and water. You don't have to mess with them. Next thing I know, I've gone through a 5# bag of chick feed in 3 days because she was filling the bowl every time she saw it empty. The bottom of the brooder box was covered with 3 inches of chick food. And since it was on the bottom, the chicks were pooping all over it. So, up to the bedroom with them.
As of right now, I have a rabbit in his cage, 3 brooder boxes of chicks, and 3 cats confined to my bedroom. The dogs come downstairs with me in the morning, stay on the couch all day except when we go outside for exercise, and go back upstairs with me immediately after we eat dinner so I can spend time with the cats and rabbit and the dogs can eat.
My adult Silkies are outside in 2 pens with coops inside them. MIL wanted me to bring them inside because they would get too cold outside. They are chickens!!! They are meant to be outside.
MIL keeps telling me that she doesn't want my cats locked up in the bedroom, but the cats are a hell of a lot happier up there. And I'm happier with them up there because I don't have to go save them from her all day long.
One other thing, cat food. OMG! I'm surprised her cats don't weigh a ton!
She has 2 cats. She feeds them a total of 3 cans of cat food a day, plus all the dry they want to eat, plus all the lunch meat and food off her plate that she gives them. I have 1 cat that has severe food allergies to many different things, including beef and pork. If he gets any of these foods, he vomits, had diarrhea, and breaks out in severe hives. She couldn't remember not to feed my cats table scraps. I barely even give the dogs any as it can upset their digestive systems. Nope, whatever she doesn't eat she gives to the cats, and the dogs if I'm not there to tell her no.
Since moving the animals up to my room, no skin outbreaks on the allergic cat. No urinating outside the litter box for poor Georgie. No being sprayed with water. They run, they play, they wrestle. The rabbit is doing great. No diarrhea. The chicks, some have moved out to the pen with the adults, are walking around in pine shavings, not food. I'm saving a ton of money on chicken food now. But MIL still insists that even during the spring and summer, it will be too cold out for the chicks to go into the garage. Guess she needs to think again. As soon as it starts warming up at nights, into the garage the littlest ones go, and the others get introduced to the adult pen.
Ok, that's my rant for the day. Stay tuned for more.
Yes, there is more....

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