Solid Versus Liquid

Valkyrie seems to be doing better in regard to her crap. It’s sometimes hard to tell whose crap is whose, though I can differentiate between most of the cats’, most of the time. Aside from that sad fact, I can also write that I haven’t had to clean faeces off walls and floors lately, which was the case for several weeks, the result of soft poop being flicked off legs and feet. What I think is Val’s is still very soft, but it is formed, which is better than it has been.

The only catalyst for this has been in her diet. I have tried my best to eliminate chicken from her menu. Chicken seems to be in most cat-food recipes, such as many of the supposedly non-chicken Fancy Feast varieties. When it is not listed explicitly, there is the mysterious and almost inevitable “meat by-product”, which could be from anything this side of a conifer and upwards from a paramecium. There is also “liver”, which might be beef, pork or poultry.

I have been feeding her a great deal of fish and, though she took to it initially, she has become jaded with it. Her intake of soft-food is down, so she has started to eat hard-food, which she has not done before, at least that I could see. There is chicken in it, too, so I am attempting to direct her toward a new brand that does not include it. It does, however, cause vomiting and diarrhea in Neville, so I can’t leave it out. Sigh.

I think I will let Valkyrie eat whatever hard-food she likes for now, and see what it does to her litter-box deposits. If they remain semi-formed, that may be the best that can be achieved wth so many cats about. The Eternal Kitten has also begun drinking water, which was as rare an activity as her consumption of hard-food, though it makes sense that she needs the fluids now that her body is receiving less in solid food.

While things are not ideal, they do appear to be improving. And Valkyrie continues to be active, playful and annoying. Her current interest is prying open the linen closet door and throwing about the towels until she makes a nice bed for herself. That I don’t expect to change with her nutrition.