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Dear Yvette,

My son had two rescued greyhounds. They were let out into their own fenced yard and began to chase what turned out to be a cat. The cat turned on the dogs, biting and scratching at them. Two days later the female began to swell around the neck. Both dogs were taken to the vet. The female spent three days on I.V. at the clinic and is now better. The male was cleaned up. It was not until two weeks later that the male started running a fever. He was taken back to the vet, but the infection has spread to his organs. After several days at the clinic he died from a cat scratch. The vet bill was over $2000.00. Both these dogs are blood donor dogs. We do not know who owns the cat, but are sure someone owns him.

Please can you ask people to control their cats, and let people know that the scratches can quickly lead to serious infections? What if this had been a child?

Muriel

Sadly, this is not the first time I have heard of dogs getting sent to the vet from a cat scratch. Before I get letters saying that I hate cats, I actually like them. But, I expect cat owners to follow the same rules as dog owners. I treat both equally.

Cat owners who let their animals roam may feel that their felines do not offend their neighbors. Think again.

The main reason that neighbors do not line up to complain is simple. It is very difficult to know if an outdoor cat is owned or feral. Even if you know the animal is owned, it can be difficult to find out who owns the cat. That puts other people in a bit of a dilemma. Does one pick up a cat and take it to a shelter, or do you ignore it hoping it goes home? If the cat causes an injury, how is one to know who the owner is?

You are correct that cat scratches are very prone to infection. Parents should teach children not to handle stray cats.

I do not blame the cat in this situation. The dogs ran up, and he defended himself. I do not blame the dogs. They saw a cat on their property and ran after it. I don't blame the dog's owner. They were in a secure area on their own property. Do we really expect people to clear their own yard of other people's animals before taking out a dog?

But the cat's owner is out there somewhere. We probably will never know who that is. But chances are they are completely oblivious to the damage they have done. They do not know how badly they have hurt the emotions of this owner. And they are not the ones stuck with several thousand dollars in medical bills. They do not know their cat killed another animal.

But the most disturbing to me is that this was completely preventable. There are fence toppers that confine cats. They are easily installed, and apparently quite effective. Cat owners can let their animals outside, and rest assured that the animal would remain confined. Adequate fencing by both parties, not just the dog owner, would have allowed both animals the ability to enjoy the outdoors safely.

Yvette is an award winning pet writer and pet behavior columnist. She also is the author of Meeting Milo, a North American dog bite prevention program to reduce the approximately 2 million children bit by dogs annually. She is the owner of AwesomeDogs.ca and works as a behavior consultant in London, Ontario.

This column was originally featured in The Londoner
See more of Yvette... www.awesomedogs.ca
www.meetingmilo.com

Yvette has 2 dogs of her own, KIKI and KAYA. Take a look...

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