Cats need to stay hydrated to avoid serious health problems, but they don’t make it easy.
Our furry friends have low thirst drives given their long evolutionary history of obtaining much of their fluids from meat. They just don’t feel the need to slurp down water the way other animals do.
When cats live in human homes, keeping them hydrated can be even more difficult because they’re mischievous little stinkers.
Buddy’s no exception. The little dude loved to knock his water bowl over and paw at the water, so I replaced his bowl with a wide-bottom stainless-steel one that is virtually impossible for him to upend.
Then I noticed his water was sometimes dirty, or I’d find things in his bowl: hair ties, toys, the little plastic rings from drink bottles, twist ties and other things he likes to play with.
Bud was taking random things from around the house and depositing them in his water bowl, which is probably just another fun game for him. (Some theories suggest this behavior is instinctual as well, that cats are “washing the scent off” toys representing prey or simply hiding it as they would a kill.)
“Cats often put their toys away in a ‘safe’ place after playing with them, and cats look upon their food area as a secure part of their territory,” says a Q&A from Chewy. “This behavior is similar to cats in the wild who often take their prey back to their nest area to hide it from potential predators. Your cat simply might be storing his toy in a secure area to be played with later.”
As far as Buddy’s concerned, the entire apartment is his territory, but he’s especially protective of his little dining nook.
I can imagine the dialogue in Buddy’s head: “Hmmm, bottle cap. Where did I put my favorite bottle cap? Oh, right. My water bowl!”
Little dude gets two fresh wet meals per day, and at night I put out about half a bowl of good dry food as a late-night snack and something to tide him over till morning if he gets peckish overnight. (It usually prevents him from waking me up strictly for food, but he still finds his reasons to interrupt my sleep.)
I put fresh water out for him twice a day at set times, and sometimes randomly if I notice the water’s low, dirty or there’s a toy in it.
Between the wet food and the bowl he probably gets just about enough fluids, but I think we can do better, for his health first and foremost — since so many serious cat ailments, especially in males, are linked to dehydration — and to avoid costly and traumatic veterinary procedures.
Can anyone recommend some good fountains?
I’d like something non-electric, but a cat fountain that uses gravity to release stagnant water kind of seems like it defeats the purpose. I’ve also read that plastics are bad, as dirt and dust can get embedded in the surface. Finally, articles about pet fountains often suggest flat drinking surfaces are best to encourage cats to drink, as their whiskers don’t get caught or wet. I’m not sure how much difference that makes, and it’s probably different for each cat.
Do you have a fountain for your cats? What are your thoughts on how effective it is at getting them to drink more?
The Cat Man of Aleppo has survived bombs, chemical gas, a siege and a risky flight to Turkey as he’s cared for people and cats suffering in Syria’s civil war.
Human beings have lived in the city known as Aleppo for more than 4,000 years, making it one of the oldest continually-inhabited settlements in human history.
But as the raging civil war in Syria expanded and bombs began to fall on the country’s largest city, there was an unprecedented mass exodus — reducing Aleppo’s population from 4.6 million in 2010 to less than 600,000 by 2014.
Mohammad Alaa Aljaleel was one of the stubborn few who stayed. His wife and children fled to safety in Turkey in 2015, but anchored by his commitment to people who couldn’t leave, Aljaleel stayed behind to continue driving his ambulance and feeding a growing population of abandoned cats.
At first friends and acquaintances turned to Aljaleel to take their cats as they prepared to flee the crumbling city, knowing he was fond of felines and would care for them as his own.
Others heard about the “cat man of Aleppo,” and soon Aljaleel’s home became a sanctuary for former pets from all over the city, which was becoming a ghost town.
With few remaining people to feed them — and food sources like restaurant dumpsters drying up — hungry stray cats started showing up too.
“Since everyone has left the country, including my own friends, these cats have become my friends here,” Aljaleel said in 2016, as a BBC camera crew filmed him among the hundreds of cats in his care.
Aljaleel, the Cat Man of Aleppo, hugs a tabby in his care.
One day a car pulled up and a little girl stepped out, cradling a cat.
Her parents “knew there was a cat sanctuary here,” Aljaleel told the BBC at the time. “The girl had brought the cat up since she was a kitten. She cried as she handed her over to me, and they left the country.”
For many people leaving the city in search of refuge in Europe or elsewhere in Syria, the decision to leave a beloved pet was agonizing.
But entrusting a cat to Aljaleel and his makeshift sanctuary — where the animal would be fed and well cared for — was much more palatable than making it to the border of an EU country only for a border guard or customs official to refuse the cat entry, forcing families to choose between pet and safety.
Kittens who were brought to Ernesto’s Sanctuary with their mother.
For people like the little girl, knowing their cats were in Aljaleel’s sanctuary meant maintaining a tie to home and hope that they could return.
“I’ve been taking photos of the cat and sending them to her in Turkey. She begs me, ‘Send me photos of her. I miss her. Please promise to return my cat to me when I get back.'”
That was in 2016. Almost five years later it looks like the young girl won’t be returning to Syria, and her cat is likely dead.
After Aljaleel’s makeshift cat sanctuary swelled to include more than 200 cats, things took a turn for the worse.
The Syrian government and rebel forces dug in, calling on allies for support and resources. ISIS and Iranian-backed insurgents entered the fray, seeing opportunity to advance their own interests amid the chaos.
So too did Russia and the United States. Both countries treated the conflict as a proxy war, with Russia backing Assad and his Syrian government forces, while the US and its allies threw their support behind an opposition that grew out of the Arab Spring in 2011.
The US and Russia provided the combatants with training and weapons systems, increasing the destructive firepower at the command of the belligerents. Both countries sought to advance their geopolitical ambitions in the region when they entered the conflict.
Not just cats: Alina and Samira are best friends and are inseparable. Credit: Ernesto’s Paradise
In internal memos justifying intervention in Syria, the US State Department predicted the civil war would flare out in months. Instead, the war has now lasted more than a decade, and in a move The Guardian called “a bloody end to [former President Barack] Obama’s reign,” in 2016 the US dropped 26,171 bombs on countries in the Middle East, with Syria absorbing the lion’s share.
Perhaps it was one of those bombs — or a bomb from Russia, or one of Syrian dictator Bashar al Assad’s own warheads — that obliterated Aljaleel’s sanctuary. It’s unlikely anyone will ever know. But one thing all sides agree on is that the chlorine gas was courtesy of Assad, who has not hesitated to use chemical weapons against his own people in the bloody war.
Weeks after Aljaleel was featured in a BBC short about the impact of the war, Aljaleel “watched helplessly as his cat sanctuary was first bombed, then gassed during the intense final stages of the siege of Aleppo,” per the BBC.
Some 180 of the 200 or so cats who found refuge with Aljaleel were killed by the bomb and the chlorine gas, and the stubborn man who dug in his heels and cared for Aleppo’s cats while everyone else fled finally gave up on his city.
Aljaleel and his cats survived the power outages, the destruction of the water works, the food shortages and a military siege of the city, but now the Cat Man of Aleppo was just a cat man in an ambulance.
He packed the few surviving cats, his meager possessions and a few sick, injured or elderly people into an ambulance and joined a convoy of civilians escaping the crumbling city. It was a tense and perilous journey, as those who fled knew Assad had no reservations about targeting his own people if it served his goals.
After seeing his family and recovering in Turkey, and with the help of an Italian benefactor and a growing community of supporters on social media, Aljaleel took his cats and his friends to a rural area in Syria, far from targets of opportunity, where he purchased a plot of land, put down roots and began his sanctuary anew.
Even in war, cats know when it’s time to eat. The kitties of Ernesto’s Paradise wait by the more than 100 plates set out for them, eager for meal time. Credit: Ernesto’s Sanctuary.
That sanctuary is called Ernesto’s Paradise, named after Aljaleel’s own cat.
Ernesto’s Paradise is home to several hundred cats, plus four monkeys, horses, rabbits and dogs. There’s a playground for kids and — after a long search to find a veterinarian who hadn’t fled — Ernesto’s finally has a doctor in the house too.
The civil war in Syria has created perhaps the worst refugee crises in modern history, with millions fleeing to Europe and elsewhere in search of sanctuary.
The war had claimed 387,118 souls as of December 2020, according to the UK-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights. Another 205,300 were missing and presumed dead, according to SOHR. In addition, more than 88,000 people have been tortured to death in Assad’s prisons, while thousands more were taken by ISIS and other terrorist groups operating in the country.
But “children and animals are the big losers” in war, Aljaleel told the BBC, and that’s why he chose to return.
“I’ve always felt it’s my duty and my pleasure to help people and animals whenever they need help,” he said. “I believe that whoever does this will be the happiest person in the world, besides being lucky in his life.”
You can follow and support Aljaleel’s work via Twitter, Facebook and by visiting his sanctuary’s official site. Direct donations to the sanctuary can be sent here.
Buddy wants YOU to feature your cat on Pain In The Bud!
The only thing better than cats is, well, more cats.
That’s why we’d like to introduce a new feature in which we profile our readers’ little buddies. It’s a win-win: You get your unique kitty featured on the blog, and the rest of us get to see more cats.
Buddy, in his infinite wisdom and generosity, has allowed me to implement this feature, “as long as the other cats don’t upstage me.” I also had to bribe him by promising to buy him a pirate eyepatch and a plush canary for his shoulder.
Interested in having your kitty featured? Head to the contact page, say hello and tell us a little bit about your cat. We’ll respond with a handful of questions. We’ll also need at least three good, high-res images of your cat, so have them ready to send when we correspond. (Don’t worry if they’re not pro quality! Mostly we’re looking for clear, close shots.)
That’s it! Right now the plan is for this to be an occasional feature, but if we get enough responses we’d be delighted to make this a regular weekly or twice-weekly thing.
Happy Easter from the Easter Buddy! Bud and I wish our readers a happy, safe and relaxing Easter, socially distanced though it may be. Who knows? Maybe we’ll see a return to some semblance of normality later this year.
In the meantime, though, our little buddies have helped us get through these dark months, entertaining us and keeping us company through the initial wave of the pandemic, the lockdowns and the long winter.
Could you imagine the past year without your cats? We can’t. Make sure to thank your own little buddies for being there for you during this pandemic!
Buddy offers fragrances for the sophisticated feline.
PARIS – Buddy the Cat’s much-anticipated new line of fragrances, Litière Eau de Cologne and Litière Parfum Pour Elle, will hit stores just in time for the summer season.
The feline-inspired scents were created in collaboration with the Purrsace perfumery and promise a pheromonal feast fantastique for the olfactory senses.
Litière Eau de Cologne, Buddy’s signature scent for males, “combines a littery musk with the earthy, seductive aura of fresh turkey, cinnamon, triumphant notes of fiery wasabi and subtle hints of tuna. As decadent and lazy as felines themselves, Litière Eau de Cologne works best as a celebration of sedentary existence, of many hours nestled in the warm embrace of a favorite couch spot with the sun on your back. Meowgnificent!”
Its sister scent, Litière Pour Elle, is “infused with notes of blackberry jam and an oxytocinal essense that evokes kittens snoozing in a purratic pile after their morning milk This lush and leafy fragrance is designed to be carried by the soft breezes of spring and summer, gently wafting its way toward the olfactory organs of strapping toms and leaving no doubt that its wearer is in heat. With Litière Pour Elle, you’ll have your next litter of kittens in no time.”
Litiere Pour Elle: For when you want every tom within five miles to know you’re in heat.
Purrsace is betting big on the novel fragrances, backing a campaign featuring commercials in which a nude Buddy emerges from a hot tub, eases into a relaxed pose and extends his claws as a pair of models towels his luxuriant fur dry.
Another spot is slated to run during the Academy Awards, La Liga, Serie A and Ligue 1 matches, as well as Wimbledon and the French Open.
That advert depicts Buddy with a beret and a baguette, enjoying coffee and croissants on the terrace of a Parisian cafe before female cats recognize him by his scent and run after him. After several frames depicting an intensifying pursuit, the camera pans out to a wider shot showing the streets of Paris overrun with yowling female cats looking for Buddy.
“It has been my life’s l’honor working with Messieur Buddeaux,” Purrsace chief perfumist Guillaume Stéphane Olivier Jean-Henri François Laurent Remontoire said. “Litière will be the aroma of choice for felines sophistiqué!”
“Sacre bleu! Un jolie femmes can’t control themselves around me! It must be the Litiere pheromonique!”
Pain In The Bud 