Weekend Cat Blogging: Emergency Kitten Bath

Thursday night, we were sitting about watching a movie, when Indrid popped up on the couch, soaking wet, and smelling rather–unappetizing.

Someone, namely, Indrid’s person, had forgotten to close the lid on the toilet, and while it had been flushed, it is still a toilet and thus doesn’t smell minty fresh, and the little bugger fell in.

So, he had to have a bath.

I had Morganna done her leather jacket, and I put mine on, zipping them up to our necks.

Cat-bathing is something that requires armor, you know.

They really do not appreciate water.

So, there we were, looking rather like two biker chicks, picking on a poor innocent kitten, as we dunked him in the bathroom sink.

He was amazingly well behaved, considering that we were doing all sorts of awful things to his wee personage. I am glad to report, that although, after the ordeal, he huddled and shivered in a towel for about ten minutes, he is now fine, and is suffering no noticeable ill effects.

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1. Indrid looks so calm in his makeshift bath, lucky you. Mine would have been thrashing around and scratching my hand to shreds as they all hate water.

   Comment by boo_licious — August 20, 2005 #

2. Goodness! I do not look forward to the day I have to bathe either of my two cats…looks like you did pretty well!

   Comment by Alice — August 21, 2005 #

3. My cats would have been rending and tearing liberally; that is why Morganna and I are wearing leather jackets zipped up to our necks in the picture. I have found that bathing cats (and in some cases, medicating them) requires armor.

   (My mother’s Siamese cat, Missy, went up a brick wall when we flea-dipped her–when she was seventeen years old. She also tore my mother up as she went.)

   Indrid was the best-natured cat I have ever bathed.

   I got very lucky, Boo and Alice!

   Comment by Barbara Fisher — August 22, 2005 #

4. I have given 3 1/2 cat baths, and wasn’t scratched either time.

   The 1/2 bath happened after Leo somehow managed to get himself tangled up in a sticky bug strip; he ran all around the house yowling because he was ‘being chased’ (the sound of the end piece clunking as he ran LOL).

   Because I was scared, and didn’t think of dressing up like a biker hee hee, plus the adhesive strip was mostly stuck to his back, I put him across my shoulder and washed him with a soapy washcloth. The massaging action soothed him, plus not being dipped helped a lot. I went through a few more washclothes getting the soap off.

   The other three times were young cats, a bit younger than what Indrid looks like. They had so many fleas, and I’d just washed the dog with Dawn dishwashing soap because of an email tip that it killed fleas (it did an incredible job, MUCH better than any flea shampoo).

   But I knew I wouldn’t be able to use the washcloth trick on them for a flea bath, so I asked hubby since he grew up on a farm and he said he would hold them by their scruff/nape while I washed them.

   It worked! They went into a ‘duh’ zone with a zombie look in their eyes ROFL. He dunk them in a five-gallon plastic bucket, then I bathed them, dunked again, and into the towel. Once hubby released the scruff, they were back to normal. The Dawn worked great for their fleas also…yay no more pesticide shampoo!

   Comment by Anonymous — August 22, 2005 #

5. What cuties! I love to take photos of my cats. They always seem up to something funny.

   Comment by Anna — August 25, 2005 #

6. Hello, Anon–

   There is a nerve center in the nape of kitten’s and young cat’s necks which when pressure is put on it, releases a chemical into the bloodstream that causes the kitten to go limp. It is so that a mother cat can carry her kittens safely around.

   If you notice–I was utilizing that grip on Indrid–but even so, some kittens, when dunked into water while held that way, will still claw their way up your body!

   Indrid, I am lucky to say, is not one of those kittens.!

   Yeah, Anna–I have tons of pictures of our cats, just tons of them. We watch them more than we watch our television, that is for certain.

   Comment by Barbara Fisher — August 25, 2005 #

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