# Cats, Mice, Decon: A Cautionary Tale



## lunamystique (Dec 10, 2003)

As if we don't have enough to worry about ...

5 yrs ago I visited my parents for Christmas w/ my two kittydren, Justin and Cooper. Dad warned me a mouse had made a home in our antique pipe organ. Unfortunately, he had put some Decon out but reported that he found the mouse dead prior to my arrival and took up the Decon. (I say unfortunately because I think this is a cruel way to catch a little pesk, preferring more humane traps and by humane I do NOT mean that awful sticky stuff).

Well, the mouse left behind some micedren in the pipe organ. The babies had probably eaten some Decon themselves, perhaps brought to them by the unknowing mother. Justin and Cooper caught some of these sluggish, sick mice (Cooper's not sharp enough to catch healthy ones) and likely ate them. We caught a few mice in time to take them outside, literally pulling them from the jaws of death with much screaming to startle the feline predators into dropping them.

I found blood in the litter box a few days later. Petrified the cats were exposed to the Decon, which is an anticoagulant that can cause internal bleeding, I rushed both to my vet. Blood tests checked out normal but I opted to give them the antidote, vitamin K tablets, just in case. I gave them 30 days of twice a day pills and saw no further evidence of possible internal bleeding.

Please remember to make sure homes you visit over the holidays don't use rat poison!


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## Spike (Dec 10, 2003)

*Rat Poison*

It is lucky you picked up the blood quickly! 

We suffered a problem similar a few years ago, it was extremely sad to see a mouse crawl up our driveway, dying. Next door had put out rat poison without a regard for the wildlife who might eat those rats. [Or mice].

Now luckily my cat Simba didn't eat the mouse, my parents killed him or her because they were suffering with the poison [So they must have snapped the mouse's neck or found some quick way to end the suffering, I'm not sure how. I wasn't there]

We used to live with a beautiful affectionate cat named Max, he was black furred and an amazing communicative cat, he and my mother were bonded pretty closely. One day though he came in coughing up some sort of bubbly fluid. We rushed him to the vets, and he was found to be containing snail poison. [Again from next door but we lived elsewhere] 
He was put to sleep because he was already dying, my mother was distraught as they were bonded and I was too young to really know where he had gone but it goes to show people are irresponsible and must learn to ward of pests using enironmentally friendly control, or natural biotic control. Terrible how dumb people are isn't it?


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## Ioana (Jul 12, 2003)

Unfortunately not every story can have a happy ending - at least Max was put to sleep before he felt the agony of death to the end. 
It is indeed so sad that people are not looking more into it to see how cruel it is to provoke for or leave any being die in pains.
The best we can do is spread the word following Lunamystique's example.


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## faile (Sep 14, 2003)

a friend of mine told me a story about how they had mice and her mother went to the store and asked for a humane trap. they gave her glue traps. who ever thinks a glue trap is humane should be shot. they are buddhists, and her mom was under the impression that she could just unstick the mouse and free it outside. they woke up and found a mousie stuck to the trap, horribly sprawled out and absolutely terrified. they spent forever trying to free the mouse, my friend was trying to cut the fur that was stuck but of course mousie kept re-sticking in it's struggles. they finally had to kill it, both crying their eyes out. story ends with the mom going back to the store and explaining at great length and loud volume to the people exactly how un-humane those traps were.


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## phoenixcat (Dec 28, 2003)

I know it's sort of unrelated, but if you havea mouse problem that your kitties aren't taking care of, there's a great trap tat just tips over when they're in it and closes, and you can release them easily. It scares them abit, but other than that, it's great. Always worked for us!


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