blood in stool

[johnny]

hey guys i have an f3 (Supposedly) males that is four months old. we received him from taran at domesticwilcat.com within the day we noticed blood in his room we kept him in. his vet visit was the day after getting him and the vet said to do a fecal sample and he did have parasites. we were given medicine to give him for 10 days and after that he has had 2 stool samples that have been negative for parasites however there is still occasional blood in his stool. taran did mention that she has them on a diet of raw chicken and i have not been feeding raw. i have just been using royal canin kitten loafs. would that cause this problem i know their diet is important i have not tried raw for lack of confidence in making a recipe.. any advice would be appreciated. he seems to act normal just occasional blood

also he has a really bad flee problem which taran said came from the dogs she has. i have tried advantage and has not cured the problem so far is it safe to use advantage along with a flea collar. also are there any shampoos that may work sorry its so long were a little angry with this situation however we just love little logan and want him healthy

 

[Brigitte Cowell]

Poor you, it sounds like you got a kitten with a lot of problems :-(

What medicine did the vet give you and what parasites were diagnosed?

Were the stool samples for a fecal float or was more accurate testing done?

It should NOT be normal for a cat to have blood in stools and it is NOT part and parcel of raw feeding. It seems that Taran may have some issue in her cattery that is not being attended to :-(

No, RC kitten canned food would NOT cause blood in stool. Savannahs (and Savannah mixes like your kitten is a Savannah-Chausie mix) do not need special diets, ALL cats deserve a high quality diet. However, I believe that there IS some anecdotal evidence that Chausies might have sensitive digestive systems and need raw diets. I would suggest seeking out some good Chausie breeders or groups to ask about this. Given the cattery you bought from, your kitten isn't JUST a Savannah but the sire is a Chausie mix (I think there is also some Pixiebob as he is polydactyl, not a Chausie trait)...

For the fleas, I would suggest something else. Capstar is a treatment that causes immediate death of all fleas...it is not a preventative so you would then follow that with the Advantage or Revolution or something like that to keep the fleas away...but the Capstar would remove all the ones on your poor kitten right NOW.

I'm not a fan of flea collars especially for kittens that might wish to chew things..they could easily get their jaw around that flea collar and hence be ingesting those chemicals :-(

 

[Patti]

Ugh, I am sorry you and Logan are having to deal with so many issues! Blood in the stool may indicate a GI infection (giardia, tritrichimonas, etc.) or it could be caused by Inflammatory Bowel Disease. However, it could also be caused by constipation. Are his stools otherwise normally formed? Does he ever seem to strain when he is going? I would probably recommend running a diarrhea PCR panel just to be on the safe side, even though I know it's expensive. If that's normal you might try adding a little extra fiber to his diet and seeing if that doesn't help - you can purchase unflavored psyllium pretty much anywhere. As far as a raw diet goes, I know that home preparation is a daunting task for the newbie, however there are commercial preparations you can purchase, even freeze dried options that quickly reconstitute such as Stella and Chewy's, which my cats go bonkers over.

As far as the fleas go, you need to treat the entire house, not just the kitten. There are a lot of products available such as foggers, diatomaceous earth that can be sprinkled into the carpet, etc. I would research some of those options as well. There is another fairly recent thread on this forum discussing flea control which might be of help: http://www.savannahcatchat.com/threads/flea-control.3091/