Topic: FIV and non-FIV cats in the same house (Read 14169 times)

Sylvia · « **Reply #20 on:** April 24, 2007, 13:41:08 PM »

Thanks for asking Lottie. The reintroductions haven't gone quite as well as we would have liked.

It was pretty uneventful the first couple of times that we opened the living room door, Tatty wasn't even too bothered about coming out initially, but more recently he has ventured a bit further through the hallway to the study and kitchen, and he has even been upstairs twice. The first 2 times that Tatty came out, the rest of the gang had gone out, so he was only being introduced to their scents first. Every inch of skirting board in the hallway has now been thoroughly sniffed

. He has met Gizzy several times, and even though he doesn't seem too bad with her, she is not very keen on him

, and she just wants to run away from him. On the occasions when he went upstairs, Suki just disappeared into her hiding places that she has up there

. He doesn't seem to like Tommy or Sweepy at all

. If either of the boys attempt to come into the living room, he tries to go for them, and if he meets them in the kitchen none of them look at all happy.

I don't know if I am doing things wrong, and being over protective of Tommy and Sweepy, but when Tatty does try to go for them, I am always there and I either sit on the floor between them or put my hands between them to ensure that they are safe.

We think that because Tatty has been in the living and dining rooms since the beginning of December last year, he thinks that these rooms are HIS territory in which he feels confident, and he is trying to defend it from all the others now.

At the moment, Tatty is back to being restricted to the living and dining rooms, with the living room door shut during the day, and left ajar in the evenings, so the existing furry residents can see and smell Tatty, and he can see and smell them. This is obviously going to take quite a long time for everyone to settle. I am hoping that we can retry the introductions again over the next few weekends, when Jim and I can both supervise

.

Team Svartalfheims · « **Reply #19 on:** April 23, 2007, 15:03:23 PM »

How is Tatty doing now Sylvia? How did the reintroductions go?

Millys Mum · « **Reply #18 on:** March 31, 2007, 18:07:14 PM »

Thats great news

Sylvia · « **Reply #17 on:** March 30, 2007, 19:53:47 PM »

Quote from: Millys Mum on March 30, 2007, 18:54:40 PM

hows he getting on behaviour wise?

Tatty is still on his own in our living and dining rooms, and his behaviour with people is getting better all the time. Last month, occasionally he still used to get a little over excited when I was stroking him, and would attempt to shred my forearm. However, he seems to be far more relaxed now, and he hasn't attempted to do this to me in over a month now. Over the the last week or so I think he has been getting a little bored of being restricted to 2 rooms, and he has been attempting come with us when we leave the room - not sure if this is because of the boredom, or because he just wants company

.

We were thinking that we would let him out into a few more rooms in the house for a short while this weekend, but without access to the others at first, so he can get used to their scents. He had already been associating with the others before moving in, but any reintroductions will be handled very slowly and one at a time

.

Millys Mum · « **Reply #16 on:** March 30, 2007, 18:54:40 PM »

Glad Gizzy is ok

Sorry about Tatty tho, but as you say with his history etc you knew there was a high chance

hows he getting on behaviour wise?
Be good Tatty and you get to socialise

Sylvia · « **Reply #15 on:** March 30, 2007, 13:40:55 PM »

The blood test results are back, and Gizzy's results are negative for FIV

.

As the vet said, Tatty's result was as he thought it would be, and his has come back as positive for FIV

Even though I told myself to expect this, I still felt a bit down about it last night.

On the bright side, we are still coping, its no different to what we thought before, and at least Tatty's flu symptoms don't seem to have come back in the 2-3 weeks since he finished has second course of antibiotics

Tiggy's Mum · « **Reply #14 on:** March 26, 2007, 00:10:41 AM »

Keeping everything crossed for you

Millys Mum · « **Reply #13 on:** March 25, 2007, 16:12:39 PM »

Good luck

Desley (booktigger) · « **Reply #12 on:** March 25, 2007, 10:13:34 AM »

Good luck with the blood tests.

Ela · « **Reply #11 on:** March 25, 2007, 10:07:32 AM »

Quote

Now all we have to do is wait for the results to come back next week...

Fingers crosses for a positive outcome, well negative in this case but you know what I mean.

Sylvia · « **Reply #10 on:** March 24, 2007, 23:05:10 PM »

Have had quite a busy week!

Took Tatty in to the vets for microchipping and his Glasgow FIV blood retest on Wednesday morning, and despite having nasty things stuck in him, even though they said that he was getting a little bit grumpy towards the end of the procedures, I thought that he was really well behaved. Considering that the CP vets thought he couldn't be handled, I was so proud of him.

Gizzy went to the vet on Friday evening for her booster vaccinations, biannual checkup and FIV blood test. Usually she is so well behaved, and purrs for the vet, but this time the blood extraction must have hurt her, and she screamed for all she was worth, bit me, and has probably ended up with a bruised paw. My poor little girl!!! I am so glad that it is all over now.

Hopefully these 2 are the last Glasgow tests that we need to get done.

Now all we have to do is wait for the results to come back next week...

Sylvia · « **Reply #9 on:** March 08, 2007, 22:51:02 PM »

Desley,

That is good to hear. When Tatty bites now, he doesn't break my skin. He only did that once, and that was during the 6 weeks after he was neutered (whilst his hormones were still settling down), and he has changed dramatically for the better since then. After we have had the Glasgow tests carried out on both Tatty and Gizzy, if he continues like he is now or gets even calmer, we could let him associate with the rest of the furry gang again.

Sylvia

Desley (booktigger) · « **Reply #8 on:** March 08, 2007, 08:02:37 AM »

Sylvia - it actually has to be quite a deep bite to transmit to another cat, which is why it is mainly seen in unneutered toms as they do fight and bite the females neck for mating - play bites aren't normally that deep.

Sylvia · « **Reply #7 on:** March 07, 2007, 20:13:27 PM »

Really appreciate everyone's thoughts.

When Tatty first joined us indoors (last December), so we could get him scanned for a microchip, he was scared of people, and even though he had been visiting us since January 2005, he wouldn't let us get very close to him. He seemed very like Isaac, who is mentioned in another thread in this section. Tatty didn't particularly look like he was trying to associate with our furry residents during that time. It was only when I was made redundant in August last year that I found out how often he was actually visiting us to grab whatever food he could. Due to the time that we have been able to spend with him, Tatty no longer tries to kill us, and has shown very little desire to escape to the outdoors. In fact, he now looks forward to human company, and loves to be stroked, purrs like an old pro, and is improving all the time, but occasionally he can still be a little unpredictable. Unfortunately, when he does have his mad moments, the first thing he does is bite. For this reason, we feel that Tatty needs to be kept apart from the rest of our furry gang, for the time being. If Tatty's behaviour continues to improve, as it has done since the beginning of the year, we may reconsider what we are going to do.

In the meantime, further to Desley's suggestion on my newbie thread, I will get Tatty retested (the Glasgow one) later this month (March), at the same time that I take Gizzy in for her vaccinations and Glasgow FIV test.

Sylvia

Liz · « **Reply #6 on:** March 07, 2007, 12:10:55 PM »

I'm sure this debate will go on but as aside bar imagine the following:

Your cat has a fight in the neighbourhood and comes home with an abcess - do you test for FIV to be on the safe side or does life continue as normal with antibiotics.

We can't test all our own cats everytime one has issues in "the hood" or we would all be bankrupt.

Sometimes our own could be infected but it doesn't change who they are it just makes us ground them until they learn to behave!

We have a multi household of feral, domestic and a raggie and only once have I tested 20 because we found out that a feral had shared a home with an FIV piositive boy and CP thought we should test just to be on the safe side - lo and behold non were positive at tht time but it was to late really as Shadow had been with mine for 5 months and made friends with the others so was staying regardless of the outcome.

Holly was a feral with nowhere to go having been trapped by a farmer and taken to our vets to be put to sleep, our vet did all the injections, neutering etc and phoned us to see if we could take her on as it was Christmas and sher had nowhere to go, she arrived the day before I burried my mother and although humans weren't her thing in the short time she was with us I wouldn't have swapped her for the world she had a good 8 months with friends, good food and above all some people who loved her with no reservations even if she did shred us on occassion humans were her issue but cats and dogs her family.

Millys Mum · « **Reply #5 on:** March 07, 2007, 11:01:38 AM »

If i found out one of mine was positive i'd leave them as they are, they dont fight and as Desley says the chances of transmission are very low.

Celia Hammond Trust in London home FIV+ve cats as normal pets

http://www.celiahammond.org/index.php?module=pagemaster&PAGE_user_op=view_page&PAGE_id=14&MMN_position=21:21

Desley (booktigger) · « **Reply #4 on:** March 07, 2007, 08:15:27 AM »

Studies have been done to show that the transmission rate is as low as 1-2%. As long as the cats are introduced well and there is no fighting, I personally would let them mix. Good luck.

Ela · « **Reply #3 on:** March 07, 2007, 08:13:21 AM »

We would not home a FIV cat where there were already 'normal' cats in a household. However, If I had a cat and it was found to be FIV+ and had lived with my other cats for a period of time and none of them were aggressive I think I would just let them continue to live together. I know one fosterer (not now with us) had four cats, 1 was very ill and proved FIV+ and it was necessary to PTS, she had the other 3 tested and one was FIV+, because they had lived together for a time and there was no knowing how long the cat had been FIV+ she just let them continue to live together and they all lived their considered normal lifespan. Of course she then kept all her cat indoors.

Liz · « **Reply #2 on:** March 06, 2007, 19:48:27 PM »

We had 36 non FIV ans our lster Hissy Holly a feral who we loved for 8 months till her FIV caught up with her.

All our others are fine and seemed to love Holly who was a runner not a fighter, she hated humans but even in her short life moved 150 miles with the rest and is now sleeping peacefully on the shelf in our bedroom till the garden of remembrance is done in the summer.

it is possible to mix there are some good american sites for this - will look up some of them for you.

Holly interacted with the others and the dogs and although never like humans did grow to love the others and her best friend Sailor was with her at the end at he is another untouchable but he seemed to bond with Holly and still seems to miss her even though she only owned us for a short while - her story is in the Rainbow bridge section under Hissy Holly of fetternear

Sylvia · « **Reply #1 on:** March 06, 2007, 19:27:39 PM »

We have had an FIV cat, called Tatty, since December last year. We found out that he was FIV+ when we took him to the CP vet to get him neutered. As both they and our own vet have said that Tatty needs to be kept separate from our existing 4 cats, he now stays in our living and dining rooms, whilst the other 4 have the run of the rest of the house. Generally, if I stay in with Tatty, then my OH will be with the rest of the gang, and vice versa. We have had the Glasgow test carried out on Sweepy, Suki and Tommy when their various vaccinations and half-yearly checkups were due in January and February, and all 3 have come back as negative

. Gizzy will be tested later this month when her vaccinations are due.

So far, the arrangements seem to be working fairly well, apart that my OH and myself don't seem to be seeing quite as much of each other nowadays

.

Does anyone else out there have any advice on anything that we could be doing when you have FIV and non-FIV cats in the same house, or whether we should be doing anything differently?

Sylvia

Author Topic: FIV and non-FIV cats in the same house (Read 14169 times)