Monty and Rolo playing with a loose piece of pull cord
The last day of 2009 was a significant last for our pussycat boys, as it was the day when they went to the vet to be neutered and microchipped.
Their operations were originally scheduled for 7th January, 2010, but over Christmas, their playfighting started to get a bit serious, and it seemed wise to take action before they found out how to mark their territory as well as indulging in stalking one another and trying to assert their dominance.
So last Thursday, they got put into separate cat carriers (a first for them, as they were small enough to fit in one carrier last time they needed to go in one) and they went to see Laura the vet. She performed their pre-op checks at our local clinic, and said that she could still hear Monty’s hear murmur, but only very faintly. She also looked in Monty’s mouth and confirmed that he no longer had any retained deciduous teeth, which made things simpler. The one surprise was when they went on the scales: Rolo was 3.2kg and Monty was 3.3kg! This is the first time Monty has ever been bigger than Rolo! He doesn’t look bigger, partly due to his dark colour, and partly because he is a neat cat rather than a sprawling cat like Rolo, but I’ve noticed when I pick him up that he’s solid.
Rolo miaowed piteously about being confined to the cat carrier, but when Laura wanted him out for his pre-op checks, he didn’t want to come out. Monty, who is very inquisitive, came straight out of his carrier!
They were transported over to the ParkVets Footscray Animal Hospital so that Laura could use the facilities over there for their operations. She phoned us up once their operations were complete and they were waking up and told us that all had gone well.
They were transported back to our local clinic and we went around to pick them up at 5:15pm – where we found them wearing perspex collars! They had both decided to lick their operation sites, and so they had to be collared. Monty, in particular, had gone a bit mad, and was looking a little inflamed, but Laura said that she was happy with him and he could go home.
We took the collars off to feed them, and Monty flatly refused to wear his again! 😯 He purred while I put it on, but as soon as I let him go, he did a Houdini act on it. The first time, I thought I couldn’t have tied it tight enough, so the second time I tied it as tight as I dared. He still managed to get the perspex part over his ears and was then in danger of choking himself. I didn’t try a third round with him. Rolo accepted his collar back on and lay down and went to sleep.
However, they woke up later and got into a playfight and I think Rolo may have scratched Monty – or maybe Monty’s inflamed nether regions were already sore. Anyway, I noticed that he was bleeding – not badly but just leaving blood where he sat down. I was a bit concerned, so phoned the vet and spoke to the evening duty vet, who turned out to have been present during their operations. She said not to worry, and just to keep an eye on him.
In the morning, Monty was much better, and neither of them seemed to want to lick themselves obsessively in the wrong place, so the collars did not last the recommended 48 hours. Monty, of course, had refused to stay in his, and I’d actually taken Rolo’s off before we went to bed, as he was running into things with it on and I thought he was more likely to get trapped by the collar than lick too much. As they were fine in the morning, I think I made the right decision.
Each cat has a patch of shaved fur on his right leg where a catheter was inserted during their operations. The catheter sites looked somewhat angry when we got them home, but now they just look like bare patches of skin. It will take about 6 weeks for their fur to grow back.
They were a bit subdued the day after their operations. They had a game of “scamper scamper”, but tired themselves out and went to sleep on our bed. They did the same thing again today, but seem almost back to normal now.
The picture was taken today and showed them playing with an old length of pull-cord. They have carted it all over the house. I thought it was in the kitchen, but it turned up on our bed.