After months of work, stress and headaches, the second half of July has finally arrived and with it those vacations that you have been planning for months. Maybe you go to the Rías Baixas, the Canary Islands or Southeast Asia, the fact is that you will be away for two weeks and there are a loose end that you have not yet resolved: Who, when and how is going to take care of your cat? If it were a dog you could take it to a dog hotel or maybe leave it with your parents, but… And a kitten?
Are there hotels for cats? Is it advisable to move them to an apartment that they do not know or is prepared for them? Better that someone go home to take care of them? Noelia Hernández, feline educator in Feline Codehas some keys.
Feeders overflowing, and that’s it. If you are going to be away from home for several days (even if not many) the option of leaving your cat alone and unsupervised is not an option. Even if you leave the feeders full, a couple of bowls overflowing with water and the sandboxes just changed. “It is not contemplated even under the law,” warns Noelia Hernández, who recalls that the Animal Welfare Law (LBA) regulates the maximum time that an animal can be alone.
In your article 27 (section “i”) the rule leaves the responsibilities of guardians in black and white. And one of them is to guarantee that your furry companion will not be unattended for more than 72 hours. To be precise, the law expressly prohibits “leaving any pet animal unsupervised for more than three consecutive days.” If we talk about dogs, that period is reduced to 24 hours.
“Also a weekend”. Regardless of what the law says, Hernández remembers that even leaving a cat unsupervised on a weekend entails serious risks to its health. The reason: if the animal is alone and no one watches it, it is very difficult to know how it behaves, if it feeds, drinks and visits the sandbox.
“A cat that spends 24 hours without going to the litter box, eating or drinking is a cat that urgently needs veterinary attention,” the expert emphasizes. He doesn’t exaggerate. In addition to dehydration, fasting can lead to hypoglycemia either hepatic lipidosis. That he does not go to the sandbox also reveals a urinary obstruction. Hence, Hernández advises that, even if we are only going to be away from home for a weekend, it is recommended that the cat not be left unattended.
What if I take the cat with me? If you plan to move to a rental apartment on the coast and stay there for the rest of the summer until September, taking your minimum companion with you is an option, although you should take several factors into account. The first, recalls Hernández, is that “the cat is a territorial animal and changes in its environment cause a lot of stress.” “The car trip can be very stressful for them and there can also be a lot of risks,” he insists.
At the end of the day, you may have your house ready, but… And that apartment where you are going to stay? Are the windows protected with nets to prevent falling? Are you sure there won’t be people coming and going without watching for the cat to escape? Not only that. Hernández remembers that yes the apartment is pet friendly It is quite likely that traces of other animals remain.
Territorial animals. The same thing happens if we decide to remove the cat from its usual home and temporarily transfer it to that of a family member or friend who will take care of it or even if we opt for a feline hotel, that there are. Hernández advocates “assessing the risks” and remembering that cats are territorial animals. If we want to avoid stress, “it is always best to leave them in their territory.”
The figure of catsitter. That does not mean that there are no options to go on vacation without neglecting the well-being of our kitten companion. Hernández remembers the figure of catsittera home cat care professional.
“If they have training, they are people who also know how to maintain environmental enrichment when they get home,” explains the expert before emphasizing that idea: the ideal is not only for a person to go a couple of times a day to watch our pet and supervise the litter boxes and food, but to interact with them.
“If the person who is going to come is trustworthy, we try to get the cats to know her first, to have seen her previously and to be aware of the routines and know as much as possible about them. Cats are animals of habit,” Hernández explains about her specific case. To ensure that everything is going well, another option is to use surveillance cameras in the food area and sandboxes.
“A little outline”. That the person who is going to come to our house has been in contact with cats is important. Both for the animals and for the caregiver himself, who will thus handle more keys to carry out his job.
“When I leave, I like to leave a small diagram of what is normal and what is not in each of my cats: how they like to play and eat, in what areas they stay and what symptoms are strange. For example, that they hide in a certain place or that they do not eat their favorite treat. The person who comes from outside does not know them.”
It is about, summarizes Hernández, giving “a cheat sheet” to the caregiver so that they can quickly detect the “alarm” signs when something is not going well. “I always leave the carriers set up for any emergency and I tell the contact who comes to the house which is our reference veterinary hospital and the nearby 24-hour center in case of an emergency. Imagine that they can’t contact us… so they know what protocol I would like them to follow.”
Extreme caution. The premise is very simple: cats (like any other pet) are not a whim, they are companions whose care we have decided to take on. And that forces us to take extreme precautions when we are not at home, just like with children. Although we have a catsitter or a trusted person who comes to our home, Hernández states that it is important that we eliminate any potential risks before packing your bags.
“I like to check that there is absolutely nothing at home that could cause accidents or dangerous cables. That is, before leaving, especially on a trip, I check that everything is well closed, that they do not have access to any area that could be more dangerous than necessary, that all the cables are collected and that all the cane toys are also stored so that they cannot drown.”
Images | Raymond Yeung (Unsplash), Mariana Cassini (Unsplash) and Viktoriia Muzyka (Unsplash)
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