Round Worms

For several days now, Minnie Mao has been doing an awful lot of sleeping. She has also had a loss of appetite and diarrhia. My first thought was that there was something wrong with the food. I have tried feeding her other things. Yogurt, scrambled eggs with feta cheese, pumpkin for the diarrhia. She did eat a little bit of the scrambled egg, but she doesn't seem to care for the yogurt...or the pumpkin (surprize!)

I have noticed that the outdoor kitties have also lost their appetite at about the same time. Due to the change in weather, maybe? I still had not ordered Dr. Pitcairn's book...until tonight. Minnie Mao has been really good about always using the litter box. Well, tonight she lost it and had a little diarrhia accident, and guess what? There was a dead roundworm, about two inches long in the mess. I had tried the garlic on the kittens for worms, and they have not been displaying any symptoms, or so I thought. Only the outside kitties had diarrhia off and on. Until a day or two ago, Minnie Mao had nice healthy looking stools.

So first thing tomorrow, I go to town to pick up some food grade Diatomaceous Earth. Here is a good site that I have found on holistic care for animals. There is enough info out there to support DE as a good approach to make the intestinal tract unhospitable to parasitic worms that I feel very good about this over using poisonous worm treatments.

I have also ordered Dr. Pitcairn's book and a couple of others tonite. And I know of a brand new veterinarian around here that I may work on with the idea of holistic care as opposed to driving an hour and a half each way. We'll see.