I had noticed my kitten wasn't drinking much so I took him to the vet. She said he is dehydrated and needs to have more fluids. Duh. I wouldn't have taken him if he was drinking. The white eyelids are starting to show. She said try putting chicken broth or tuna water in with his regular water. I tried that but he still isn't drinking much. Only a few little laps with his tounge about 2 times a day. The eyelids are still visable. What can I do? How much does he need to drink so he won't be dehydrated and when will those other eyelids go back to their proper place? I am worried about him.
2007-01-21 11:37:27 · 6 answers · asked by Anonymous in Pets ➔ Cats
I even bought distilled water to give to him and he won't drink that. I noticed that he likes drinking out of my cups when they are on the table so I put some cups of water around the house and I don't think that's working either.
2007-01-21 12:04:27 · update #1
I can't believe the vet didn't administer some water to the poor thing if it is dehydrated. Maybe you need to get a different vet. Many cats don't drink extra water. I had a cat who lived to be 18 years of age and I bet throughout here whole life I only saw her drink water twice from her bowl. The moisture in her food was enough for her system. Having said that, if you know your poor thing is continuing to be dehydrated, you must do something. Dehydration can be fatal in a kitten and they can quickly die (within hours) if they aren't helped. Just to make sure, take it to a different vet. Do not give it milk. It will give it diarrhea which it won't survive right now. At WalMart and most pet stores you can buy something called milk replacer. It comes in a little carton which is on the shelf, just like a juice comes in. Its very inexpensive and it is used primarily for kittens who are still suckling but have lost their mother. It is a substitute mothers milk. He would be able to tolerate it because it won't give him diarrhea. Try that, it just may be the answer to get him through this and build up his strength. I hope this helps. Good luck
2007-01-21 13:37:05 · answer #1 · answered by HeatherFeather 3 · 0⤊ 0⤋
First off,.. If you haven't yet, you should take steps to make sure the water tastes good for your cat. A cat is more sensitive to taste I guess - they are picky about water. Some cats don't like tap water because of the, what's it called, flouride(?) in it, among other things they can taste. Some cats who don't drink a lot of waterat home from a bowl - if you take them out on a walk and you go by a puddle of muddy watter, they might like to drink it. This is because it doesn't have the stuff in tap water that they can taste. Go buy some distilled bottled water, or if you have a water filtration thing at home, give the cat water from that.
Make sure the water bowl is clean - you're might be better off washing it with no soap, but if you use soap, rinse it out a LOT. Also don't use a bowl made out of plastic.
Leave at least 2 bows of water. Probably keep one of them a few feet away from their food (not right next to it) and another one somewhere else. Neither should be near a litter box.
I'm not too sure about other things you can try such as stuff to put in the water,.. but this would be easy and could help a lot:
If you feed your cat dry food, switch to wet. Dry food has about 12% moisture, while wet food has 80%. A cat that eats dry food must drink MUCH more water than if they eat wet. A cat that eats wet food has to drink very little water. If I remember, when I'm at work tomorrow I'll check specifically how much an average cat needs to drink if they eat wet compared to dry.
2007-01-21 12:00:24 · answer #2 · answered by Travis 1 · 0⤊ 0⤋
You can mix water and cat milk together. The milk by itself probably wouldn't hydrate it, but with the water in there your cat will probably drink the milk/water.
Be sure to use cat milk though. The kind you get at the grocery store would give it diarrhea.
2007-01-21 11:46:52 · answer #3 · answered by Anonymous · 0⤊ 0⤋
DON'T give your kitten milk!!! It is bad for cats, even though cats love it...it gives them digestion problems, and if your kitty starts vomiting or has diarrhea then it'll REALLY be dehydrated
2007-01-21 12:02:48 · answer #4 · answered by Nicky 2 · 1⤊ 0⤋
you could actually force it with a plunger similar to the ones you would use for medication like dewormer. just make sure you scruff the cat, they don't like it too much, but they get over it.
2007-01-21 12:01:26 · answer #5 · answered by kevin g 2 · 0⤊ 1⤋
give the kitten milk and it will drink up
2007-01-21 11:55:50 · answer #6 · answered by sunflare63 7 · 0⤊ 1⤋