I had put off listing Bubba in the title of a thread because I wasn't sure I was going to be able to get my wife to allow me to name him Bubba. However, now that we have an official veterinary record of him under that name, it's official. His veterinary appointment was this morning. He is, first of all, a he, proving that I can tell a girl from a boy, after all. He has an upper respiratory infection, which is the same thing that's causing the eye problem, as well as mucus production and coughing. It's called Feline Viral Rhinotracheitis, which is a common cause of respiratory disease in cats, and a cause of conjunctivitis. The vet suspects he was born with it, or that he caught it from his mom shortly after birth, as he was born to a barn cat. I have some ophthalmic gel to put on his eyes every eight hours, and some stuff that I have to put in his mouth every twelve hours, and he should be okay. However, FVR stays in his system even after it becomes inactive, and may reoccur if he is stressed. Although it is contagious, he said that the chances of Ella getting it are low as long as she stays away from him until his symptoms have abated. I guess Ella has already figured that out because she doesn't even want to be on the same floor if she can't be outside. To be on the safe side, I will be washing cat beds often and cleaning the surfaces of things that he spends time in, and we have already been caging him at night. While I do want them to make friends, I guess we won't be encouraging that for a while. I had Bubba in a car carrier on the way there (it's a 70-mile drive), and he threw fits the whole way. It's a cloth carrier so I guess he figured he could tear his way through it. He really put it to a test, but it held. When I picked him up, the vet told me that I was right about him being feisty because he had escaped the treatment room, and he had to chase him down. I took him out of the carrier to reassure him before heading back home, and he seemed calm enough. Rather than having him battle the carrier for another seventy miles, I decided to give him a try outside of it. I drove home with one hand, while he was perfectly calm during the trip back, looking out the window, sleeping, and wanting to play.
Ella is not pleased with Bubba's response to her hissing. Although Ella is about five times his size, or more, and she is doing absolutely nothing to give him the idea that she's a friendly face, he reacts to her hissing at him as if she were inviting him to come closer. He is a flurry of activity. Then, when he is ready to sleep, he often crawls up into my arms, regardless of what I might be doing at the time, and falls asleep instantly. I have to stop what I'm doing, sometimes for as long as an hour, while he sleeps. Then he's off again. His eyes were clear this morning and I haven't heard a cough yet today.
Ella is going to have trouble with this one. She gave him the longest hiss in the world, then turned and started to leave the room, and Bubba slapped at her tail. He is not impressed by her hissing.
Bubba got slapped. He deserved it. I gave him some treats, and Ella some treats. He ate his like a pig and tried to steal Ella's, so she slapped him on the head. It looked like a measured slap, intended to send a message without causing brain damage. He ran under the dresser to hide, so I guess he got the message. He's fine, and he'll probably try to steal her treats again next time.
Bubba's eyes are all cleared up, although I still have to give him the eye stuff every eight hours, and I haven't heard him cough yet today; there too, he still has to get the oral medications every twelve hours until they've run out, and by then it will be time for a return visit to the vet. I'm thinking that he's on the mend, though. That's a good thing because Ella is showing hints of warming up to him. She still hisses at him but it seems to help that she has permission to hiss at him. At first, she'd hiss at him because she was angry about his being in the house, then she'd feel that she had to run from me, for fear of getting in trouble for hissing at Bubba. As long as no one is being hurt, my philosophy on cat raising is that some things are cat things, and they have to work them out for themselves. If Bubba wants Ella to quit hissing at him, it wouldn't hurt for him to approach her with a little bit of deference, given the differences in size and the fact that Ella was here first. Ella has swatted him twice now, and she's not trying to hurt him. She just wants him to back off, and that's a message she can get across better than I can. Ella watches Bubba play with cat toys on the floor and I get the idea that she is thinking she wouldn't mind joining in, but she doesn't want to give in to the new cat too easily, and I don't want to encourage her to until I know that she isn't going to be in danger of catching his upper respiratory infection. The vet said that once his eyes are no longer running, and he quits coughing, it should be safe, so I think we're close. I have been caging him at night so that I can supervise their interactions. Although it's a very big cage, he is starting to catch on and hides now when he thinks it's time for me to go to bed. The cage is right by our bed, so I can actually pet him or play with him through the bars while I'm in bed. He still hates it though. I had to do some editing because I have had only female cats for the last thirty years, so I tend to use a feminine pronoun for cats, including Bubba, and I think I could be jailed for that these days.