The pendulum swings

Basti looking annoyed, waiting for food

About 3 weeks ago, the vet came by for the yearly shots of all 3 cats. We discussed the medication of Basti and when we told her that she got her Prednisone only once every 10 days, she said: Well, then it's almost a placebo at this point'. I don't quite get how a real medicine can become a placebo but I figured that she meant that there was no use in giving it to Basti anymore. As I know how nasty this medicine can be, I decided to simply stop giving it to her. And that was no problem. 

At this point, you would think that that was the end of the story but something strange happened: after we stopped giving her Pred, she didn't start eating less, the started eating more. For the last consecutive days, she does what I've described in my last blog: where it would usually take her 6 to 8 hours to go through the first 20 grams of kibble for the day, she currently finishes in two and then start the staring contest in front of her food bowl. I upped her intake from 45 to 50 grams for a few days and than figured that if I kept giving in, she'd soon weigh more than the almost 4 kg she weighs now. And that was unacceptable. So no more than 45 grams for my black girl.

I should have known however, that Basti figured out a way to circumvent the problem; mice. For the last few days, she's been bringing her pray inside the house and eating it underneath a piece of furniture. Besides the fact that my red cookie monster is absolutely ticked off that she won't hand Mr. Mouse over to him like she used to, she actually totally finishes said Mr. Mouse. Now I have an entirely new problem on my hands; she's getting constipated, throwing up grass from trying to fix the constipation and I'm afraid that combining kibble with raw food is causing Basti's stomach to get upset again.

I might be time to change food again...she wasn't interested in raw food before but if she keeps up eating mice on a daily basis, I may have to get her off the kibble entirely; I don't think that letting her combine kibble with mice is doing her tummy any good. 

I beg your pardon?

Unlike Blinky, my monster of a red cat who was taught by his previous owner that begging was a perfectly acceptable way to get extra food, my two ladies have not been raised that way perse.

Basti 'begging'..

Yes, they do beg in their own cute way but it's never over the top and in your face. Nike will start making noise around 9 AM to get her treats (any other time I'll give her treats and she'll be suspicious of my motives..we might be going to the vet for all she knows) and Basti has her own weird way of begging which looks more like a staring contest.

Sometimes, in the morning, Basti will be going through her food like there is no tomorrow...and by 9 or 10 AM, the first round of food will be gone. I usually won't give her anything more until around 4 PM but she's not apposed to giving it a try. We'll then have a staring contest which I usually lose because I feel sorry for her. Sometimes I try to trick into giving more healthier options that her dry food but she's usually not that interested...

I still think that even though I haven't raised my two girls to beg, they have still  managed to come up with their own way to squeeze food out of me...but it's more like the Lady than like the Tramp.

From plastic to ceramic

The one thing I still can't imagine is how a company such as Sureflap, creator of pretty incredible things, can put plastic bowls in their products. They probably have no clue that plastic becomes porous after a while and will accumulate bacteria that can make your cat sick..something I really don't need with an IBD cat.

So, I figured that having her eat out of plastic for a little while was no big problem but I also knew that I needed to find ceramic bowls. With the measurements of these things being so much out of the ordinary and not being someone that could work with clay, I found a pottery man who would make the bowls for me.

I love swirly patterns...

Mister Bob Ernsting from Zuidoostbeemster was really a sweetheart; I gave him one of the plastic bowls for measurements but didn't show him the actual feeder. When he called to say they were done, I brought the feeder with me and as it turned out, the bowls were too high... He then realised how little wiggle room he had. The second batch of bowls fit perfectly however and thankfully he wasn't too upset for having to do them again. They are now 3.2 cm high (1.25 inch) and 11 cm (4.3 inch) in diameter.

Maybe it was imagination, but from the moment I put the ceramic bowls in, Basti was a much happier camper! There are some disadvantages; I cannot put too much in the bowl. The plastic bowls were bigger so putting one day of food in her ceramic bowl, is pushing it. One the other hand, Basti doesn't seem to mind because now she won't have to push her food around.  And because she's eating like crazy anyway (and I need to pace her), she gets smaller portions 3 times a day.

She's got it!

Yes, Basti has figured out how the feeder works! How I know? Well, one morning I came downstairs and her food bowl was empty. And I was absolutely sure that when I went to bed, there was food still in her bowl. This basically means two good things: one, she knows how to operate the feeder and isn't afraid of it anymore and two, (and that is a huge accomplishment), she will eat when we're not around! Since then, we've heard her eat while standing in the kitchen and we're out of sight. So no more 'holding her paw' when she eats and we can leave the house for more than a few hours at a time. I do so love technology! Below the video of how she does it; I've fast-forwarded the part where she's eating because it's not the most interesting part of the video.

There was one strange occurance and I think Basti knew before we did; that bright light close by the feeder will actually confuse the chip scanner and cause the feeder to stay closed. A few weeks back, we noticed that during the day Basti would go up to the feeder and it would open, but in the evening, she would go up to it and simply wait for us to open it for her. Initially, that was puzzling us: why wouldn't she try? When we realized she had been eating at night, the only difference between day, night and evening was that in the evening, we turned on the lamp that stood nearby...so that had to be the cause. When we switched lamps, Basti quickly realized that she didn't need to wait for us anymore and now everything is working smoothly. Mission accomplished!

Yet another try

After months of trying to get Basti in the box by means of the microchip cat flap, I had to admit defeat. We got as far as closing the lid on her after she had jumped in and letting her get out through the cat flap by herself but that usually freaked her out anyway. We needed to find a way to make her go through the flap by herself but something seemed off. Like it wasn't working properly. We started making plans to try and adjust the cat flap so that it could be plugged in, in stead of working on batteries. We would then try to cover the sensor so that the scanner would work constantly and we hoped that this would make it easier for the scanner to pick up on Basti's chip. Up until that point, Basti has to stick her head in almost all the way, and she wasn't going for it.

Blinky checking it out

My husband was trying all sorts of options to change from batteries to an outlet situation but the voltage was giving him a hard time. At one point I suggested contacting the manufacturer of the cat flap to see if they could help and when I went to the website of the manufacturer, we saw another product they had come up with; the Surefeed. https://www.sureflap.com/en-gb/pet-feeder/microchip-pet-feeder

From the moment I saw it, I was almost sure that that would be a much simpler solution so we bought it. Of course, I had to change everything at the same time. We put the feeder on top of the box; we turned the box 90 degrees so it would take up less room in the living room and we changed the brand of petfood again... I tend to do stupid things like that. Blinky was very interested from the get-go and had no problems with the change...Basti on the other hand was not amused and initially wouldn't cooperate

Basti eating from the Surefeed.

A couple of things were annoying her. The noise of the lid opening and closing freaked her out. Plus, having the curved sensor above her head, wasn't something she particularly liked. I had also positioned the feeder so that she couldn't see if my other cats were coming up to her so she would look up every 2 or 3 seconds to see what was going on and that didn't work. After a week or so, I changed the box back to its original setting and put the feeder in such a position that she would be able to look into the living room and see every cat that would try to approach. That seemed to do the trick and she started  to get less freaked out. About a third of the time, she still doesn't stick her head in far enough to open the feeder but during the rest of the day, she does and it opens by itself. Every time that happens, we praise the living daylights out of her :-)...She still wants me or my husband  nearby when she eats (a tricky side effect from when she wasn't eating and I dragged the food to her and stayed while she ate) but I'm having high hopes!

Too much

I didn't think I was ever going to say this but Basti's getting fat! She currently weighs 3.94 kg!
A year ago we saw a similar thing happen but by the time I figured she might be gaining too much weight, she crashed and stopped eating. I got her up to 3.8 kg and within a few months, she dropped back to 3.3 kg. In my ignorance, I assumed that maybe she kept her own weight in check and I didn't have to worry. Plus, remembering how it was to force-feed her and barely getting her to take half the food she was allowed in a day, I wanted her to have a buffer, in case it would happen again. But unfortunately, I don't think I have the luxury of letting her decide how much food she's consuming anymore...

Basti at her lowest

Basti at her highest weight

It'll be the first time in 3.5 years that I have to tell her 'no' when she wants food and it's going to be strange and frustrating. Will she become obnoxious or aggressive when I refuse her food? Will she get so stressed out that her illness flares up? Should I give her less kibble and more wet food so that she can still eat but at the same time consume less calories? One thing's for sure..she's got to come down!