Kitten vaccinations

[gritsar]

Very, very well put patandchickens. You don't let your children go without vaccination and my pets are my children. Like I said, made that one mistake with Bekka; it'll never happen again.
Love to talk to you about bats sometime. I think they are awesome and an important part of our ecological system. I plan to include a few bathouses in my garden plans this spring. We have a big mosquito problem here.

 

[Wildsky]

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Lots of people do - you just don't hear about them, and they don't talk about it over tea.

 

[Lunachick]

That's right Wildsky. I know plenty of people who don't vax their kids for fear of SIDS. I'm not sure how accurate the info is on that, but the fear is real. And I know of people who have vaccinated their cats, and the poor kitties get tumors where the needle went. That's why they (Vets) give one shot yearly instead of the 3-year shot (dose).

 

[Poison Ivy]

The local humane society here has a thrift store that you can go in to buy discount spay/neuter certificates. The local vets honor them so I was able to get my cat done for $30. I also go to pet supermarket or TSC for shots. Plus where I live we have a neuter commuter that travels to different locations and they also due shots for $25 and I believe they spay & neuter for $25. So you might want to call your local humane society to see if they sell the certificates.

 

[patandchickens]

Quote:
Oh no, I'm not getting sucked into a vaccinations debate!

Suffice to say that, having made sure to go into the original sources of information and think hard before acting, what I personally do is this:

I ALWAYS ALWAYS keep horses and cats current on rabies vacc's (because rabies is incurable, always fatal, very contagious to other animals and to people, is not that rare in the places I've lived, and because having unvaccinated animals biting someone or contacting a rabid animal can require making those animals very miserable or even putting them down irrespective of health).

The horses are always kept current on tetanus, too, because tetanus is not uncommon and is fatal-to-merely-very-expensive. They also get West Nile vax these days, since it is not uncommon here now, is fatal-to-expensive, and we live in a giant mosquito swamp here hoo boy let me tell you! But that is all.

The horses do not get vaccs for encephalitis or PHF (almost absent up here), strangles (vaccine does not work well), or any rhino/flu vaccs (my guys have no direct exposure to other horses and those vaccines only last a couple months anyhow, so IMO why do it unless your horse mingles with others a lot) (I would do a broodmare w/rhino vaccine, because that's a common cause for loss of the pregnancy. Not that I will ever have a broodmare)

MY [indoor] cats get the combo resp disease vaccine (fvrcp) ONLY in years when I expect New Cat Acquisition, such as this year since our oldest cat is doing poorly. I would skip even this vacc if I had the means (and self-control <g>) to do 2 or 3 wks isolation of new cats or if I had more savings for treating sick cats.

I do not do FeLeuk vacc's, as it makes WAY more sense to have new cats tested before introducing to household. (Have they changed the FeLeuk vacc to eliminate the sarcoma problem? I haven't looked into it for some years.) New cats get FeLeuk/FIV tested... I'm willing to take the chance, which is certainly no higher than rate of vaccine failure, that a new cat in newly infected and thus false negative. Mind, if I had an outdoor cat I would probably do fvrcp anf FeLeuk every year.

(Edited to add: and my kids are vaccinated for some things and not for others)

I do not think it's wise to lump all vaccinations into one simple basket.


Pat

 

[chickbea]

Let me just say this about being so sure that your indoor critter won't be exposed to rabies:
Last summer, I was sitting in my living room on a lovely evening, and what skitters across the floor but a bat, with my tiny three pound house rabbit in hot pursuit! I got the bat outside, and inspected bunny, who didn't appear to be bitten. I called my vet the next day, because certainly bunny hadn't ever had a rabies shot. My vet had to refer me to the state rabies hotline, who called the state veterinarian; all were clueless as to what to do, because who has ever heard of a rabbit attacking a bat?

So, you just never know what two animals may end up interacting with each other!
Bunny is fine, by the way, although as fiesty as ever!

 

[peepkeeper]

We had bats last year, and the cats naturally chased them . And you can carry in some diseases on your shoes, like distemper. Not worth the risk to me. I'd never forgive myself if my pet died a painful death while I had the knowledge to easily prevent it.

 

[Chirpy]

Not that this is a long history but we've given all our animals their shots for almost ten years and thus far never had ANY issue with any of the shots. (dogs, cats, horses, llamas)

We are required by law to have rabies given by a vet so that we do with our cats and dogs - it also gives the vet a chance to see the animals and talk with us about any questions we may have. Both our vets support our decision to give our own shots - they take care of the 'big' stuff (surgeries, seriously sick animal, etc.) and we do the little stuff.

 

[EweSheep]

Now I do recall having a bat that accidently came into our house one evening and now there is a reason for it. Thanks for reminding me about bats...just plump forgot about it. One thing I can say that how the bat came in, was when I went outside late at night to shut up my chickens for the night and came back in. Opening doors wide open was enough for them to fly in. So that is the only time it was in the house. Scared the crap out of everyone and had to tell hubby when he got home from late night shift to get the bat out of my bedroom! Unfortunately my cat was in the bedroom but never seem to bother the bat but just watched it perched on one of the curtain. One butt ugly thing but hubby released it outside with towels and gloves. Bats have a purpose in our city limits too...keeps mostiquoes down and I dont like killing them even they are ugly. Fruit bats are much cuter LOL! My own mother said I should have killed it and we said no way, we just take all the precaution and get the bat out of the house.

I do recall in our newspaper that bats in our area found dead, DID have rabies....so I can not see taking too big of a chance to get it bitten, either the cat gets bitten or bat bites the cat and then cat playbites a person and then liability will hit us hard. I believe the animal control have found FOUR dead bats in our city that died of rabies or ran into accident that tested positive for rabies.

I will check around for the low cost spay thing and will also look around for rabies low cost programs as well. I can vaccinate my kitten for other stuff and will stick with the lowest combo vaccine I can find like the two way or three way. It gets so confusing to get conflicting info from different vets and all of them say you do need this and you dont need that. I certainly need to do my homework and decide whats best for my kitten even the previous cats I had never gave me any problems at all. Will check into the Jeffers link for the combo vaccine.

Hubby has a hard time believing that we do have cats AIDS or HIV in cats. No known vaccine for preventive measures even on humans.

As for admistering the rabies shot, the state of IL prohibits anyone except for licensed vets to give rabies to animals. OK for those who have other vaccinations for their pets and not illegial to do so.

Peepkeeper, your point is noted....not all vets are created equal. We have young vets and old vets and ask them the same question, you will get perhaps two to three different answers. Most vets say no vaccinations to elderly cats while some says some vaccinations. Its our judgement call and our decision what we can do to our pets and we all must suffer the conquenceseven the vet would have their problems too. I was not pleased with this vet's approach(he was my old vet that I had for my dogs and he has changed alot in his attitude toward his patients and their owners and losing businesses) and I decided to change vets who I can work with alongside rather being judgemental or inflexible by this vet. The new vet I found (that also does chickens YAAAY!) she was giving me all options and I have to make the decision on based on the info she gave me what she considered the best avenue for my kitten. We had a little accident last night with the kitten, crawled under the rocker recliner, I got out of the rocker, pinned her under the carriage and boy, I thought I killed her! So emergency call and she was so kind and considerate and said the kitten looks fine and call her back if any problems. Well talk about winning my patronage for this vet. She enjoys chickens too...there was one sitting in the cage with eye out...a fox got to the chicken and required surgery to remove the eye. I am glad I found a vet that does all animals and includes chickens even in the city limits. Their appointment bookings were solid for two whole days and had to get my kitten squeezed in for her emergency call. With this new vet and my hubby and I can work along side and use the best judgement we can give to our animals in near future.

Thanks for your inputs I can not risk getting rabies to my cats...it takes only one bat nor I would rid of bats either so the homeowners insurance can breathe a little easier.