# Four cats and three are vomiting



## Kotick (Nov 24, 2009)

I have four cats in my home (all strictly indoor) and three seem to have a bug of sorts or perhaps not. The one who isn't vomiting is sneezing.

We took one to the vet yesterday because he had been vomiting food and water for 3 days. This is our youngest of about seven months old. X-Rays were done to see if there was an obstruction but not much was found other than an inflamed stomach lining. No blood work was done. After the x-ray all we could afford to do was have them inject fluids underneath the cat's skin. Last night his stool was runny and had some hair and what seemed to be a little blood. He went twice like that last night and his vomit after that had some specks of blood (I'm thinking due to irritation). He has yet to vomit today so we gave him a little water and a little chicken flavored baby food. He's kept it down thus far. 
*Question:* How often should I introduce water or baby food to him to make sure that he's keeping it down and to make sure that he stays hydrated?

The second youngest cat who is almost a year old, started vomiting last night. I'm not allowing him to have any food at this point but have kept the water out for all of them.

The third cat is over a year old and started vomiting in the middle of the night last night. He is also not allowed to have food.

The fourth cat is a little over two years old and just sneezes off and on. Not so frequent to where it's a huge concern but enough to notice it.

Here's the thing though. All of the cats have tons of energy still and want to play and do normal things, those three just randomly throw everything up. We honestly thought that the first cat to get sick had swallowed something which was causing it to vomit since none of the other cats had the same problem and he needed fluids and quick cause his head started to bobble around when he would look at things. But apparently it seems something else has made them sick.

Since they are indoor cats and my boyfriend and I don't touch stray animals and wash our hands regularly we aren't sure how they could get sick. We feed them dry food only right now (Purina Cat Chow Indoor Formula), they drink from a communal water dish that gets changed when the bottle gets low or runs out (every few days), we have three litter boxes (yes we need a fourth at least but funds are becoming an issue) and use clumping cat litter (it changes from tidy cat to whatever is on sale but is usually a multi-cat formula).
*Question:* Could any of the above be the thing that's making them sick?

I know that they should be seen by a vet but we're tapped out now till the first and getting three cats tested and treated just isn't possible. What I need is any suggestions on what caused the sickness via a recall on the food that I'm not aware of or how the food is stored (large bag with a chip bag clip kept under the sink where there is no visible water leak) or if there's something going around in my area (Southern California) or if maybe it could be caused by ring worm (which I'm pretty sure all three had but the oldest who isn't vomiting never got).


If I'm missing any information please feel free to ask. And thank you for any input. I know we have too many cats but sometimes even one costs too much.


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## marie73 (Jul 12, 2006)

I can't really help you with the health issue, but you do* NOT *have too many cats and I don't think anybody here would tell you that you do. atback 

I hope you get this figured out soon.


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## Heidi n Q (Nov 22, 2006)

Make sure whatever baby food you are feeding has no ONION or ONION POWDER in it.
You could feed canned cat food mixed with water to be gushy, to help get nutrition and water into them.

With 3-4 cats with similar symptoms, I would suspect some sort of household *thing* is bothering them. Purina isn't the greatest food but I don't think they've ever had problems with their ingredients, like some other companies. I definitely hope you are able to get a handle on this and they all recover. I have NO idea and my first thing to suggest would be a vet visit with blood tests to see what is going on inside. The blood test is a *great* diagnostic tool vets can use because it tells them so much information ... which is a very good thing when you have a patient who cannot talk and tell you what is wrong.

Best of luck!
heidi =^..^=


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## Kotick (Nov 24, 2009)

All three cats stopped vomiting yesterday. They haven't thrown up since. The one we took to the vet passed what looked to be a piece of thick white plastic, still don't know what it was from though. Maybe they all just had a quick one day kitty flu except for the youngest who was vomiting for three days or maybe they all ate something they shouldn't have. It's still a mystery as to what happened to them.


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## marie73 (Jul 12, 2006)

Sometimes it's even more annoying to never get an answer. 

Glad to hear the hurling has halted.


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